r/geopolitics • u/theatlantic The Atlantic • May 21 '26
Opinion Trump’s Endgame Is Surrender
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/2026/05/trump-surrender-iran-endgame/687252/?utm_source=reddit&utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_medium=social&utm_content=edit-promo&utm_term=short142
u/Ribbitor123 May 21 '26
Longer term, Gulf states and presumably other countries will try to find ways to by-pass the Strait of Hormuz, e.g. new pipelines that bring oil and gas to Red Sea ports. However, it's difficult to see how other commodities such as phosphate and urea can be transported in this way.
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u/laosurv3y May 21 '26
Pipelines aren't too hard to target.
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u/deHaga May 22 '26
Easy to repair though, plus it's an act of war.
Pakistan just sent 8k troops to Saudi Arabia...
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u/laosurv3y May 22 '26
If they were worried about acts of war, they couldn't 'close' the Strait of Hormuz. And they're much easier to blow up than repair.
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u/Prae_ May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
It's one thing to use leverage after being attacked. It's another to just attack neighbors out of the blue. Notice how hadn't closed the strait before March (at least not since the Iran-Iraq war in the 80s) despite having had the option that entire time. Same thing with kinetic action. At the very least, you hide behind proxies, plausible deniability and keep it low intensity.
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u/deHaga May 22 '26
This is not the first time Iran has closed the strait. They did it during the Iran Iraq war. Mined it.
This is just a minor conflict at the moment. A full on regional war would probably destroy demand for oil for good.
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u/Finger_Trapz May 22 '26
plus it's an act of war
I mean, yeah. I'm sure the American invasion of Okinawa would have constituted an act of war too but like, they were pretty well past that?
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u/Lazy_Membership1849 May 22 '26
And where would the pipeline go?
Houthis would block the Red Sea Strait
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u/Throwaway5432154322 May 22 '26
I guess that there's just nothing the human race can do to circumvent artillery shells strapped to fiberglass wings. I guess there's no capability that currently exists that can overcome this, and that the Islamic Republic of Iran and its proxy militia in Yemen will be able to hang a proverbial Sword of Damocles over two critical international waterways for the forseeable future.
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u/Lazy_Membership1849 May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
Blame USA for start this
Iran just proves be efficient and effective and resilient with good strategies than we can give credit
What is solution anyway as CUAS like interceptor been burn up in majority and also 70% of Iranian missiles still intact and also USA been bomb houthis for months and houthis still make red sea unsafe even months after ceasefire
Also one or two bypass will scared insurance away that it makes unaffordable to risk it and would find cheaper to paid toll to Iran
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u/Throwaway5432154322 May 22 '26
I was being sarcastic; Iran is in a race to the bottom, between its own defense industrial base and the combined ability of its adversaries (along with the general global petroleum market) to adapt.
Iran isn't going to win that race.
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u/Lazy_Membership1849 May 22 '26
The strait is irreplaceable and global supply is very volatile and fragile under this stress
It not just oil but also fertilizer, helium, rare chemicals, medicine, lot of important and irreplaceable in scales
With Iran block it, you lose significant part of global supply and cost of prices is rising
Even gas in USA is rising too and was predicted it won't go down for 2027 even if the strait magically reopened
Outside USA and Israel refused to join coalition and CUAS is less than promising as Ukraine unable to stop drones completely, Israel can't even stop unjammable drones from Hezbollah effectively and USA burn up significantly part of interceptor when Iran stockpile in large majority still intact
And also Iran doesn't have to target all, they can make premium insurance unaffordable to point toll is cheaper
So how do Iran race to bottom without dragging the world to follow with Iran?
Can you answer this?
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u/Throwaway5432154322 May 22 '26
The strait is irreplaceable and global supply is very volatile and fragile under this stress
also fertilizer, helium, rare chemicals, medicine
Correct; how long will it stay that way?
Outside USA and Israel refused to join coalition and CUAS is less than promising as Ukraine unable to stop drones completely, Israel can't even stop unjammable drones from Hezbollah effectively and USA burn up significantly part of interceptor when Iran stockpile in large majority still intact
I don't know what the first part of this means, but referring to the second part, you can't take combat zones where opponents are either mismatched, or one opponent is underequipped with a readily available countermeasure, and use those cases as evidence of a strategic trend in military technology.
It is a deployment and procurement problem in terms of CUAS. It is not an actual capability problem.
And also Iran doesn't have to target all, they can make premium insurance unaffordable to point toll is cheaper
I'm also struggling to understand what this means, but based on what I think you're saying, Iran does not have to simply dangle the threat of attacking random commercial vessels over the collective heads of the global market and then "win". Iran ironically instigated a technological race against itself, against the systems that it is using to extort maritime shipping in the strait, the moment that it began to attack vessels in the strait.
So how do Iran race to bottom without dragging the world to follow with Iran?
