Donald Trump promised his base there will be no more “forever wars.” Last Saturday, he just created one.
Pakistan invested much of its prestige trying to broker a lasting ceasefire between the US and Iran. But only the Iranians took the talks seriously. They arrived with expert staff that worked out the details of their proposals.
The Americans did not only field an obviously unqualified team – but also a grossly unprepared one. The sidelights reveal everything. While JD Vance was constantly on the phone with both Trump and Netanyahu, the American president was out watching a boxing match. The next day, he was on the golf course.
For Trump and his team, the Islamabad talks were nothing more than a photo op. They made their impossible demands and expected the Iranian side to accept them in full. Then they flew off without indication of any follow through with the nation they bombed mercilessly without provocation. The Americans appeared consigned to continuing hostilities.
Trump is not running a war. He is running a circus.
Over the weekend, Trump declared that since Iran would not unblock Hormuz, the US Navy will establish its own blockade against ships traversing the narrow strait. The world can only look on, extremely puzzled.
The horror of Iran’s stranglehold on Hormuz is its destructive effects on the global energy supply chain. The longer shipping is constricted, the greater the danger of a global recession.
And what is Trump’s solution? A second layer blockade of shipping that magnifies the problem of broken energy supply chains.
Technically, Trump’s insane strategy is difficult and costly to implement. He will need more warships deployed to enforce his own blockade. That will take months to assemble.
And what will the Americans do when their warships are in place? Will they intercept ships in international waters? Where will they impound them? Will the rest of the world accede to Trump’s buccaneer tactics?
Iran offered a smart retort to the American demand they open the strait. They say they have laid down mines and could not now recover all of them. So there.
In the meantime, all shipping to and from the Persian Gulf will have to use the narrow passageway that hugs the Iranian coastline. They will pay the transit fees Tehran specifies. Ships from countries Iran considers hostile will not be allowed passage.
In addition, any American escalation will likely be met by the closure of Bab el-Mandeb Strait at the mouth of the Red Sea. This will bring the volume of constrained energy shipping to 32 percent of the global total. The pain will simply ripple through the global economy.
Today, we will be enjoying a small rollback in pump prices. The joy will not last, sadly. Oil prices will quickly resume their rise in the aftermath of the failed Islamabad talks.
Unable to convincingly declare victory and walk away from this war, Trump will fall back to the dynamic of escalation. He will probably try to put boots on the ground. But with all the US bases in the Gulf region destroyed by Iranian missiles, the Americans will have no viable launching pad for an invasion. Then, too, the projected invasion will likely be costly in American lives and weaponry. The American public will not accept this.
The temptation for Trump to decide on the use of nuclear weapons against Iran will be stronger. But the penalty for nuclear escalation will be intolerable. Pakistan, even if it sent a military force to Saudi Arabia in fulfillment of its treaty obligations, declared they will nuke Tel Aviv if nuclear weapons are used against Iran. North Korea and Russia have made the same threat. Turkey toys with the idea of invading Israel itself.
We are, indeed, on the brink of World War III. And we have such an incompetent bunch in Washington dancing on the rim of a global apocalypse.
The Gulf states are now learning that hosting US bases on their soil makes them combatants in a war that is not of their own making. We might seriously reflect on that lesson ourselves.
The US is trapped in a narcissistic paradigm. They think their great advantage in military power allows them to dictate terms on every other nation. If all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like nail.
The genius of Iran’s counter-strategy against the US-Israeli invasion lies in its willingness to accept losses while expanding the equation of war. Its asymmetric strategy enables the country to survive – and possibly prevail. For Tehran, geography is a weapon. Its ability to choke the Strait of Hormuz is the equivalent of a thousand nuclear weapons.
Iran will continue to wield its strategic leverage. The longer hostilities persist, however, the more the rest of humanity suffers. This is an unavoidable cost.
Tehran humors us. We are obviously a US ally. But Tehran allows Philippine-flagged vessels to navigate Hormuz. There are no Philippine-flagged vessels in the Persian Gulf.
We are more vulnerable than the others because of our dependence on oil coming from the Middle East. If transit through Hormuz remains constrained – by the Iranian or by the American blockade – the limits on our oil supply will begin to show. We are speaking here of mere weeks.
Life will be much harder when oil begins to be rationed.