Trump says he won. Iran says it's winning. Can both be right?
Iran Believes It’s Winning
The Wall Street Journal reports Iran Believes It’s Winning—and Wants a Steep Price to End the War:
Three weeks into the war, the Iranian regime is signaling that it believes it is winning and has the power to impose a settlement on Washington that entrenches Tehran’s dominance of Middle East energy resources for decades to come.
This attitude may prove to be a dangerous misreading of President Trump’s determination, or of Israel’s capacity to inflict strategic blows on the Islamic Republic’s surviving leadership and military capabilities.
Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have given mixed signals on how long the war would go on, as they try to talk markets down and keep Tehran guessing. Netanyahu said Thursday that the war would end “a lot faster than people think.” Trump said this week the U.S. would wrap up the conflict in the “near future” even as the Pentagon dispatched thousands of additional Marines to the Middle East.
The problem is, Iran also has a say in when the guns fall silent—and, for now, it seems to think time works to its benefit.
Despite optimistic U.S. and Israeli pronouncements about destroying launchers and missile stocks, Iran has retained the ability to fire dozens of ballistic missiles, and many more drones, every day across the Middle East.
Instead of declining, the rate of fire actually picked up in recent days compared with 10 days ago. Iranian strikes inflicted catastrophic damage this week on key energy installations in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates—while Iran’s own oil exports kept booming.
Shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, the Persian Gulf’s chokepoint, remains only possible with Iranian permission. Surging oil and gas prices, meanwhile, are exacting growing pain on economies worldwide—and putting pressure on Trump to end the war that he began in expectation of swift victory on Feb. 28.
“The Iranians aren’t ready to end the war because they have learned an important lesson: They can, comparatively easily and cheaply, cause a lot of damage and disruption. They now want the whole world to learn that lesson, too,” said Dina Esfandiary, an analyst on Iran and author of a book on Iran’s foreign relations.
Seeing its leverage, Tehran has pledged that it will agree to a cease-fire only if Washington and the Gulf states pay a steep price. The spokesman of the Iranian Parliament’s foreign affairs and defense committee, Ebrahim Rezaei, said after Friday’s meeting with military commanders that any talks with the U.S. are off the agenda as Tehran “focuses on punishing the aggressors.” Other Iranian leaders have been just as triumphalist, with Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi describing Iran as another Vietnam for the U.S.
“This hubris is dangerous because they are not smart enough to understand that President Trump will never let them win. They don’t understand how far he’s willing to go,” said Jason Greenblatt, who served as the White House special envoy for the Middle East in the first Trump administration. “This can come at a huge cost, but the cost of not taking care of the problem will be many times more expensive over many, many years.”
Demands voiced by Iranian leaders in recent days as conditions for ending the war include massive reparations from the U.S. and its allies and the expulsion of American military forces from the region. They have also called for transforming the Strait of Hormuz—an international waterway where free navigation is guaranteed under international law—into an Iranian toll booth controlling one-third of the world’s shipborne crude oil.
Hubris by Iran, US, or Both?
It’s quite the irony for the administration or US analysts to be talking about Iranian hubris. Trump thought this would be a cakewalk, over in a few days.
Trump bragged six times that the war was over already. The war is not over. It’s been ongoing for over three weeks now. And after bragging that the US and Israel destroyed all of Iran’s missile sites, Iran has stepped up missile attacks.
It’s important to understand the war would not be over even if Trump declared the end of the war tomorrow. The war will be over only when both sides say it’s over.
Iran’s demand are not realistic, of course. But they are no more unreasonable than Trump’s ridiculous demands on day one for Iran to surrender and Trump having a say in picking Iran’s new leader.
In retrospect, Iran’s demands are less unreasonable than what Trump stated.
What’s Iran’s Real Game?
I believe the near-term goal is to hang on long enough so Republicans get clobbered in the Midterm elections.
That is very likely. Republican loss of the House is nearly certain.
The betting markets have the Senate at roughly 50-50. That’s my take too, for now. But if there’s a recession, or if inflation gets much worse, I think we will see a massive Democrat sweep.
Meanwhile, as long as both sides have demands the other side cannot accept, the war will go on.
Militarily, time may be on the US side, barring another Afghanistan or Vietnam boots on the ground setup. Pressure will certainly be on Trump to declare “victory” by whatever measure he wants.
However, politically and economically (think deficit spending), time is definitely on Iran’s side.
This was a stupid war for Trump to start. Trump will pay a huge political price. The US and the world will pay a huge economic price.
It may take a decade to fully restore all of the damaged facilities. And it’s not just the war. Nothing much has gone right for Trump. Tariffs, inflation, and a disastrous deportation policy have all been disasters.
Yet, Trump has bragged incessantly, about everything. Hubris all the way.
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