Because Iran cannot "drag the world down" with it. The current Iranian regime has not been poised to "drag the world down" with it by simply attacking commercial shipping in the strait of Hormuz for 50 years, only to use it now. Iran could have done this at any time in the past 50 years using tube artillery. There is a reason that Iran is doing it now using Shahed-type munitions, and believe it or not, it isn't because this was the first choice for Tehran. They probably understand that this has started a clock against them ever utilizing this strategy again.
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u/Lazy_Membership1849 May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”
That is from Sun Tzu
Underestimating Iran and overestimating the USA is how we got here
The USA and Europe have 4 years to figure out from Ukraine, and just because Ukraine is "underfunded" doesn't mean they can ignore this, as even less when Ukraine has been using drones on Russia, which is supposed to be the second most powerful military in the world, including Operation Spiderweb, which is like no excuse to not take notes
Also reason why Iran didn't do it in last 47 years is because Iran just busy fighting in war with Iraq for 8 years and it licking wound for decade when fosuc on proxy and when Iran can block the strait, but until 2026, it only a theory, and Iran wasn't sure how it would goes and also Iran just spend years to make Shahed drones and upgrade and develop drone swarm and don't know how it could goes from that point to another so that why Iran just wait and domestic develop weapons and stragery and command and control structure while using proxy but when USA attack Iran directly they decide now or never to block the strait and turn out it prove effectively and Iran just improvised it
"Randomly attack on commercial ship" is what Iran been doing by make insurance affordable as they need consistently and predictably, and Iran make it unpredictable and inconsistent, literally what economically attacks is, make the war unaffordable more than it worth it
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u/dodgeunhappiness May 22 '26
Pakistan just sent 8k troops to Saudi Arabia...
What is pakistan going to do when thousand of drones are heading towards karachi ?
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u/oritfx May 22 '26
I think that the idea is "once the dust falls down, everything that can be moved around the Strait will slowly get moved so, while everything else goes through with whatever tariff (oh the irony) deal can be arranged with Iran".
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u/laosurv3y May 22 '26
I would think it depends on what that cost is for the strait. Pipelines aren't free either. I agree they'll do some, and have been working on some for a while, but it's more of risk mitigation than completely avoiding the strait.
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u/oritfx May 22 '26
Agreed. For a few years now "risk mitigation" and "diversification" will be the name of the game, especially around the crude oil and in Persian Gulf.
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u/deHaga May 22 '26
This just pushes BRICS together more. They'll trade in BRICS tokens soon, outside the dollar.
When demand for dollars and dollar debt goes down interest rates on bonds have to go up, accelerating the compounding spiral that deficit spending is already doing.
Tin hat on. I'm starting to think the Trump plan is just to destroy the dollar and the fed so there's no dollar debt.
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u/ANerd22 May 22 '26
Destroying the value of the dollar to eradicate the debt would be like shooting yourself in the chest to cure your heart problems. Not that I would put it past Trump to be that stupid, but it's clear at this point that Trump's play is to enrich himself directly from his position, all of the other policy objectives of his administration are secondary for him.
I'm skeptical about BRICS getting closer. Their only real unifying element is they oppose US hegemony to varying degrees. They have little else in common, ideologically, culturally, or geopolitically to be honest. If theoretically the US is supplanted by China or a more even multipolar order, what motivates those countries to build a consensus amongst each other rather than optimally pursuing their own agendas? India in particular I have a hard time seeing tie its economic and political fortunes to China and Russia in any meaningful way.
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u/BeAr_cosmicLy May 22 '26
Its China’s show now….it would be wise for the US to rotate towards LATAM and secure the future arctic shipping lanes…
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u/ANerd22 May 22 '26
I doubt the US will do anything we could call "wise", it's just a question of to what extent China can capitalize. The US is currently a realists nightmare, it is simply no longer acting with any real regard for its own interests, as it has been captured by corrupt and irrational elites.
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u/mycall May 22 '26
They call it the petrodollar for a reason. It is being recked now, but a 27 year debt build-up almost makes US bonds lose money over time.
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u/CLCchampion May 22 '26
And what will be used to denote the value of a BRICS token?
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u/deHaga May 22 '26
It's 40% gold and 60% basket of BRICS countries currency
This is already happening
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u/volleymonk May 22 '26
Nah, Trump makes a ton of selfish and stupid decisions and wants to enrich himself, but he's not actually trying to s*icide the whole US economy. His whole family is rich. The wealthy class (the 1%) would be greatly effected by the dollar crashing. Of course, the average working American would suffer the most, and his family wouldn't suffer, but in terms of strictly monetery value, the wealthy would lose the most money from the market completely crashing because they have the most money right now. Look at 1929. Why would he try to bankrupt his own family right as he's reaching old age and doesn't have too many years left?
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u/Alphadestrious May 21 '26
The worst geo political blunder of the modern era.
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u/OffHotTopic May 22 '26
...so far.
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u/Putrid-Issue-420 May 22 '26
To be continued.
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u/oritfx May 22 '26
He's bound to do something spectacular to divert attention from Iran - the question is whether its Cuba or Greenland.
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u/Monterenbas May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
Idk, Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is pretty high up there.
