The fundamental question is not whether Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's regime was a malign force in the world. On that point, the evidence accumulated over four decades is overwhelming. The question Australia must answer honestly in the days ahead is whether endorsing a military strike of this magnitude, without prior consultation and without a clear legal framework, serves this country's long-term interests or merely its immediate alliance obligations.
In the early hours of Saturday 28 February, Australian time, the United States and Israel launched what the Pentagon has named Operation Epic Fury: a joint assault on Iran combining US Tomahawk missiles, HIMARS launchers, drones and Israeli fighter jets, targeting the leadership and military infrastructure of the Iranian state. The operation targeted key officials, military commanders, and facilities, and included the assassination of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Iranian state media confirmed Khamenei's death, aged 86, in strikes targeting his office in Tehran.
Trump announced the action was taken after Iran rejected "every opportunity to renounce their nuclear ambitions", urging the Iranian people to rise up against their government. Speaking from his Mar-a-Lago property in Florida, the President told CNBC the operation was "ahead of schedule" and declared that 48 Iranian leaders had been killed. CBS News reported that an intelligence source told the network that around 40 Iranian officials had been killed, though it was not clear whether they were in one location or multiple locations.
Three US soldiers were killed in action and five seriously wounded after Iranian attacks throughout the Middle East, US Central Command confirmed. Iran's retaliation was swift and broad. Iran fired missiles at Israel and US military bases, with governments in Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates all reporting that they had been targeted. Iran also announced it was closing the strategic Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway for Gulf oil exports.
That last move carries direct consequences for Australia and for every economy connected to Asian energy markets. The Strait of Hormuz handles about a quarter of the world's seaborne oil trade. A prolonged closure of the strait could tip the global economy into a recession. The Swiss bank Lombard Odier estimates that a temporary spike in oil prices to $100 per barrel, or beyond, is plausible, and global LNG prices would also be affected if Iran moves to block the strait. For Australian households still grappling with the residue of a two-year inflation surge, that is not an abstract geopolitical scenario. It is a price at the bowser.
Canberra's Wager
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, together with Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles and Foreign Minister Penny Wong, released a joint statement highlighting Australia's concern over the Iranian regime's actions and its impact on global security. Albanese did not equivocate. He said Khamenei "will not be mourned", following confirmation of his death in the strikes. In a statement on X, he said Australia "supports the United States acting to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and to prevent Iran continuing to threaten international peace and security".
The government's domestic case rests on solid ground. Wong and Albanese cited Iran's longstanding nuclear ambitions and its role in orchestrating attacks on Australian soil, including the 2024 firebombing of the Adass Israel synagogue in Melbourne, as justification for supporting preventative action. In response to those attacks, Australia had already expelled Iran's ambassador, suspended operations at its Tehran embassy, and listed the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a state sponsor of terrorism. The government's position is not, in other words, a sudden reversal. It is the logical end point of a diplomatic deterioration that has been underway for two years.
But there is a gap in the argument that deserves examination. Foreign Minister Wong confirmed Australia had no advance notice of the US-Israeli strikes. When pressed on the specific legal basis for the military strikes, both Wong and Albanese deferred to the United States and Israel, with Wong stating: "I will leave it for the United States and Israel to speak of the legal basis for the attacks." That is an uncomfortable position for a country that routinely frames its foreign policy around the rules-based international order.
The Counter-Argument Deserves Serious Consideration
Professor Ben Saul, a United Nations special rapporteur and expert at the University of Sydney, stated that the attacks represent a clear breach of the UN Charter's prohibition on the use of force, emphasising that supporting such actions is profoundly damaging for nations like Australia, which traditionally advocate for a rules-based system. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned that the US-Israeli strikes on Iran risk "igniting a chain of events that nobody can control" in one of the world's most volatile regions.
Criticism has mounted against Washington for taking part in the attacks while still engaged in nuclear negotiations with Tehran. In the weeks before the 2026 attack, Iran and the US had been in indirect nuclear negotiations mediated by Oman, and a second round of nuclear talks had been scheduled to be held in Geneva. France's Emmanuel Macron said plainly that "no one can think that the questions of Iran's nuclear program, ballistic activity, regional destabilisation will be settled by strikes alone." That is not a fringe view; it is the considered position of one of Australia's closest European partners.
At home, internal dissent within the Labor party has surfaced, with the Labor Against War group, led by former senator Doug Cameron as patron, lambasting the government's stance, with Cameron stating that "Albanese's backing of Israeli and US attacks on Iran shows that we are completely devoid of acting independently." Greens senator David Shoebridge went further, arguing that if it is true the government had no prior notice of the US attack, then Australia is being "treated contemptuously by its major ally".
The Strategic Calculus
Strip away the talking points and what remains is a genuine dilemma for a middle power like Australia. The AUKUS partnership, the depth of intelligence-sharing arrangements under Five Eyes, and Australia's structural dependence on US extended deterrence all create powerful gravitational pull toward Washington's position. A government that withheld support from a major US military operation in the Indo-Pacific era would pay a steep credibility price.
At the same time, experts warn that Australia's alignment with the US on this issue carries significant long-term consequences, with Professor Saul arguing that middle powers have a crucial role in upholding international norms by raising the political cost for superpowers that violate them. The UN Charter framework that Australia helped build after 1945 does not enforce itself through goodwill; it requires states with credibility and standing to push back when norms are tested.
The Smartraveller portal was updated to its highest alert level: "Do Not Travel" for Iran and Iraq, and "Reconsider Your Need to Travel" for the wider Gulf region, including the UAE, Qatar, and Jordan. Australians in the region face immediate, practical danger. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is urging anyone requiring urgent consular assistance to contact the Consular Emergency Centre around the clock.
History will judge this moment by whether the operation's architects had a coherent plan for the day after the strikes. The Islamic Republic is an ideological system with a multi-layered elite and base of support. Iran's top security official, Ali Larijani, announced a temporary leadership council and warned that any secessionist groups attempting to take action would face a harsh response. The regime, decapitated but not dissolved, has every strategic incentive to make the cost of this intervention as high as possible for the United States and its partners.
Reasonable people can disagree about whether the threat posed by a nuclear-armed Iran justified this operation. The Iranian regime's record, from its proxy violence across the Middle East to its attacks on Australian soil, provides genuine grounds for arguing that the status quo was untenable. But endorsing the outcome is not the same as endorsing the method, and Australia owes its public a clearer account of where this government believes the limits of pre-emptive military action actually lie. Backing an ally is not a substitute for a foreign policy. The bill for this week will take years to calculate, and not all of it will be paid in Tehran.