The standoff between Iran and the United States has currently reached stalemate. Iranian hopes to use control of the Strait of Hormuz as a lever to force an American climb-down show no sign of realization.
The IRGC’s extension of its methods of asymmetrical warfare to the Strait was a creative and bold move. In the same way that terrorist movements seek to offset military inferiority by striking directly at an adversary’s civilian population, Iran tried to raise the costs for civilian ships seeking to transit the Strait to a level which companies and shipowners would find intolerable. In this way, Iran hoped to render US conventional naval ascendancy meaningless. Faced with skyrocketing oil prices as midterm elections loomed, the US would be forced to concede the issue, Iran’s new Persian Gulf Strait Authority would become the accepted custodian of the strait and victory could be declared.
Iran’s hopes of generating a global economic crisis by choking off Hormuz have not been realized
It hasn’t worked. Rather, the limitations of Tehran’s capacities for disruption have been exposed. Firstly, it turns out that conventional naval superiority is not an advantage that can so easily be neutralized. US maritime patrols and capacity to escort ships via the southern, Omani corridor through the Strait are proving somewhat effective.
The volume of oil passing through the Strait this way is disputed. Many observers consider that the US claim of 8 to 10 million barrels per day is exaggerated (and even this figure would represent less than half of the amount transiting the Strait prior to the war). But even the more modest and generally accepted figure of 5 to 6 million barrels per day represents a major and growing dent in Iranian claims of control over the Strait.
Major oil-producing states, meanwhile, are finding alternative routes. Saudi Arabia is using its East-West crude oil pipeline to bring roughly 7 million barrels of oil per say to its terminal at the Red Sea port of Yanbu. Ships exiting from Yanbu still have to go through the Bab el Mandeb Strait on the way to Suez. But as of now, Iran’s Houthi allies appear reluctant to go all in on behalf of Tehran.
The United Arab Emirates, meanwhile, is using its Habshan-Fujaira pipeline, dubbed the Abu Dhabi crude oil pipeline (ADCOP) to transport crude oil across the desert to the port of Fujaira on the Gulf of Oman, once more bypassing Hormuz. Up to 1.8 million barrels of oil are exiting the Gulf per day via that route. In partnership with Total Energies, the Emiratis are currently fast-tracking a parallel pipeline project intended to double capacity along this route.
The result: Iran’s hopes of generating a global economic crisis by choking off Hormuz have not been realized. Current trends indicate that the effects of their efforts to disrupt passage through the Strait will decline still further in the period ahead, as states and private companies adjust to the threat and either bypass it or find and develop alternative routes. Disruption to Hormuz was a tactic which needed to reach maximum effect quickly, forcing a political result. It failed to achieve this, and its impact, while considerable, is now diminishing.
Iran is also facing the impact of the war and the US economic blockade. Its economy is set to contract by 5.4 percent in the year ahead, inflation is approaching 90 percent, oil exports from Kharg Island have effectively ceased due to the US blockade and there are widespread petrol shortages. That is in addition to the infrastructural damage inflicted during the fighting between February and April.
But while Iran’s efforts to force a US climbdown appear to have failed, the Americans have similarly not succeeded in exerting sufficient pressure on their opponents to force the regime to abandon its ongoing disruption of Hormuz. Hence the stalemate. Neither side is under sufficient pressure to force the other to retreat.
The result: both sides are trying to find ways to escalate. The Iranians, in this case and more generally, have only one real tool in their box – disruption by military means, conventional and asymmetrical. Sure enough, a series of statements from Iranian officials in recent days have threatened a return to war.
Iranian Defense Minister Majid Ebn Alreza asserted this week that in response to increased US sanctions, “To protect our people, we too have no choice but to expand the battlefield.” Mohen Rezai, Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council said on Iranian state television that “any country participating in America’s economic war will be regarded as an enemy”. And so on. It is questionable as to whether Iran will in fact seek to return to war, but the possibility of isolated strikes against US regional allies in the Gulf or US installations is distinctly possible in the period ahead.
The US, for its part, wants to now increase the pressure on Iran by closing off its remaining economic partnerships via secondary sanctions against countries doing business with Tehran. This is what Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent referred to as an “economic D-Day”, an “onslaught against Iran’s financial connections around the globe”.
Again, it’s not yet clear if anything very substantial will emerge from this. Over the last decade, it has been Iran’s relationship with China which has enabled it to ride out periods of pressure from the US. China has already announced that it opposes the new sanctions on Iran and regards them as illegal. It remains to be seen if Washington will begin to target Chinese companies. Past form in any case suggests that Chinese concessions in this area are unlikely.
What all this means in practice is that, despite the rhetoric on both sides, major escalation currently appears unlikely, and the stalemate looks set to limp on for the immediate future. Iran failed to turn its seizure of Hormuz into the knife to the global economy’s throat that it had hoped for. On the other hand, the US has not yet found a way to force the Iranians back from their efforts to disrupt and hence control passage over the strait. President Trump told al-Jazeera yesterday that he is in “no rush”.
Amid all this, it is worth remembering that the very fact that the entire dispute now centers around Hormuz represents a significant gain for Iran. Prior to 28 February, there was free passage through the Strait. By seizing it, Teheran succeeded in changing the subject and terms of the dispute. The Memorandum of Understanding that was meant to end the fighting in April is a dead letter. But the US is no longer using Iran’s ballistic missiles or nuclear programs or its support of proxies as potential reasons for a return to fighting. Regime change too is off the table. Iran succeeded by surviving, but has failed to impose its own terms. The contest, as a result, grinds on.
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