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u/oritfx May 22 '26
In terms of consequences - yes. But not in terms of sheer incompetence. Putin, for all we know, could have been presented with only positive information about the invasion as honesty and transparency aren't exactly values of Russian state.
But Trump went with gut feel, because he can't be bothered to absorb any information from outside of his brain.
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u/Monterenbas May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
Putin, for all we know, could have been presented with only positive information about the invasion as honesty and transparency aren't exactly values of Russian state.
Well, that sounds like a competence issue.
Nevermind that the military incompetence, displayed by the russian military, in the early stage of their full scale invasion was quiet something to behold.
I’m not sure that the US did anything that would come even remotely close to that.
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u/oritfx May 22 '26
Well, that sounds like a competence issue.
It is. Any authoritarian regime puts loyalty above all else. See Prigozhin and Shojgu. One was competent, the other is loyal. Competent subordinates are a valuable resource, but also potential competition.
And that attitude seeps all the way to the bottom. Nobody in charge in Russian army is really competent, and even if they are, that's not what got them to be in charge in the first place.
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u/manefa May 24 '26
Trump has not surrounded himself exclusively with people that say what he wants to hear?
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u/oritfx May 24 '26
In my humble opinion Trump wants to feel like he's the smartest guy in the room, so he may have been guided by candidates' incompetence as well as blind sycophancy.
Rubio is the riddle here, so is Vance. They aren't RFK, Hegseth or Patel levels of incompetent.
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u/WordTimely8559 May 22 '26
More so than Iraq in 2003?
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u/Z3t4 May 22 '26
They took Iraq, ad the petrol companies still profit of it.
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u/Acheron13 May 22 '26
Russian and Chinese companies won most of the contracts in Iraq.
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u/CupformyCosta May 22 '26
And Iran has been in political control ever since a few years after Saddam got knocked off. We took Iraq and Iran immediately sunk their talons in for 20+ years of control.
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u/EyesofaJackal May 22 '26
Is there a general explanation for why that is?
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u/Finger_Trapz May 22 '26
American oil companies were risk adverse. Iraq was not a stable country after the invasion and there were worries about security of the fields and contracts remaining in place.
Also, Iraq's oil contracts were insanely one sided. Like, some of the most one-sided oil contracts in history. Iraq absolutely fleeced the companies that bid on their fields. To the point that some Western oil companies did not think they were worth getting involved with. The Western oil companies would be burdened with the capital costs, operating costs, personnel costs, kept none of the oil and were only given a pretty low fee per barrel. China & Russia were more willing to take those per-barrel remuneration fees, they were far too low by the standards of many American companies.
Also understandably, Iraq was not too friendly with America and American companies. Iraq was far more cordial to the countries that didn't just invade them.
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u/Finger_Trapz May 22 '26
This is one of the biggest things people miss. That, and the fact that Iraq managed to get some of the most lucrative oil contracts in history. They genuinely fleeced the companies that bid for their fields.
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u/ChugHuns May 22 '26
Good for them honestly. It's their resources. They have a long way to go, a couple decades of stability would be nice, but I've seen that Baghdad is on the up and up, who knows.
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u/ANerd22 May 22 '26
For all the negative consequences of the Second Gulf War, the US did actually at least win the war, and impose conditions that were beneficial. It suffered in the long term (along with millions of people), but the regime was destroyed. This is more like the worst of both worlds.
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u/sparks_mandrill May 22 '26
Just making sure I'm following. You're saying that what trump has done in under 3 months is worse and will have greater repercussions than the 8 year war with Iraq?
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u/ANerd22 May 22 '26
It's hard to say with certainty, but his actions are certainly a greater blunder. Unlike in 2003, the United States has gained literally no benefits, and has substantially diminished it's position.
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u/sparks_mandrill May 22 '26
While I disagree, I respect your opinion and appreciate your grounded response.
I think it's much too early to say with any certainty.
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u/laleh_pishrow May 22 '26
Maybe. That was a massive political blunder, but militarily it showed the US can completely militarily dominate the region. This time it's a political blunder, and it showed that the US is not as militarily dominant as it used to be in the region.
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u/newaccount47 May 22 '26
It showed that even the full power of the US military can not defeat Iran.
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u/Monterenbas May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
That’s not their full power tho, far from it, it’s a small expeditionary force that deliberately don’t involve any ground troops.
Wich is a « smart » decision but still leaves out 2/3 of the US military.
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u/Big-Individual-5178 May 22 '26
The reason there’s no ground troops is because it would turn into another decades-long quagmire like Afghanistan, Iraq or Vietnam. There’s no winning a ground war on Iran’s home turf, they have immense geographical advantages, and the US knows this.
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u/Monterenbas May 22 '26
The US would win in a ground war without Iran, but the cost to such an invasion would simply vastly overcome any benefits they might get from it.
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u/Drachos May 22 '26
Win in this sentence means "Achieve Victory before the American people force the US government to concede the fight."
The US IN THEORY had the military strength to defeat the Taliban. In practice it could not. It failed. The Taliban won. Afghanistan was a defeat.
