De-escalation in Iran is the most likely scenario

Iranians hold almost all the cards in their ability to cause lethal damage to the international system, which is Trump’s sole responsibility to avoid. For Trump, the imperative to reach a negotiated settlement subsumes all other considerations.

Speculations are rife about the direction in which the one-month-old United States-Israel war on Iran is likely to move in the near term. A US-Israel escalation may seem the most likely scenario, since Tel Aviv still has unfinished business and US President Donald Trump is a manifestly reluctant partner.

The past week has been marked by contrarian trends: Trump appeared unwilling to throw in the towel, while serious efforts to engage Tehran emerged with US Vice-President JD Vance brought into the equation — Vance has been watching from the sidelines, sceptical of the ongoing war. 

Tehran is also showing pragmatism, the best evidence of which is its calibration of the ‘closure’ of the Strait of Hormuz, which was never really closed, but is rather morphing into a new regime similar to the one that prevailed at the mouth of the Baltic Sea historically, where Denmark used to collect Sound Dues at the border between the ocean and the land-locked Black Sea. All foreign ships passing through the strait had to stop in Helsingør, a historic coastal city in northeastern Denmark — renowned as the setting for Shakespeare’s Hamlet — and pay a toll to the Danish Crown. If a ship refused to stop, cannons in Helsingør would open fire and sink it.

According to CNN calculations, Iran could earn more than $800 million a month if its tolling system gains international acceptance. To be sure, monetisation of geography is indicative of zest for life, and who knows, there could be a trade-off.

But at any rate, the past week ended with two devastating Iranian retaliatory strikes near the Dimona nuclear city in Israel, and the IRGC’s missile and drone attack on the Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia, less than 100 kms southeast of Riyadh, leaving at least 15 US troops wounded, including five in serious condition, destroying several planes including an E-3 Sentry AWACS aircraft designed to provide all-weather surveillance, command, control, and communications, which remains crucial for US military operations. (An E-7 Wedgetail, which the Pentagon sees as a replacement for the older E-3 Sentry spy plane, is priced at more than $700 million.) 

The week concluded with three other developments, each more fateful than the others. First, the Washington Post, in an exclusive report, citing several US officials, disclosed that the Department of War is drafting plans for weeks of potential ground operations in Iran, whose objectives could include the seizure of Kharg Island, Iran’s oil export hub, or raids into coastal areas near the Strait of Hormuz. 

According to CBS and CNN reports on Friday, US amphibious assault ships and special forces are also reportedly moving to the region. The US Department of War is deploying a third aircraft carrier group to the US Central Command’s area of responsibility to potentially join combat operations against Iran.

Second, on Saturday, the Houthis of Yemen, who control the capital Sana’a and much of the country’s north and previously disrupted shipping in the Red Sea, jumped into the fray firing missiles at Israel at a sensitive moment when the Strait of Hormuz is effectively closed, forcing Riyadh to redirect its oil trade to the Red Sea, through the 32-km-wide Bab el-Mandeb Strait, which is in the cross wire of the Houthis.

Third, in an ominous development, Iran’s Majlis have begun an urgent review of the country’s continued membership of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). Suffice to say, considering that the only country ever to quit NPT in all these 58 years has been North Korea (in 2003), this development has foreboding overtones.

The bottom line is that in a reality check, as a New York Times report on Monday titled Iran May Be Wounded, But It Still Has a Deadly Bite estimated, “a series of attacks against Israel and Gulf countries in the past several days is only the latest evidence that Iran retains enough missiles and drones to … inflict a punishing cost on its foes, while signalling that … it is still very much in the fight.

“Iran still most likely possesses thousands of Shahed drones and could still have hundreds of ballistic missiles, despite American and Israeli strikes over the past four weeks, one US official said … [who] cautioned that it was impossible to know for sure, as US intelligence on Iranian ability is limited.” 

Indeed, Trump may reluctantly opt for escalation unless Vance pulls a rabbit out of his hat, which of course cannot be entirely ruled out as the latest extension of the deadline for Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz to April 6 suggests. 

For the moment, though, thousands more US troops neared the region; Israel poured more troops into southern Lebanon to fight Hezbollah; Tehran tightened its grip on the Strait of Hormuz; and, sirens wailed over Israel, warning of barrages of incoming Iranian missiles. According to the US magazine Military Watch, quoting Israel’s Haaretz newspaper, eight out of 10 Iranian missiles manage to hit their targets in Israel, evading Tel Aviv’s vaunted system of interception. 

In conclusion, Washington has proposed a 15-point package for Iran, and Tehran has responded with a five-point plan. The US proposal is a rehash of something that Iran rejected a year ago, before the conflict erupted.

Quintessentially, the Iranian proposal (which is separate from the conditions presented during the second round of negotiations in Geneva last month) included five ‘conditions for ending the war’: the acts of ‘aggression’ coming to an end, ensuring the war will not recur, a payment of war damages and reparations, the ending of the war across all fronts involving all resistance groups, and Iranian sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz.

Simply put, there is no meeting of minds. However, the writing on the wall is of critical importance. Importantly, Iranians can wreck the international economy; they can wreck the Gulf states; they can do enormous damage to Israel. Ground invasion of Iran is a foolhardy idea. That said, ironically, isn’t it a fact of life too that the US is, after all, allowing Iran to export oil, which earns it good money? 

There is no question that if there is escalation, the international economy will crash. As Prof John Mearsheimer puts it, there is a giant iceberg out there, and it is going to be Trump’s responsibility to make sure that the Titanic does not hit the iceberg; Trump won’t care to listen to what the Israelis may think because “the stakes here are so enormous.” 

The US deep state, including the Pentagon, is against the operation in Iran. But Mossad convinced Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (and Trump) that the regime change operation would be a neat cut-and-paste 48-hour affair as the decapitation of leadership was accomplished and the State apparatus collapsed.

Evidently, things have turned out differently, and in the ensuing war of attrition, Iranians hold almost all the cards in their ability to cause lethal damage to the international system, which is Trump’s sole responsibility to avoid. Suffice to say, for Trump, the imperative to reach a negotiated settlement subsumes all other considerations.

M K Bhadrakumar is a former diplomat.

(Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.)