Can the U.S. and Iran Avoid Going Back to War? |
President Donald Trump blinked on Tuesday and unilaterally extended the Iran War cease-fire, citing the need for more time for peace negotiations to play out and for Iran’s “fractured” regime to get its act together. The U.S. negotiating team, led by Vice President J.D. Vance, had been poised to depart for a second round of direct talks in Islamabad, but though Trump had claimed that Iran has already agreed to all of his demands, it obviously hasn’t. Since the U.S. fired on and seized an Iranian cargo ship last week, Iran has insisted that it won’t attend more peace talks until the U.S. ends its blockade. Trump is meanwhile insisting he won’t lift the blockade until there’s a final agreement to end the war, and he didn’t say how long the cease-fire extension will last. (A U.S. official told Axios that Trump will only wait a few more days.) Nobody knows what will happen next, but Iran fired on multiple ships in the Strait of Hormuz overnight, and the risk of escalation looms large. The fighting is paused but the war isn’t over, and the U.S. and Iran both insist they now have the upper hand. Below is some of the recent commentary and analysis on this precarious new phase of the war and what’s to come.
. What if the worst isn’t over?
The Financial Times’s Gideon Rachman fears the conflict has not yet reached its peak:
The key questions now are: will rising economic pressure force the two sides to reach an agreement at diplomatic warp speed? Or will the difficulty of closing the gap between the Iranian and US positions lead to a breakdown in talks and an escalation of the conflict? Either outcome is possible — but my money is on escalation. If that is right, then the Middle East and the world economy have not yet seen the worst of this crisis.Escalation is likely because both the US and Iran seem to feel that they can force the other side to crack first. US vice-president JD Vance returned home from failed talks with the Iranians in Pakistan on April 12 in an upbeat mood — telling confidants that the US blockade would probably force the Iranians to fold within a few days.But throughout this conflict, the Trump administration has consistently overestimated America’s ability to bend Iran to its will and underestimated the Iranian regime’s resilience. That pattern now threatens to repeat itself.
The key questions now are: will rising economic pressure force the two sides to reach an agreement at diplomatic warp speed? Or will the difficulty of closing the gap between the Iranian and US positions lead to a breakdown in talks and an escalation of the conflict? Either outcome is possible — but my money is on escalation. If that is right, then the Middle East and the world economy have not yet seen the worst of this crisis.
Escalation is likely because both the US and Iran seem to feel that they can force the other side to crack first. US vice-president JD Vance returned home from failed talks with the Iranians in Pakistan on April 12 in an upbeat mood — telling confidants that the US blockade would probably force the Iranians to fold within a few days.
But throughout this conflict, the Trump administration has consistently overestimated America’s ability to bend Iran to its will and underestimated the Iranian regime’s resilience. That pattern now threatens to repeat itself.
If Vance, the administration’s top war skeptic, who is the supposed driving force of the U.S. negotiating effort, really believed the blockade would force Iran’s hand within days, is there anyone in the administration whose view of the conflict is rooted in reality?
As Rachman points out, this risky new “fog of peace” could drag on for a while: “The coming weeks, and perhaps months, are likely to see periods of escalation, mixed with periods of talks — with the two processes sometimes running side by side — as Iran and the US test each other’s will.”
Under those circumstances, the best possible outcome might just be a perpetual uneasy cease-fire for the hot war, but paired with the global damage of an economic cold war — which can definitely get a lot worse.
. You can’t pressure an adversary you don’t understand
INSS analyst and Iran expert Danny Citrinowicz is still waiting for some sign that Trump and his advisors have any real sense of who they are dealing with, or how their current tactics won’t have any influence on the now even more hardline regime:
The persistent belief that a single decisive move like a naval blockade, strikes on critical infrastructure, or even the targeted killing of senior officials, could fundamentally change Tehran’s behavior reflects a profound misreading of the system. This point cannot be stressed enough: when faced with a choice between conceding to U.S. demands or escalating a confrontation it believes it can manage and even win, Iran’s decision is not difficult to predict. It will not capitulate. There is no scenario in which one dramatic move forces the Iranian regime to raise a white flag. Not........