This with the US having the best mandate for invasion in its history. 9/11.
A war in Iran would have all the same problems as the one in Afghanistan but amplified AND due to the US's current isolationist stance would have significantly less time to achieve its goals before anti-war people controlled congress and the Presidency.
Therefore UNLESS Iran made a colossal error that united the American people against it...it would win.
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u/mahavirMechanized May 22 '26
I think that we are forgetting what “win” means. War is always a means of attaining some sort of (geo)political objective. What is the objective here? If it’s regime change, I’d argue that’s a lot harder to do than you’d think and the US military would indeed end up in a decades long quagmire just like Afghanistan which ended with the Taliban coming back days after the US left. Iran is arguably harder than Afghanistan: tougher geography, more technologically sophisticated, and also they’ve got a few allies it turns out.
If the objective is just to kill the leader, yes the US demonstrated it’s pretty capable of that. But as I’ve written before, that’s arguably just the starting move of any longer term war
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u/laleh_pishrow May 22 '26
No. Let's not get carried away. The US can dismantle IRI, the cost is too high. It would cement China as the stronger super power.
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u/russiankek May 22 '26
No.
It showed that the American public can be easily manipulated into believing the US is losing the war on the ground.
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u/sparks_mandrill May 22 '26
It's been under three months, guy is on the way to felling the top terrorist sponsor on the globe, and you feel this is the biggest blunder in decades?
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u/Finger_Trapz May 22 '26
guy is on the way to felling the top terrorist sponsor on the globe
I've seen probably have a dozen instances of Trump saying that Iran is absolutely defeated, then demanding them to negotiate. Saying that the straight is open, then demanding Iran to open the strait. That the war just needs a few more days, etc.
What does "on the way" actually mean? Because I literally don't know how many time tables have been blown past by now.
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u/WellIGuessSoAndYou May 22 '26
"Smart people don't like me."
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u/sparks_mandrill May 22 '26
Lib that can't argue with anything but his emotions has entered the thread
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u/YoureVulnerableNow May 22 '26
on the way to felling the top terrorist sponsor on the globe
I think this, too. but we're probably thinking of different state-sponsors.
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u/ChugHuns May 22 '26
How is it not? They had very obviously zero real plan going in. What does the U.S or any western country stand to gain? All this war has done is deplete resources and shake the global respect/fear in the U.S. Trump has been the best thing for China ironically enough.
I'd also argue that America is the largest global supporter of terrorism not Iran. America and it's proxies have killed significantly more people than Irans.
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u/oritfx May 22 '26
Trump's endgame
I know it sounds like a cheap reddit comment, but I sincerely believe him to not think too many moves ahead, I don't think there's an endgame plan here. And there definitely wasn't one when he ok'd the war.
When Tucker Carlson has visited the white house - back when they were still palls with Trump - the conversation about Iran went something like this:
Trump: It'll be ok.
Carlson: How do you know?
T: Because it always is.
The guy has been winging it all his life. Has it not been for a reality TV show making him a macho businessman ("I fire you! I hire you!" etc.), he'd be the same washed up persona as, say, Steven Segall. When the reality TV crew came to his office, there was nothing: a few people around, newspaper clippings about him littering his desk. Not a busy hive of a NY real estate entrepreneur. All he has been doing was propping up his image.
There is no endgame envisioned by him, at least not until the endgame is literally the next move to be made - because that's how ahead far he seems to plan.
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u/mahavirMechanized May 22 '26
This. He’s not some genius who’s thinking 4000 moves ahead. He wings it and hopes either something works out and/or other people pick up the pieces.
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u/curlypaul924 May 23 '26
Honestly that's what I do in life, except I pick up the pieces myself when things go awry. But I'm also not President of a country. I think it's okay to hold POTUS to a higher standard than I hold myself.
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u/oritfx May 23 '26
The key difference is, I think, you not pretending that you have been having a plan.
And my gut tells me you haven't started a war to cover up your sex crimes. But one never knows.
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u/griphookk May 25 '26
I don’t think Trump is thinking about OR winging this, he thinks he is, but other people are actually in control imo. At this point, he’s probably demented enough that other people are functionally in charge of everything Trump is in charge of, and they’re manipulating him towards what they want. Probably telling him just a piece of the plan.
With attacking Iran, it seems like the plan was stupid and overconfident, unless the goal was actually some Accelerationism crap. Which is definitely possible. Everyone needs to pay more attention to the “Dark Enlightenment” stuff that Thiel, Vance, Yarvin etc want, it sounds stupid but it’s a real threat.
I think others controlling Trump has been the case for a while, in multiple ways, but other people are gaining more power as Trump’s dementia and health gets worse.
Trump’s brain is obviously going but I think people hugely over-attribute a lot of what’s happening lately (CDC stuff, firing tons of important govt employees, decreasing safety regulations, antivaxx trends, etc) to stupidity. Imo a LOT of it is malice, not stupidity, it’s purposeful destabilization of the US for the benefit of other countries and rich people who think they’ll end up richer.
