By Tom Fowdy
Last night, Donald Trump announced a two-week ceasefire in negotiations with Iran, brokered by Pakistan. As part of the deal, the Strait of Hormuz would be reopened, and it came amidst Trump making some of the most disturbing public comments ever issued by a US President, including threatening the destruction of Iran as a "civilization."
Since the deal came into place, Trump has proclaimed "total victory." However, all but his most sycophantic supporters can see that is not the case. Instead, what we are looking at here is the single biggest humiliation and strategic defeat the United States has faced militarily since the Vietnam War, and there is no way to dress up what has happened here than that.
First, we should not forget what Trump's actual intentions were for this war, in starting it, and his assumptions were. The President, following Israel's pressure, engaged in an explicit regime change operation against Tehran with the belief that leadership decapitation would topple the Islamic state within days. Indeed, Trump and Netanyahu both called publicly for Iran's "unconditional surrender" and hoped that its population would rise up and overthrow the regime.
In calculating for the Mullah state's quick collapse, Trump saw strategic gain in seizing strategic dominance over the country's oil reserves, which reflects a foreign policy that aims to obtain leverage and geopolitical dominance by controlling critical resources. Just two months prior, after all, the White House had overseen a rapid and relatively bloodless operation which saw US forces invade Venezuela, seize President Nicholas Maduro and then force the country's capitulation, with America gaining control over its oil exports.
The overconfidence and hubris derived from the incursion clearly warped the White House's thinking over Iran, an adversarial state the administration (including his previous one) long had the knives out over, having famously binned Obama's Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) or "Iran deal" in 2018. Thus, the operation was supposed to be quick and devastatingly effective, a clear demonstration of American power and chutzpah which could be pulled off, as was in Caracas, without being locked into the quagmire of "forever wars." As per the MAGA narrative, Trump had found a new and clinical way to show force.
But, contrary to the triumphalism of the administration, everything went wrong. The Iranian regime did not collapse, even without its figureheads, and nor did it cower in the face of American and Israeli aggression. Instead, Iran shut down the Strait of Hormuz, sent oil prices skyrocketing, and retaliated with a military capability beyond was factored, bombing American bases and military infrastructure across the Middle East with drones and missiles, creating chaos in the Gulf States. What was supposed to be a quick operation became an unmitigated disaster.
Owing to Iran's vast geography and size, neither the US nor Israel was able to prevent Iran's attacks or reopen the strait. The President appealed to allied states to assist, but they shunned him, and as global markets suffered, Trump's public rhetoric became increasingly deranged and out of the pale. The President posted expletives on Truth Social, calling for Iran to "open the f***ing strait!" and "praise Allah" before then threatening the end of Iranian civilization. Given he neither terminated the regime nor militarily stopped them, it is staggering that he can proclaim "total victory" in this situation, having accepted a ceasefire, having once demanded "unconditional surrender." According to his earlier rhetoric, there were no terms and no negotiations to be had, because he was sure he could bomb the country into submission. Thus, the ceasefire, even if it provides no long-term solutions to the conflict, preserves a new status quo which stands contrary to all his objectives: The Iranian regime continues to exist, and worse still, it now exerts power projection over one of the world's most strategic shipping routes and is deriving revenue from it.
Let's be blunt: Ignore anything his supporters are saying. This scenario is the biggest military humiliation the United States has faced since Vietnam. It ushers in the formal end of an era which started with George H.W Bush's "New World Order" in 1991, wherein the US and its allies easily defeated Saddam Hussein's Iraq in the Gulf War, establishing a perception of unparalleled American dominance. With this outcome, though, US credibility and leadership have been shattered. Iran is bruised, yet somehow gains in terms of power projection, showing how it has the power to undermine the world's energy supply, render alliance guarantees worthless, undermine the dollar, force its way out of sanctions, and, in this case, literally bring the President of the United States to his knees.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of DotDotNews.
Read more articles by Tom Fowdy:
Opinion | The end of the Middle East 'oil' paradigm
Opinion | Is the effort to 'contain' China starting to fail?
Opinion | Trump's talk of seizing Iran's Kharg Island will be another disaster in the making
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