By Amin Saikal
Control over the Strait of Hormuz has become the main bone of contention between the US and Iran in their prolonged conflict.
In the face of Tehran’s determination to control the strategic waterway as a critical leverage of deterrence, US President Donald Trump has declared the end of the ceasefire, a renewed blockade of Iranian ports, and a return to war to degrade Iran’s defensive capabilities further and wrest control of the strait.
Trump has also announced a completely nonviable 20% levy on each tanker that passes through the strait – a move to counter Iran’s own plan to impose tolls on commercial ships.
Given this impasse, a potential end to the conflict is nowhere in sight. This will only bring more economic pain to both protagonists, the region and the world.
Why did the ceasefire fall apart?
The irony is that before the US and Israel started attacking Iran on February 28, the Strait of Hormuz was not in dispute. It was open to free shipping, allowing for the daily flow of 20% of the world’s supply of oil and liquified natural gas, exported from the Persian Gulf countries.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) closed the chokepoint as part of its response to the US-Israeli military campaign, causing worldwide energy shortages and threatening a global economic crisis.
Tehran then set up the Persian Gulf Strait Authority to manage the waterway, potentially along with Oman on the southern side of the strait. It also signalled the imposition of a management toll on ships passing through the waterway.
The Trump administration rejected this move, but had no plan on how to deal with it – or end the war. Under increasing economic and political pressure after six weeks of fighting, the administration was forced to resort to a diplomatic resolution.
The 14-point memorandum of understanding that Washington and Tehran signed last month to end the war was vague and open to different interpretations.
But it was relatively clear on two critical issues:
- there would be a 60-day ceasefire across the board, including Israel’s assault on Lebanon, while a negotiated settlement was finalised
- and the Strait of Hormuz would reopen to commercial shipping.
Other points in the agreement were more contentious, such as the status of Iran’s nuclear program, the unfreezing of Iranian assets in the West, and a payment of US$300 billion for Iran’s reconstruction.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was unhappy with the interim agreement and his military has continued its strikes in Lebanon.
And Trump faced opposition, not only from Netanyahu, but also many pro-Israel, Republican supporters in the US who thought the MOU was too favourable to Iran and many Democrats who argued that it fell short of the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement achieved by the Obama administration.
Then, late last week, Iran fired on unauthorised ships going through the strait. The US Central Command responded by firing on Iranian military sites, prompting the IRGC to hit US assets in the region.
Who’s calling the shots?
When the war began, Iran adopted a decentralised military command structure known as the mosaic defence strategy. This allowed IRGC commanders across the country to take retaliatory actions independent of the leadership in Tehran.
The attacks in the past week have exposed the lack of sufficient coordination between the political and military wings of the government. There is also a divide between the moderates in the government who favour a negotiated settlement and the hardliners who want to punish the US and Israel as much as possible for starting the war and killing Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
On the other side, the Trump administration is now pursuing a policy – imposing a toll on ships in the Strait of Hormuz – that runs counter to what it had previously articulated. Just weeks ago, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the strait was an international waterway and must be free of any toll.
Trump has not fully explained how the US would collect these tolls, how much the operation would cost, or how the IRGC would be deterred from targeting ships to prevent their passage.
Nor has he addressed the devastating effect his plan would have on the price of oil, gas and fertilisers, with the potential to cause a worldwide recession.
He’s also said nothing about how long the US would be prepared to maintain its costly massive force deployment in the region.
The Iranian Islamic regime is accustomed to fighting wars of attrition. It fought Iraq for eight years (1980-88), while enduring massive human and economic costs. In the end, neither side won. But Iran did not to lose an inch of its territory and managed to deny Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein – backed at the time by Washington – from claiming any kind of victory.
The danger of Trump’s new plan is that it could make the conflict much longer and worse than it was before, with more widespread consequences. And it is unlikely to serve the US or the world well, geopolitically and economically.
Amin Saikal is Emeritus Professor of Middle Eastern Studies, Australian National University; The University of Western Australia; Victoria University.
JimboXYZ says
They’re bombing civilian infrastructure in the entire region at this point.
PaulT says
Who are [bombing’Jimbo?
Certainly the US is now bombing civilian infrastructure as well as military targets in Iran while various independently controlled IRGC units are retaliating though not co-ordinating with Iran’s central government, which has lost control. So both sides are destroying civilian infrastructure including water treatment (desalination plants). Arguably that is a crime against humanity, a war crimes committed by both sides.
Why is this continuing?
Because unlike Trump, Iran planned ahead, had a strategy so when Israel and the US decapitated Iran’s central government by assassinating it’s leaders the country’s resistance would continue.
But really, the main point is that before February 28th, before the US at Israel’s behest started an unannounced all out war against Iran, the Strait’s of Hormuz were open for free, unrestricted navigation.
And everyone, the Gulf States, European and Asian powers and the American intelligence community knew that a prolonged military assault would result in Iran choking off the Straits of Hormuz to shipping in retaliation.
Everyone except Donald Trump.