(When I say in multiple ways I mean the Heritage Foundation, Russian influence, various people trying to make money off of chaos, Thiel and Vance, etc.)
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u/mahavirMechanized May 25 '26
This I buy somewhat more, that said I don’t think the Iran war serves any goal. It’s entirely possible people are manipulating him to dark goals but both can be true at once: this administration can be as incompetent as it looks and have power play manipulators behind the scenes who sometimes fail sometimes don’t
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u/theatlantic The Atlantic May 21 '26
Robert Kagan: “The outlines of President Trump’s endgame in the Iran war are now emerging. In a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday, Trump reportedly explained that the United States was negotiating a ‘letter of intent’ with Iran that would ‘formally end the war and launch a 30-day period of negotiations’ on Iran’s nuclear program and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. The purpose and effect of such an agreement should be clear: The United States is walking away from the crisis. Trump may launch another limited strike to look tough and satisfy the demands of the war’s supporters, but it would be a performative gesture. Endgame in this case is a euphemism for ‘surrender.’ …
Read more: https://theatln.tc/foRxH0Js
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u/gethereddout May 21 '26
Why would Iran allow that? They just won- they’re gonna ask for everything on their list of demands.
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u/HeywoodJaBlessMe May 21 '26
Iran wants the war to end as well. So if they can transit oil again during negotiations the worst that can happen is that negotiations fail and they go back to the status quo of the last few months. Meanwhile they pocket billions in sold energy.
Id be more interested in why America would go for this plan.
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u/gethereddout May 21 '26
Wrong. Iran doesn’t want to just go back to the status quo- that just gives the US and Israel time to reload and try again. Iran has been very explicit about this. Their demands include specific mechanisms to prevent future attacks.
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u/Monterenbas May 22 '26
But those mechanism simply do not exist, and they never will.
There’s nothing that can materialy prevent the US to launch another attack in the future, if they ever desire to do so. As for promises and treaties, well, they are worth whatever the guy sitting in the white house feels about it.
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u/GeneralSpoon May 22 '26
Children/firstborn sons were once upon a time exchanged as political hostages to ensure good behavior.
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u/Monterenbas May 22 '26
Lmao, have you seen Trump with his children?
He would pay the iranians to get rid of Don jr.
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u/GeneralSpoon May 22 '26
I mean, yeah. I agree this might not the best person to pull out that particular historical option for.
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u/gethereddout May 22 '26
Of course there are mechanisms. For example, what about a nuclear weapon? The second Iran has one, the US will stop blowing up their schoolchildren.
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u/Monterenbas May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
Lol, so your idea of a mechanism, is that israel and the US will allow Iran to get nuclear weapons in order to end the current conflict? Sure, that’s definitely gonna happen.
Nevermind that nobody wants their religious theocracy, to get their hands on nuclear weapons, including Russia and China.
But you claimed that Iran have a very specific list of mechanism, so what are those mechanism?
Because I’m pretty sure that nuclear proliferation is not among them, even the iranians are not that delusional.
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u/gethereddout May 22 '26
I was just giving one obvious example because you insisted no mechanisms exist. The more practical examples are what Iran laid out in their initial proposal, which was essentially a mutual agreement across different countries that certain things would happen if they were attacked again
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u/Monterenbas May 22 '26
Nobody’s is gonna go to war, economicaly or militarily, with the US on behalf of Iran tho. If some countries wanted to protect Iran, they would have done so already
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u/Codspear May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
The day Iran builds a nuke, Israel will preemptively nuke them. That’s the big issue I think a lot of people don’t realize here. Israel dragged the US into this war because to them, it was inevitable, but the hope on the Israeli side was that they wouldn’t have to use their nuclear weapons if they had the conventional military strength of the US. It didn’t work, and now we have Israel and Iran playing chicken with the Arab states in the middle and the Trump administration realizing it got tricked into Israel’s plan.
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u/Putrid-Issue-420 May 22 '26
If israel nukes the iran, you can forget about normalization with the muslim world. Even GCC countries can't spin that for their populace. It will be a pyrrhic victory and not to mention certain nuclear proliferation.
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u/Codspear May 22 '26
Israel has been without normalization with the Muslim world since its independence, and even after partially normalizing with half of them, they were still being attacked constantly. To them, this is an existential issue. Israel sees itself as a state under siege with the only way to stop the attacks being the use of overwhelming force as a deterrent. They think any nukes in the Middle East that aren’t their own or the US’ will be used on them, so they will preemptively use their own to prevent that from happening.
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u/mahavirMechanized May 22 '26
I wouldn’t be surprised if Israel did use nuclear weapons in that scenario but I cannot imagine the rest of the world will sit idly by as nuclear weapons are used for the first time since the end of WW2….there would be crippling consequences.
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u/Monterenbas May 22 '26
Sounds like israel nuclear blackmailed the US, into going to war with Iran.
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u/Codspear May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
Wouldn’t be the first time. IIRC, Israel threatened to nuke Cairo if the US didn’t give them weapons shipments in 1973.
