This is in the Washington Post:
“U.S. forces resumed extensive attacks on Iran this month following Iranian attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz as the April ceasefire between the two countries collapsed. And if talks fail to secure progress, Trump has threatened to expand U.S. strikes to target more infrastructure. “I could take out most of their bridges in less than an hour,” Trump told Fox News in an interview this week, in which where he threatened Iranian power plants. “They know I’m going to do that if we don’t make a deal,” he said.
The targets of the resumed U.S. attacks at first appeared similar to those U.S. forces hit before the ceasefire: radar installations, launch sites, munitions stores and other military infrastructure along Iran’s coast.
Then the targets widened: The U.S. hit at least six bridges and tunnels surrounding the port city of Bandar Abbas, according to a tally kept by the Institute for the Study of War. Elsewhere in the south, strikes damaged communications lines, a rail station and a desalination plant, according to Iranian state-affiliated media reports. Other attacks hit a military complex near Tehran and a rail line in a province bordering Turkmenistan.”
“600 injured in this latest wave of attacks. Iranian officials have sought to downplay the strikes, saying they caused only temporary traffic disruptions and communications blackouts, as per local media reports.
The recent strikes mark “an expansion in the scope of the targets,” said Dana Stroul, a research director at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank, who served as deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East in the Biden administration. By striking bridges and tunnels, she said, U.S. forces are targeting “the supporting infrastructure” used by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps “to move assets and capabilities around to reinforce the activity they’re doing from the coastline.”
U.S. strikes on key infrastructure, and threats to hit much more, have prompted concerns that such attacks could amount to war crimes. “International humanitarian law protects from attack objects indispensable to the survival of civilians,” Harold Hongju Koh, who served as a State Department legal adviser in the Obama administration, told The Washington Post in April, after Trump threatened to bomb “every” bridge and power plant in the country.”
The Trump administration has classified some infrastructure the U.S. has attacked as “dual use,” qualifying as military targets because they are used by the military as well as civilians. Stroul stressed that it’s unclear if the most recent infrastructure targeted in Iran reaches the “dual use” threshold.
The expanded targets are intended to send Tehran a “signal,” she said. Central Command “is signaling that we have taken this incremental step up the escalation ladder, you can’t stop us, we can keep going, and you are vulnerable.”
“Economic pain has been described by the Trump administration as a key component of the war against Iran. Operation Economic Fury was launched in April as the U.S. imposed a blockade on Iran and tightened sanctions. But economic analysts say that so far the strikes on infrastructure, particularly the attacks on manufacturing and industry, are having the larger economic impact.
The administration has emphasized the economic impact of the naval cordon and other moves over that of strikes. “While Iran’s ability to subvert the free flow of energy is being degraded by the United States Military, the regime is being squeezed economically by our naval blockade, sanctions, and other economic measures,” said a senior U.S. official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters. “There are many levers the president can crank harder in the weeks and months ahead, if that’s the path Iran chooses to go down.””
“Iran’s president has been warning of the long-term economic costs of the war since it began with joint U.S.-Israeli strikes in late February. This month, he described Iran’s economy as “the most important battlefield” in the conflict.
“If economic pressures lead to social dissatisfaction and that dissatisfaction expands, the immense social capital that the people have created in support of the system could be damaged,” he warned, as reported in state-backed media coverage of his remarks.
But rather than elevate voices like that of President Masoud Pezeshkian, the continued fighting has only further sidelined them, according to Sina Azodi, a lecturer at George Washington University.
“Right now, everybody is thinking in terms of survival and fighting,” he said. “I don’t say that the president is powerless, but it’s usually the case that in wartime, the military people have more say in the decisions of the country.””
“As long as the war continues, Iran’s economy is expected to further deteriorate. The International Monetary Fund predicts Iran’s economy will contract by more than 5 percent this year and says that inflation is already near 70 percent.
Hadi Kahalzadeh, an Iranian economic analyst, described the country’s economic crisis as a “cascade.” If the economy contracts by roughly 4 percent, he said that could force businesses to lay off some 4 million people in a matter of months, a move that could push more than 4 million more Iranians below the poverty line.
In the immediate term, he said strikes on infrastructure are “intensifying the humanitarian cost of the blockade” by hitting key land trade routes.
The attacks are “making it harder and more expensive to move food, medicine, fuel, and other essential goods,” he said. “The effects were already visible in inflationary expectations, further depreciation of the rial, rising prices” that he said would ultimately result in deeper poverty in Iran.”
“But rather than capitulate in the near term, Kahalzadeh argues, the Iranian system is poised to continue to adapt, just as it has done for years to evade sanctions. And Azodi of George Washington University agrees, explaining that after years of heavy international sanctions, Iran is not new to sustained economic pressure.
“The Iranian state has traditionally been able to absorb a lot of pain, and the people are also the same, their pain tolerance is pretty high,” he said.”
Excerpt From
“Trump’s infrastructure strikes leave Iran’s economy battered”
Susannah George
The Washington Post
https://apple.news/AGzs-eQgtQPSFBXidH7e7tg
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