THE account of how successful United States President Donald Trump’s war on Iran was, which has been made by Defense Secretary Peter Hegseth and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Dan Caine, in a recent press conference, makes one wonder whether the US should have demanded unconditional surrender from Iran, instead of agreeing to a ceasefire and sit down and talk peace.
The war, it turned out, had three objectives: 1) destroy Iran’s ballistic missile and drone capabilities; 2) destroy the Iranian navy; and 3) destroy Iran’s defense industrial base. Although Trump says the US has already exceeded these objectives, Hegseth and Caine are a bit more modest, putting the rate of success in fulfilling these objectives between 80 and 90 percent. Still, Iran would not have been able to defend itself against Trump’s threat to obliterate its lifeline infrastructures, e.g., power plants. Hence, it was Iran that begged the US for the two-week ceasefire, and Trump acceded purely out of the goodness of his heart.
So intoxicated was Trump with his war adventure that he seemingly allowed Iran to dictate the terms of the ceasefire. The obligation to cease firing appears to fall only on the US. A few hours after the ceasefire was announced, Iran attacked US Gulf allies Israel, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait and Jordan with missiles and drones.
Partner Benjamin Netanyahu showed himself pursuing an objective of his own, that of Greater Israel. While mediator Pakistan insisted that Lebanon was included in the ceasefire agenda, Netanyahu chased Hezbollah operatives in Beirut and killed 3,400 human beings, including, to wide condemnation, 1,600 civilians. Trump’s minion Vice President JD Vance wagged his tail and dutifully echoed Netanyahu in declaring that Lebanon was not part of the ceasefire agreement.
The US forces appear to have succeeded not only in taking command of Iranian seas and airspace, and reducing defense factories to ashes, but also in decimating the leadership, and rank and file of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). There are reports that the IRGC is recruiting children as young as 14 years old and getting foreign mercenaries, terrorists and proxies to man outposts. The IRGC’s manpower shortage problem is reflected in the missing US pilot incident. The IRGC resorted to offering a considerable bounty for information about the location of the pilot. Despite the worsening economic situation of the population, nobody took the bait.
The role of Iranian civilians supporting US forces is overlooked in credits for the recovery of the pilot as in the Hegseth and Caine account. According to an Iranian podcaster about events in Iran (a rara avis in social media because the Islamic Republic shut the internet down), civilians blocked streets to prevent the IRGC capturing the pilot. Civilians sheltered and fed him.
Under Trump’s threat of pulverizing essential infrastructures, Iran agreed to open the Strait of Hormuz completely. Actually, the Iranians had opened the strait to their allies but under the ceasefire agreement the Strait has been opened to all, including the vessels of adversaries the US, Israel and the European Union. But since the announcement a few days ago, so far only four vessels have tried entering the Strait on which some 150 vessels used to pass each day. It was momentarily closed after the Israeli attack on Lebanon and it was reopened upon the behest of the US, demonstrating how fragile the ceasefire agreement is.
A paper presented by the Iranians for use as basis for negotiation on the subject of the Strait calls for the Iranians to have and maintain control over the Strait. In this regard, the Iranians plan to charge a toll fee of some $2 million for each vessel’s passage through the Strait. The State of Oman, which occupies the southern end of the Strait, is reportedly contemplating the same thing. Although there is the ancient precedent of the Portuguese who once occupied Hormuz and charged vessels a toll fee, customary law and Unclos (United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea) regard the Strait as international waters, and passage should be free.
Alas, the US has very little of its energy requirements riding vessels passing the Strait of Hormuz, and Trump’s current occupation with that Strait that’s crucial to almost everyone else, is on his part only just a psychological thing (read: an ego trip). Besides, as many experts have observed, Trump considers international law in general as optional. In negotiating with the Iranians, Trump is not expected to champion this principle governing narrow bodies of water with might and main.
Having caused so much damage to their country and just desired to send it back to the Stone Age, the Americans might approach the negotiations with the wily Iranians with a soft, accommodating heart. There’s a passage in the Hegseth and Caine account about the Iranians who have survived the American and Israeli massacre of their predecessors and now run the Islamic Republic of Iran being viewed by the Americans as a changed regime. The faces are different, yes, but the genomes are the same.
It now seems that the millions of Iranians who marched in protest and demanded a regime change at the end of last year were used as a mere pretext for waging war with Iran. Autocrats to the core, Trump and Netanyahu don’t much care for the future democratic and modern Iran that the protesters envision. Netanyahu gloats that he has succeeded finally to get America going along his lifetime dream: a Greater Israel stretching from the banks of the Nile to the banks of the Euphrates.
But maybe like horses, we should cover our side vision and focus on ahead. What matters most now is to get the hundreds of vessels stranded in the Persian Gulf, in all probability carrying Filipino mariners, moving on and leaving the Strait of Hormuz.