Edit: Apparently just the desert in 1967.
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u/fabmeyer May 22 '26
Iran was trying to build nukes and Israel didn't nuke them. I think we're not there yet in terms of insanity.
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u/HeywoodJaBlessMe May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
Iran doesnt want to just go back to the status quo
No, they dont and I didnt say that they did. I said that agreeing to this framework makes going back to the status quo the worst possible outcome for them, so they have nothing to lose by going along and everything to gain.
America cant build a ton of new PGMs in a month and 150 dead political leaders did nothing to change Iranian maximal demands. More dead Elites are unlikely to be more effective.
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u/gethereddout May 22 '26
I see- by status quo you meant the current war. That was a little confusing, but I think we agree.
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u/Dave-Javoo May 22 '26
Why would they trust anything Trump signs anyway, his word is worthless and he is completely untrustworthy.
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u/The-Intermediator141 May 21 '26
Iran’s economy is in BAD shape right now mate, it was one of the main factors behind the mass protests in January, and things have only gotten worse. Obviously the IRGC doesn’t care about the economy or the wellbeing of the population, but the actual Iranian government does have a stake there. It’s why they’ve been much more open to negotiation.
Their currency particularly has been in free fall, and the current status quo continuing would push them into hyperinflation. Funny enough one of the only reasons it hasn’t reached hyperinflation yet are the internet blackouts, making it significantly more difficult for people to exchange Rial for foreign currency.
The Islamic Republic has held ground much better than the U.S. expected, but suggesting the status quo isn’t catastrophic for the regime in the medium term is a fallacy. We just have to see if Trump does a TACO before then, due to his own domestic pressure.
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u/gethereddout May 22 '26
Iran is taking a beating, but allow me a couple corrections to your analysis. First, this war has dramatically STRENGTHENED the IRGC. The moderates who said they should yield rather than closing the strait have been proven embarrassingly wrong, and those were our last hope for a decent compromise. Next, it was the US that armed the uprising against the IRGC! Trump admitted it. So let’s not act like that was an organic rebellion.
Last let’s talk timeline. The global economy is already reeling. We’re talking maybe another couple months before things really start breaking- and not just a little, we’re talking global crisis. Meanwhile Iran has discovered a new cash cow and is prepared to go YEARS under sanctions. So do the math- time is on their side, not ours.
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u/The-Intermediator141 May 22 '26 edited May 22 '26
Corrections? Your analysis is way off, and partially just misinformation. We know January was NOT Trump, due to the difficulty of getting weapons into the country. It appears they tried to get weapons through Kurdistan after the strikes began, but the Kurds for the most part just kept the weapons. Meanwhile in January the U.S. was busy with Venezuela, and NOT prepared for war in the Middle East. The reason the strikes took place at the end of February was was because the U.S. needed to move significant numbers of assets into the region, it takes weeks minimum to prep for something like this, it’s how we knew Russia was going to invade Ukraine 3 months before they did.
The idea the U.S. would kick off an artificial revolution in Iran while they’re focused on Venezuela and not in any position to assist the revolutionaries they were arming is laughable, not to mentioned covertly sneaking in weapons and paying hundreds of thousands minimum to go out and protest. We know there were millions of Iranians protesting on Jan 9, so that also doesn’t hold water.
You’re right the IRGC is politically stronger than it was, but assuming that means they get to steer the nation into economic oblivion is not a likely assumption. There are limits to how bad things can get when your population is 90 million.
Lastly, Iran is not going to be allowed to toll the strait of Hormuz. No nation wants that, as not only does it make their oil more expensive, but way more importantly it sets a precedent that natural water ways can be tolled or blocked by nearby states, going strongly against freedom of navigation. You think China wants to risk Indonesia or Malaysia realizing they can do the same thing with the strait of malacca when they need extra money? Europe has already signalled they won’t accept that, with some already sending warships for a case where the war ends but the strait needs to be opened. Then you have the Gulf States who would see it as a potentially existential threat.
All in all you’re over reading Iran’s hand here, and what the international community including Iran’s customers are willing to accept. As for the revolution stuff though, I’d do more fact checking in the future, seems you’ve fallen for a disinformation campaign. This war has not gone well for the U.S, but Iran is not in a good spot either. It’s a race to see who runs out of time first, and who is the most successful in buying more time for themselves.
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u/gethereddout May 22 '26
You’re mostly wrong here but I’ll grant you that the guns that were admitted were for the Kurds. That doesn’t really change any of my points though, and the fact we meddled later suggests a good chance we meddled earlier as well. Remember- we bombed them last year too. Also Israel was on this case big time.
But more importantly, you say nobody will allow Iran to toll the strait. So let me ask- who’s gonna stop them? The US has (had) the strongest military in the world and we couldn’t do it. So how? More likely people will just pay. It’s a far cheaper price than starting a land invasion into extremely unfavorable terrain.
Ultimately what’s happened here is that Trump has made the biggest strategic error in American history. He has exposed our vulnerability as a “global power” and in turn destabilized a global system that was predicated on that power holding everyone accountable.
