Trump weighs risky bet on Kharg Island in ‘game of chicken’ with Iran

President Trump is weighing a seizure of Iran’s critical oil depot on Kharg Island in a bid to force Tehran’s hand and open the Strait of Hormuz. 

Such a move, which would require U.S. boots on the ground to capture the strategic terminal, would mark a major turning point in a war in which Trump has so far held off on deploying American forces in Iran.

Any ground assault would trigger a major escalation in the conflict, given the island is an economic lifeline for Iran, handling roughly 90 percent of the country’s crude exports. Experts say a U.S. invasion is risky as it would almost certainly lead to more casualties in the war, while unlikely to bring Iran to the table.

“I think that U.S. forces — which I think are very capable of seizing Kharg Island – could be at risk of coming under fire here. It is within the range of certain kinds of weapon systems in Iran, not to mention on the water,” said Clayton Seigle, an energy expert and senior fellow with the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank. 

“Surely our military planners are aware of that and would look to mitigate those threats, but they could come under fire and we could take casualties,” he told The Hill.

At least 13 service members have already died in the conflict, while another 200 have been injured, including 10 severely, according to the Pentagon.

Seigle added that even without control of the island, Iran may be able to outlast the political and economic pain inflicted on global economies and governments amid Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which has led to an energy supply crisis.

“This is all just elements of a giant game of chicken to see who’s gonna outlast the other before conceding on certain terms,” Seigle said. “To make the bet that the rest of the world can outlast the Iranians on this is dubious.”

Iran has closed the Strait of Hormuz by attacking oil tankers in the waterway shortly after the start of the U.S.-Israeli war, now in its third week. The conflict has caused oil costs to spike to over $100 a barrel for the first time in four years and sent gas prices soaring, given that the narrow maritime pathway carries a fifth of the world’s oil.

Trump now has his eyes trained on Kharg, which despite its tiny size — about one third of the size of Manhattan — is an economic lifeline for Iran. The strategic terminal, which sits roughly 20 miles off Iran’s coast, hosts massive storage tanks and pipelines and allows Tehran to transport oil from its vast reserves to global markets.

The island has been on Trump’s mind as far back as 1988.

“They’ve been beating us psychologically, making us look a bunch of fools,” Trump told The Guardian of U.S.-Iran relations at the time. “One bullet shot at one of our men or ships, and I’d do a number on Kharg Island. I’d go in and take it.”

The U.S. has already struck the island in an attempt to force Iran to open the strait, but avoided hitting its oil infrastructure in favor of attacking military targets. 

“We hit Kharg Island, took out every single thing in Kharg Island except one thing — we left the pipes. If we take out the pipes that’s a long time to build. At some point something’s going to happen that’s positive in respect to those pipes,” Trump said Monday at the White House. 

But a takeover or destruction of the island also isn’t likely to change Tehran’s calculus toward the war, according to Robin Mills, a non-resident fellow at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy.

“Their leadership has been killed off one-by-one, right? And all kinds of stuff is being destroyed. That seems to me to be more threatening than having their oil cut off, and yet they keep going,” Mills said. 

What’s more, the Iranians have a separate pipeline which goes outside the Strait of Hormuz, meaning taking Kharg wouldn’t completely cut off Iran’s oil exports.

“Obviously that means less oil on the market and higher prices, which is kind of the opposite of what the U.S. is trying to do,” Mills said, adding that Washington wouldn’t be able seize all the oil from Kharg for itself because the Iranians “would simply turn off the turn off the taps” and not pipe oil to the island. 

What’s more, sending American troops into Iranian territory is largely seen as undesirable by lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, as well as the American public. A few individuals in the GOP have argued that a Kharg takeover doesn’t count as U.S. boots on the ground, creating a carveout to seize the island by framing it as a security mission to cripple the regime’s economy. 

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) late Tuesday said Trump has “no reason” to invade Tehran but urged him to “take” the island.  

“No, we’re not going to evade Iran, there’s no reason to,” Graham said on Fox News. “Kharg Island, 90 percent of their income comes from oil and gas revenue, 100 percent of that revenue generating capabilities on a single island. Mr. President, take Kharg Island, this war is over.”

Earlier the same day, Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Texas) claimed that sending U.S. forces to Kharg Island isn’t considered boots on the ground.

“The island is not, in my opinion, boots on the ground in combat circumstances, it would be to secure the facility,” Sessions said on CNN. 

But with a population of more than 8,000 people, the island presents a host of challenges should it be seized.

“Who’s going to run the place with 8,000 people? You’ve got to do something about that, right? You can’t just land a company of Marines, that’s it. No. You want to continue to hold the place, you’ve got to have a continuous military presence,” said Patrick Clawson, who directs the program on Iran and U.S. policy for The Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

He also pointed to the island’s close location to mainland Iran, so “whoever’s holding the island is going to face some artillery attacks from the mainland.”

Asli Aydintasbas, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., also warned a U.S. invasion could create another open-ended conflict similar to those in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“It’s not certain that Iran would capitulate, even if the United States captured Kharg Island. It is certain that they would fight back, waging some type of a guerrilla war,” she told The Hill.

Asked Tuesday whether he was concerned about committing U.S. forces to a boondoggle in Iran, Trump replied: “I’m really not afraid of that. I’m really not afraid of anything.”

Seigle said one alternative option that could throttle Iranian oil exports from Kharg is simply enacting a naval quarantine, similar to what the U.S. military did in Venezuela this past year. 

“We didn’t put hands on the spigot and the valves. We just put our Navy and Coast Guard to work and said, ‘no ships can load in Venezuela, and no loaded ships can make their way to market, unless we say so.’ We could do that with Iranian shipments. And we could, and probably should do that outside of the range of Iranian weapons,” he said. “That would come at much lower risk of casualties.”

But that avenue comes with its own challenges, according to Mills, who said it could cause Iran to “be even more aggressive in attacking oil infrastructure in the Gulf and trying to stop everybody’s oil production.”

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