Iran: no good options?

I haven’t written much about the war in Iran because I simply don’t really know what’s happening. It seems to be a facet of modern wars that the more you read, the less clear the picture becomes. That’s certainly been true of Ukraine for a long time. Competing narratives emerge and you choose the one that best suits your own personal biases and political agendas.

In the case of Iran, I’ve struggled to come down hard on any one side of the debate because I don’t see an optimal course of action. You can only really look at it in terms of the national interest, recognising that we are not in the driving seat, and we only really have control over our own policy reactions.

For us, the status quo was the least bothersome, albeit with Iran using its regional influence to destabilise the Middle East, which is not without consequences for Britain. But the status quo got to a point where Israel was forced to take action. Not only has Iran been waging war through its own proxies, it has launched waves of deadly attacks against Israel and shown a willingness to use any and all weapons at its disposal.

On that basis, Israel had no choice to to take pre-emptive action to ensure its own safety. While Israel’s missile defence shield is powerful and quite effective, it simply cannot be a sitting duck, and it would seem that President Trump agreed. If there was any danger of a nuclear armed Iran, which would have given the regime the freedom to act without retaliation then that would not be a good thing for anybody.

Having taken that decision, America then runs into what most of us assumed was a well understood lesson. You cannot affect regime change with air power alone. That leaves America unsure what to do next since there is no real appetite for putting boots on the ground even in a limited capacity.

That then leaves the mullahs in charge, and free to harass shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, bringing half the world’s economy to a standstill. Which is really not good for anybody either. As such, the West has to decide if it’s going to allow a kleptocratic Islamist regime to hold the world economy to ransom. Britain has decided that it will allow it, because the ruling party is in hock to British Islamists, who are now allied with the far left and the antisemitic isolationist right (which is more influential than ever). And, of course, because orange man bad.

That said, there is a certain wisdom to not getting involved. Any operation aimed at reopening the Strait of Hormuz will require ground forces. Naval and air power alone simply cannot do the job on a long term basis. A naval missile defence shield is a long term operation for which the technology does not exist to do it long term and cost effectively. Moreover, it seems logical that if you’re going to commit ground forces to keep the strait open then you might as well go all in and remove the regime. But that would require a multinational force. Trump simply doesn’t have the political capital to do it alone, and British forces have nothing useful to contribute anyway.

As such, it looks like America has no real option but to de-escalate, switching the focus to doing as much damage to Iran’s military capabilities as possible while it can, (which should be done for its own sake), and leave Israel to do the mopping up. But that doesn’t bode well for America in that all this operation will have achieved is to tank the world economy for the sake of Israel’s security. Given the shifts on the American right, this could well be the end of Trumpism.

That, though, depends on how you view Trump’s wider strategy, having secured alternate sources of energy and moving to cut off a key energy source to China. It’s still within the America First remit, especially if the goal is continued reshoring.

That’s great for America but less so for Britain. Britain has decided that we are going to let a dysfunctional Islamist state hold us to ransom so the first and most obvious thing to do is to tap into as many of our domestic energy reserves as possible, as quickly as possible. On that basis, Donald Trump might have done us a favour in helping to end net zero delusions once and for all. Or at least it might have done were we not ruled by drooling imbeciles who are determined to deindustrialise.

As such, it looks like we’re heading for a time of austerity the likes of which I have never experienced in my lifetime where, for the most part, the worst symptoms are wholly self-inflicted. It certainly looks like my travel plans fort the summer are in doubt with petrol prices being what they are, but it’s still the case that most of what we pay at the pump goes towards maintaining Labour’s welfare clients. Meanwhile, we have to keep subsidising useless windmills. Where it gets especially messy is that Ukraine is going all out to attack Russian energy infrastructure so Europe soon won’t have a plan B.

Regardless of Trump’s actions in the Gulf, Europe was already on a suicide trajectory, but this war has put Europe’s decline on turbocharge, and we lack the political coherence to help ourselves. It seems the only people happy about this mess are plane spotters in the vicinity of RAF Fairford. If I don’t post in the week, that’s where I’ll be.