So far, Trump has held his fire, wary of igniting a much wider Middle East war that some supporters warn could sink his chances for reelection. But analysts say the region is headed for a major conflagration despite the president's restraint.
Here's why: Ever since last year, when Trump quit a 2015 nuclear accord that he castigated as a"bad deal," he has bludgeoned Iran with sanctions that have drastically reduced its oil exports, sending both inflation and unemployment soaring.
"Sometime in 2006, Iran briefed the GCC on its capabilities and told the Arab states to go tell the Americans that if the U.S. attacked Iran, Iran would respond by taking out twenty percent of the world's internationally traded oil and gas export capacity," Theros said in a September 24 commentary published on the website of the Gulf International Forum, a Washington-based think tank where he serves as a strategic adviser.
But those sanctions will only provoke Iran to escalate its resistance."If things continue on this trajectory, some kind of military exchange is inevitable," Ariane Tabatabai, an Iran analyst at the Rand Corporation, a Washington think tank that works closely with the Pentagon, toldMeanwhile, others have tried to turn the mounting tensions with Iran into a negotiation, but without success.
In response, Trump placed blame for the failed diplomacy on Tehran."Iran wanted me to lift the sanctions imposed on them in order to meet. I said, of course, NO!" "The economy is much more resilient than Washington would have us believe," Batmanghelidj said in a telephone interview, adding this resilience has given Rouhani more leeway to escalate Iran's responses to Trump's sanctions.
Jarrett Blanc, a former senior State Department official, says Trump's sanctions-based policy toward Iran is a recipe for war."The Iranians have demonstrated an alarmingly high risk tolerance in their recent actions," he said in an interview, referring to their downing of the U.S. drone and the strike on Saudi oil facilities."I'm worried they might cross a line with the United States that leads to conflict.
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