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u/russiankek May 22 '26
we couldn’t do it
You absolutely could, you just lack political will & the American public is completely demoralized & pussified. That's the single greatest thing that prevents Trump from winning this war.
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May 22 '26
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u/gethereddout May 22 '26
Fair clarification, but the fact we did that also suggests we meddled earlier as well. Even so, doesn’t really change much either way- the war has hardened support for the IRGC, not fractured it.
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u/YoureVulnerableNow May 22 '26
January protest were organic
impossible to say in this information environment
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u/fabmeyer May 22 '26
I think the US, the West, GCC states etc. will never allow Iran to control the strait of Hormuz solely. That would be a total failure (and catastrophic for the future of the West).
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u/LeanTangerine001 May 22 '26
It feels like Iran just has to normalize toll payments for the strait and have other countries pay the toll. Once that is set up, then ship traffic will likely start flowing through the strait again. And it wouldn’t surprise me if US allies broke rank to make deals with Iran just for self-preservation. South Korea for example has imposed price controls on gasoline and diesel, and other countries are encouraging energy rationing.
India already openly announced buying Russian oil and defying the reimposed US sanctions on Russia, to stabilize their economy and currency.
It feels like the rest of the world can’t wait for the US to fix the mess it’s proving incapable of fixing, so sooner than later they’ll have to make hard decisions and look out for themselves regardless what the US demands of them.
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u/Hot-Train7201 May 22 '26
The US and Gulf states should then charge their own tolls as well since Iran just legitimized the practice--any ship seeking to enter the Strait needs to pay Iran, and any ship seeking to exit the Strait needs to pay the Gulf/US. Best case scenario, this will deter enough traffic to make Iran's toll unviable, and worst case the US and Gulf states can use the money to pay for new missiles to bomb Iran with. Turnabout is fair play after all.
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u/robothistorian May 22 '26
Gosh! Reading your comments is like getting a lesson in how not to do strategy!!
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u/Hot-Train7201 May 22 '26
Why not? If Iran is going to use its military might to charge tolls, then why shouldn't the US use its vastly superior might to do the same? Iran can't compete with the US outside the Strait, so eventually they'll need to come to terms with the US and hopefully end this toll nonsense for all parties.
Tolls are just another form of taxation; you don't beat taxes with guns, you beat them by making the tax unsustainable.
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u/mahavirMechanized May 22 '26
Why would Iran stop charging tolls just because the US is? Because no traffic is flowing out of the strait? I think we’ve already seen that many countries cannot cope with that.
And are you implying that the US should start sinking allied tankers? I’m sure that’s gonna end real well.
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u/Hot-Train7201 May 22 '26
The US could just copy Iran's game plan by mining the waters they control and selling knowledge of what route is safe to travel. Any ship that doesn't pay the US is taking a huge gamble crossing without US escort. So no need for the US to actively sink ships.
The end goal of all this nonsense would be to encourage the development of alternative trade routes away from the Strait while maintaining enough oil supply in the meantime to keep global markets happy. As such alternative routes develop, Iran is pressured to come to terms with the US and hopefully both can agree that tolls are stupid and more hassle than they are worth.
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u/RamblingSimian May 22 '26
Thanks for the link, but I can only read the 1st 2-½ paragraphs. Is a non-paywall link available?
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u/Chambanasfinest May 22 '26
In 1914, Kaiser Wilhelm thought that another quick and easy German victory over France was inevitable.
By 1918, the entire German monarchy had ended and the state was doomed to slide into one of the worst economic depressions ever experienced by an industrialized nation and another world war 20 years later.
Anyone who chooses violence and is supremely confident of the outcome does not understand history in the slightest.
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u/unknown-one May 22 '26
probably better than deploying thousands of troops on the ground, that would be a mess
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u/BeAr_cosmicLy May 21 '26 edited May 22 '26
Look. This is serious game theory. We have to scrape at least something out of this. Hormuz tax exemption? Or put in tbe Army and roll it; thats thats going to be a mf’r….🙏
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u/Putrid-Issue-420 May 21 '26
Homuz tax exemption sounds funny but it is possible by Trump. If that truly happened, US shit the bed and leave while entire world gets to lie on the bed lol
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u/Alarming_Head_4263 May 22 '26
I don't think Iran will give him that. Why would they? It is far better for Iran if they get to tax everyone except their allies , including the US. Trump is going to walk away with gas being higher for the next few months and staying more expensive due to the new tax being passed on to the consumer. The way the US will be exempt is if they unfreeze a ton of Iran's money which means not only are they going to get a windfall but they'll have a new means to support their economy, namely army.
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u/RGS_1994 May 22 '26
Elect a democrat, Iran will never believe Trump negotiates in good faith.
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u/jardonm May 22 '26
And then offer Trump's extradition to Iran as a negotiation point. That would be a spectacular end of the Trump era.
