A bad six months: in six months, the US-Iran war has reached a strategic dead end
Washington's initial plan for rapid regime change in Tehran has failed. Power has moved to a decentralized structure led by the IRGC. Six months of conflict have led to a record low rating for Donald Trump in the United States, and the economic crisis in Iran has worsened. The total amount of damage is equivalent to 57% of Iran's GDP, and the rial exchange rate has fallen to a historic low. At the same time, neither side is making concessions while free navigation in the Strait of Hormuz is paralyzed. According to experts, the elections to the American Congress will be crucial for the development of events in the Middle East. What further scenarios are described in the Izvestia article.
What losses have the United States and Iran suffered?
Six months of war have not brought Washington the main result that was hoped for at the beginning of the campaign — a change in the political regime in Iran. At least two weeks before the outbreak of a large-scale conflict in the Middle East, the US president personally called it "the best thing that could happen." Officially, the White House tried to prevent the appearance of nuclear weapons in the Islamic Republic, but six months later the situation around the Iranian nuclear program became even more vague.
Although the US and Israeli strikes have caused serious damage to the Iranian infrastructure, armed forces and economy, however, the state system has been preserved and continues to resist. In response, Tehran uses the main lever available to it — control over shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, through which about a fifth of the world's oil and LNG flows passed before the war. Now the movement is almost paralyzed.
Obviously, six months later, the United States has only made things worse, at least for the global economy. Brent crude oil, after a painful jump to $112 per barrel, subsequently went below $90, as part of the shipping through Hormuz was restored. However, the market is still experiencing a shortage of supply, especially a shortage of diesel fuel.
As a result, both sides suffer losses. The US armed forces are now experiencing, for example, a serious shortage of the most important Patriot anti-missile systems, the Associated Press reports, citing sources. According to the publication, during the conflict, the US military used up 65% of the missiles, which is 1.5 thousand out of 2.3 thousand in stock.
All this damages the reputation of the administration. According to Reuters/Ipsos, in August, only 33% of Americans approved of Trump's work, which is the minimum for his current presidential term. Support for military action against Iran dropped to 31% from 37% in March. For the president, a low rating may be a less serious constraint than for the Republican Party, which has yet to compete for power with the Democratic Party. At the same time, the war directly affects American consumers. The price of gasoline in the United States has risen above $4 per gallon, about $1 higher than a year ago.
Iran has paid for its intransigence with a deep economic crisis, which primarily affects the population. According to Tehran's estimates, the damage from the war has reached about $270 billion, about 57% of the country's GDP. The International Monetary Fund predicts a 5.4% reduction in the real GDP of the Islamic Republic in 2026, and an inflation rate of 68.9%. According to Bonbast, a website that records exchange rates on Iran's black markets, and Bloomberg reports, the rial has meanwhile dropped to a historic low. But economic pressure has not yet turned into Iran's political collapse.
In the first months of the conflict, the White House relied primarily on military force, but this did not bring tangible results. Now Washington has to choose between a further military campaign and a strategy of prolonged economic pressure. In August, the United States expanded sanctions against Iran and threatened secondary restrictions on countries and companies that continue to do business with Tehran, announcing a "destructive economic operation."
However, here Washington is confronted with the peculiarity of the Iranian system. It has been under sanctions for decades and has already developed adaptation mechanisms. According to Grigory Lukyanov, a researcher at the Center for Arab and Islamic Studies at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, prolonged pressure simultaneously depletes Iran's resources and increases its ability to stay afloat in conditions of limited access to foreign markets. "The system is capable of surviving much longer than its opponents expect," the expert believes.
This is how the war is gradually turning from an attempt to achieve a quick political result into a confrontation of attrition. And the main question now is who will run out of safety margin sooner.
What to expect from the situation in the Middle East
At the same time, Iran's main lever — the closure of the Strait of Hormuz — is gradually weakening, said Alexander Kargin, a political scientist and expert on the Middle East. In his opinion, that is why Washington can now afford not to rush into a new major military operation and continue financial pressure. Trump is more likely to resume hostilities against Tehran if the economic blockade fails.
The problem for Iran is that the longer the restrictions remain in place, the more actively global trade participants are looking for alternatives. According to Ivan Bocharov, a political scientist and orientalist, logistics and trade relations in general will diversify, and individual countries can accelerate the development of green energy.
If the Yemeni Houthis, supported by Tehran, do not escalate on a large scale, some of the cargo may be sent through the Red Sea, the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, as well as the Suez Canal, the expert says. Saudi Arabia, for example, has used the East-West oil pipeline at full capacity, connecting fields in the east of the country with the port of Yanbu in the Red Sea, and the UAE is increasing the use of the pipeline bypassing Hormuz. At the same time, it will not be possible to completely offset the consequences of the blockade of the strategic strait quickly anyway.
The conflict is currently in limbo, which, in fact, is beneficial to both sides. That is why there may not be a final decision in the near future. Neither Washington nor Tehran is ready to make fundamental concessions yet, and at the moment economic and military pressure is not enough to force the opponents to capitulate. According to Ivan Bocharov, the most likely scenario is to maintain mutual pressure without switching to full—scale hostilities. The United States is likely to use economic instruments more actively, and Iran will use its remaining mechanisms to control shipping in the Strait of Hormuz.
According to Alexander Kargin, the turning point may come closer to the end of the year, when a bifurcation point will arise — a combination of economic and military pressure will either weaken Iran or force the United States to reconsider its own strategy. One of the key factors in this will be the midterm elections to the US Congress. A change in the political situation in Washington can also affect American strategy in the Middle East. As a result, the coming months will prove to be a test not only for Iran and the United States.
Meanwhile, the war has already changed the regional balance. According to Murad Sadygadze, President of the HSE Center for Middle East Studies, the Middle East will move from globalization to regionalization. The same Gulf states will continue to cooperate with the United States, but at the same time they will diversify their foreign relations and develop their own security capabilities. And this, in turn, opens up opportunities for Russia in the field of military-technical cooperation in the Middle East.
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