Todays Telegraph
Just as unhatched eggs do not imply an equal number of chickens, diplomatic deals should never be counted before they are signed. But recent leaks out of Muscat, Tehran and Washington all point in one direction: an agreement between Iran and Oman to reopen the Strait of Hormuz is all but sealed.
Iran effectively closed the narrow waterway through which a fifth of the world’s oil and gas passes after the United States and Israel attacked it in February. The US retaliated with its own naval blockade of Iranian ports. For months, they have been locked in a kind of maritime Mexican stand-off over who should act first to restore freedom of navigation.
So for many people, the reported deal is good news. The seafarers held hostage on their ships in the Persian Gulf for the past five months may soon be able to go home. Consumers around the world will dodge another energy and inflation crisis. Above all, it raises the chances of lasting peace.
The fate of the Strait is (or was) the key point of contention between Tehran and Washington over how to implement their June memorandum of understanding (MOU) on ending the war. Resolving that quarrel (America is not technically a party to the deal, but is expected to acquiesce to make it work), may unlock a path to agreement on other points in that document.
Fingers crossed the war could be over – mostly, at least – well before US midterm elections in November. Such a peace is not, however, the one the US had in mind.
It means that Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu’s war to topple or defang the Islamic Republic is ending in a demonstrable expansion of Iranian regional influence. They lost. Iran won.
The Hormuz deal tells us why. Leaked reports suggest the agreement grants Iran control of marine traffic entering the Persian Gulf, and also gives it some oversight of the outbound route which will be under the purview of Oman. The two countries will also charge a fee (yet to be set) to cover environmental, security and staffing costs.
As Kazem Gharibabadi, Iranian deputy foreign minister, told state media, it cements Iran’s “effective sovereignty” over the Strait. This was always a possible outcome of the June MOU, which was left deliberately vague on several points.
Point Five, for example, simply called for Iran and Oman to “conduct dialogue… to define the future administration and maritime services in the Strait of Hormuz”. Iran interpreted that to mean it had the right to control the Strait and charge fees. The United States insisted that it meant a return to the pre-war status quo of free navigation.
Everyone knew that the contradiction would have to be resolved, and that there was a danger that Iran’s interpretation would win out. But there’s no point in blaming the diplomats who drafted the MOU for this. Peace agreements, after all, only reflect the verdict of the battlefield.
The return to all-out fighting about three weeks ago, with the US bombing targets specifically related to Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps control of the Strait and Gulf Coast, can be seen as an attempt to revise that verdict. It failed.
Trump’s threat last weekend to launch a fortnight-long Second World War-scale destructive blitz was his last throw of the dice. He dropped that plan, we now know, because of an intervention by America’s Gulf allies, including Saudi Arabia. It has now been reported that came after Iran warned its neighbours that they would be targeted in the event of a US attack.
So Iran not only has control of the Strait in a way it did not before the war; its military leverage – the ability to use the threat of force to influence the behaviour of its neighbours – is stronger than before.
Much is still uncertain. The US and Oman have not yet publicly commented on the deal, which is of course contingent on American acquiescence. Meanwhile, Iran says it will only actually put the deal into effect if America lifts its blockade of Iranian ports. It is possible that Trump could decide to try another round of strikes to deliver a different outcome.
On Tuesday, the president warned that Iran would be “hit very hard” if the strait did not open “very soon”. His remarks came after senior officials in Washington suggested that talks had progressed to allow passage through the waterway to resume later this week, though Iran has repeatedly restated that it is not negotiating with the White House and has no plans to do so.
And there are many other bones of contention in the MOU – among them the fate of Iran’s nuclear programme, lifting of American sanctions and the unfreezing of Iranian assets – that could yet scupper the nascent peace process. Yet the first test has gone Iran’s way, and there is every reason to believe the other points will too.
So much for the verdict of the battlefield. What about the verdict of history? There’s a possible universe where this conflict could prove a turning point in the decline of US global power. One of those blunders, like Britain’s misadventure at Suez, that come to mark the end of an empire.
Just imagine, for example, if America finds itself unable to fight a war of necessity because of the missile stocks it used in this failed war of choice.
On the other hand, America remains the world’s dominant superpower. It has suffered no defeat in battle, and very few casualties. Great powers can often take such setbacks in their stride.
The Islamic Republic, on the other hand, has suffered losses in the thousands, and economic and military destruction that could take decades to repair. Iran’s victory may yet prove Pyrrhic.
It is, however, a victory. There is no getting around the fact Iran won this war. America lost.
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