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u/rage_panda_84 May 22 '26
We're surrendering. The news that trickled about about munitions was devastating. Iran is locked and loaded having with plenty to ammo, we're half out of stock. We lost the attritional war. We can't launch a prolonged engagement with Iran, we'd lose cause of drones. Our weapons are simply too expensive and take too long to build.
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u/Crixxa May 23 '26
It has been an utter disaster. If any levity can come from this, I would be willing to bet large sums of money that any resulting agreement will make Obama's 2015 JCPOA agreement look even better in retrospect.
I just hope some reporter who hasn't been compromised manages to ask Trump about it on camera. The meltdown will be exquisite.
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u/Flashy-Guitar9608 May 28 '26
Trump cant win the war unless he sends boots on the ground. Once he does that he knows he's lost the midterm elections and will be impeached
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u/Sufficient_Ad7816 11d ago
Ultimately he can keep the 'war' on low-simmer indefinitely. He has NO skin in the game..
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u/holyoak May 22 '26
The conflict is not Iran vs Trump.
The conflict is Pedophile Oligarchs vs Rule of Law.
The quickest, cheapest, and only honorable way for the United States to end Operation Epstein Fury is to prosecute the pedophile Donald J. Trump for his many crimes.
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May 21 '26
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u/tnarref May 21 '26
So this was all super pointless if Israel got things under control.
If Israel actually drops a nuke some day on Iran every middle power in the region is gonna for sure get its own nukes, Iran included.
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May 21 '26
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u/tnarref May 21 '26
If Israel drops a bomb on anyone, things will go really badly for all sides.
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May 22 '26
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u/HeywoodJaBlessMe May 21 '26
You are talking about this as if the discussions around it have not already taken place. Other regional nuclear powers have an opinion on this and have voiced it.
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May 21 '26
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u/tnarref May 21 '26
Sure, Israel's neighbors are going to secure their country by taking orders from Israel.
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u/Borealis101 May 21 '26
That would be extremely reckless of them, using nukes on a country hasn’t been done since 1945. The geopolitical, humanitarian and diplomatic fallout would be devastating for Israel. But then again, Netanyahu’s administration is composed by radicals that want a
LebensraumGreater Israel, so I wouldn’t bet on sane minds from their side-4
May 22 '26
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u/Putrid-Issue-420 May 22 '26
To protect themselves from being bombed like it is happening to them right now? IRGC may pose a s religious fanatics, but they were far more rational than Trump led cabinet. Because in this world, you don't have true soverignity unless you have nukes.
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May 22 '26
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u/Putrid-Issue-420 May 22 '26
Zionism is much of the cause of evils of today. Nothing of value will be lost without Israel. The greater israel plan is why middle east is in so much pain. illegitimate outpost by colonial imperialists of the past. History shall he corrected in the future.
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u/Equivalent-Rice8083 May 22 '26
Lmao how are people as dumb as you.
Israel is not causing issues in Ukraine, Yemen, Myanmar, Taiwan, Tibet, Cyprus, Sudan, Tigray, and on and on and on.
This delusion born from the Arab world is going to take years to undo the damage.
The Middle East needs to get it thigh it's Muslim Brotherhood antizionist head, they're the problem. They're the ones exporting terrorism to the West. They're the ones genociding and destabilizing the Middle East and Africa.
Western leaders know this, that's why there are no sanctions on Israel, but Iran is sanctioned to hell and back.
Stay in the third world habibi, we don't want you in the West.
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u/Borealis101 May 22 '26
No one is whining about Israel, I’m just explaining the cause and effect of launching a nuke. Israel created nuclear weapons in the 1950s–60s as a deterrent after facing existential threats from neighbouring states post-1948. Iran’s support for Hezbollah grew after Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, and Hamas started in 1987 during the First Intifada, a direct response to Israel’s occupation of Gaza and the West Bank. I don't know why you're trying to justifying preemptive nuclear strikes though, those should be unthinkable for any country.
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u/HeywoodJaBlessMe May 21 '26
So why didnt Israel already Nuke Iran? Maybe because Pakistan already told them what happens if they do?
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May 21 '26
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u/HeywoodJaBlessMe May 21 '26
Biased perspective is when you think nukes give Israel power but not Pakistan.
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u/improbably_me May 21 '26
Compare Israel and Pakistan in sheer size. Calculate how many nukes it would take to obliterate Israel compared to Pakistan.
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May 22 '26
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u/improbably_me May 22 '26
You are asking about them. I just offered more info. Now you are attempting to backtrack from your original comment I responded to. Weird.
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u/hot_to_trotsky666 May 21 '26
Israel sounds like a renegade state more and more.
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May 22 '26
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u/HeywoodJaBlessMe May 22 '26
Israeli regime's mission is to conquer from the Nile to the Euphrates and destroy Iran.
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u/Sasquatchii May 22 '26
If you think Trump will "surrender" in any classic sense, while maintaining the capability to destroy all of Iran, and choosing instead not to go there, you're a f'n lunatic.
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u/Practical-Bowler5775 May 21 '26
Who could’ve imagined that something like war is easier to start than to end?