Trump and Netanyahu started this war to distract from their own legal and political problems. Unfortunately neither one had a plan or a realistic objectives though Israel probably did want to ‘Take Iran Back To the Stone Age’ but Trump was scared of political fallout and tried to call a halt to the conflict. That failed and now we may face anther ‘forever war’ in the Middle East started by a US president who pledged ‘No More Foreign Wars’ as a keystone of his second term policy.
But this is Trump. Did he lie about this to get elected? Probably. Is his attention span so short that he forgot that promise? Maybe.
After all,Donald Trump is not very stable and this war proves him to he a fool, not the genius he claims to be.
Pogo says
In itself, not much that isn’t already widely known.
However, Professor Saikal possesses information and insights of utmost importance:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kd9-pziLb-M
Is Iran already a nuclear armed country via its brother Pakistan?
https://www.google.com/search?q=Pakistan
EC: File
Al says
In Nam we had a saying kill’em all and let God sort them out. The middle east has been a problem forever and it needs to stop. Mohammed was a murderous pedophile! People didn’t join his religion like they did Christ they were forced into it or murdered for not joining. What a great way to be a leader, religious at that.
PaulT says
Are you kidding Al? Do you even know what happened in Vietnam?
A 20 year US military campaign in which 58,000 American died ampng a total of 3.8 million, the US pulled out having achieved absolutely nothing. The communists took power after the US abandoned the South Vietnamese. Just like the diasterous war in Afghanistan.
Is that whayou want to see in the conflict with Iran.
As for the brutality of Islam’s growth and expansion, do you know nothing about the Christian colonization of the Caribbean as well as Central and, South America. Or of the Atlantic slave trade. Are you unaware of the cruelty of Christian ‘conversin’ if indigenous people over the centuries as they spread their religion as part of their colonization. Or like DeSantis and Trump have you ‘re-written history’ in your own mind to hlank out your ancestor’s sins?.
Dennis C Rathsam says
Thank the Democrates for NAM
Pierre Tristam says
You’re forgetting the Civil War, Dennis. Also, maybe Democrats’ ancestors who lost the Levant during the Crusades, and that Democrat-barbarian blood that felled the Roman Empire? Come on now Dennis, your fantasyland is losing a step.
R.S. says
Well, strictly speaking, I suppose you’re right, Dennis. The Golf of Tonkin Lie happened on Lyndon B. Johnson’s watch; he did ask for expanded military presence in the region, which ultimately did lead to the Vietnam War. However, at first, the nation and Congress closed ranks behind that effort.
R.S. says
If you knew your history, Al, you’d know that Xtianity did the same thingd. I suppose you hadn’t heard about the Crusaders, the Inquisition, the witch burnings, the Outlaw and Excommunication rules, the selling of years off in hell (which raised enough money to built St. Peters in Rome), the Doctrine of Discovery, and the child marriages of “by the grace of god” monarchs? And I suppose you didn’t hear about the conversions of Saxons and Thuringians by the sword of Charlemagne? It’s sad that people suffer under such limited mentalities so as to lose their understanding of what it’s like to be human, all too human. I have lived in Muslim societies and have met selfless and supporting people who I’d trade anytime for limited mentalities as what too often I meet among those valuable Xtians around here. People such as you are the problem, not Vietnamese or Levantines.
PaulT says
Well said RS.
Samuel L. Bronkowitz says
You’ve never been to war.
Skibum says
So I have to ask, Al… is that what it has come down to now for republicans? “Kill’em all and let God sort them out” really worked out well for the U.S. in Nam, didn’t it? That kind of ridiculous thinking would definitely NOT end up working to our benefit in the Middle East either.
The second point I’d like to bring to your attention is that religion in general, regardless of any particular one, has been responsible for more human death and misery throughout the history of the world than any other cause. I have to wonder just how many other religious or other “leaders” have taken a stance like you stated in your comment above, thinking it is preferrable to just kill everyone and let God (or Allah, or whatever deity one believes in) sort it out. Gee, why not kill all mankind on the planet for that matter and let God, or evolution, etc. start all over again?!
That kind of thinking, whether joking or not, is dangerous and serves only to rationalize more and more violence, more and more slaughter for “religious” theology differences or anything else.
Deborah Coffey says
You may have the Prophet Muhammad mixed up with Donald Trump.
Sherry says
@al. . . as usual,your comment is completely ignorant of factual history, and beyond despicable!
Laurel says
Trump so f*ked up it’s not funny. Under normal circumstances, the Republicans would themselves run him out of town.
Atwp says
Trump said he would erase the USA deficit but the deficit is larger now since he took office. I thought he said the war would end soon, that sometime ago, the war is getting worse. I don’t think the war war will end soon, but knowing Trump he will end it just before the Midterms. We will see what happens, I hope the war will continue until he is out of office. The very sad thing is many innocent live are being taken daily. What a bad President. I hope we will go into a a very deep depression under his rule if that happens he will blame other people. I’m not a politician but I will run the country better than what he is doing. Everything he gets involved in becomes a chaotic mess. The war is an unnecessary chaotic mess.