The Trump administration has borrowed every military term it could find to describe its decision to impose "unprecedented in history" economic sanctions on Iran, in an attempt to justify a shift in strategy from direct military attack to the arena of economy and finance.
اضافة اعلان
In short: it's the same war, but with new tools. Trump gave a martial character to his decisions when he described the announcement as "Economic D-Day." Among the many terms used in the run-up to the Treasury Secretary's announcement of these decisions were "the harshest economic crackdown ever," and "a war of economic isolation of unprecedented severity," aimed at "strangling Iran" and cutting it off from the world. The American Secretary went further, promising not to leave the Iranian regime any room to breathe.
Behind this escalation in tone and description of the sanctions package lies an urgent need on the part of the Trump administration to counter the narrative of its opponents in the Democratic Party — and not a few voices within the president's own party — which holds that the military campaign against Iran failed to achieve its goals, and in fact increased Iran's intransigence and aggressiveness toward its neighbors, and caused an unprecedented global energy crisis that also reached the American market.
There is no doubt that the domestic fallout of the economic war within the United States — represented by the continued rise in fuel prices ahead of a decisive midterm election — is the most prominent motive for the Trump administration to adopt such a step, in the hope of forcing the Iranian regime to accept Trump's terms and pushing it to open the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for lifting the blockade on its ports. Victory that eluded them on the military battlefield would then be achieved through economic warfare instead. With that, the task facing Republican candidates becomes less difficult as they face off against Democrats eager to win a majority, at least in the House of Representatives.
The rule of Iran's Supreme Leader views Trump's sanctions as one last desperate step after his failure to topple the regime or force it to open the Strait of Hormuz — which has effectively proven to be a weapon in Tehran's hands more lethal and effective than a nuclear one.
Can Tehran hold out for two months or less, until the picture becomes clearer after the American midterm elections and Netanyahu's fateful Knesset elections?
There is no single, unified answer in Tehran. Hardliners among the Revolutionary Guard leadership and the Supreme Leader's inner circle believe that withstanding the sanctions is possible and that there is no other choice. The Pezeshkian government does not appear to be on the same wavelength, nor does it have the necessary energy to hold out. It is closer to the street, and sees the catastrophic impact of the war on the economy and on people's daily lives.
The closing off of what remains of smuggling routes for goods and oil sales to the Chinese buyer will double inflation rates and send the rial plunging to depths with no bottom in sight. The Iranian president was clear and decisive days ago when he declared that now was the right time to stop the war, after which there would be no victory to claim. The Revolutionary Guard has long heard such appeals and messages from the president and his allies in government, and has completely ignored them.
Some believe the Revolutionary Guard has no choice, in responding to the suffocating sanctions and breaking their tight grip, but to carry out its threats of igniting a new military confrontation, targeting states allied with Washington in the region on the grounds of their participation in the sanctions imposed on Iran. That would mean pushing the Trump administration into the military confrontation it has no desire whatsoever to return to.
While waiting for the Islamabad–Doha route to reopen, one cannot expect anything but the worst-case scenarios for this confrontation.
