Martin Jay
Trump's final throw of the dice is a second incursion with the stakes even higher and no element of surprise.
The latest threat by Trump to blow up Iran's oil wells and desalination plants if they don't agree to his terms for a deal is both preposterous and disingenuous. America is already bombing the country's infrastructure day and night, and to take the threat to a new level of bombing has little if any credibility. So what was Trump up to with such a comment ? The threat drew quite a bit of media attention, which is really all it was intended to do. It was a fatuous comment which was designed to draw journalists away from the bigger picture and write the sad truth: America has lost the war in Iran on so many levels it's hard to know where to begin.
But it's the Straits of Hormuz which continue to take centre stage and become an obsession of Trump's. To understand this, you have to delve into the mind of a manchild and how he thinks when he's lost something valuable. The Straits of Hormuz might be the silver bullet which defeats Trump finally, making the Iranian victory a moment for Trump and America which Britain had in 1956 with the Suez Crisis. Will the Straits of Hormuz crisis be the downfall of America's hegemony ? Will there be a point when enough western leaders have to gather together and tell him to get out of the Arabian Peninsula altogether?
Trump needs it back so badly for his own ego and legacy, as he is aware that Americans understand that his fiasco 'incursion' in the Middle East has pushed up gas prices and is soon to create a global crisis in a number of other commodities like fertilizer, helium and computer chips. It is said that the UK, for example, has only about two weeks or so of gasoline, with Australia only a little more than a month. At a certain point in the next 14 days, the whole world is going to be very angry with Donald Trump, not to mention his own MAGA base which is being hit hard by rising gas prices.
And so it should not come as a great surprise that in the few days' break which he claimed to have initiated himself, he has been planning a new military strategy to put U.S. forces on the ground in Iran, with a view to taking back the straits.
The three plans being mulled go from the completely nuts and suicidal idea of taking Kharg Island to more plausible ones of taking small islands in the centre of the straits which Iran has not fortified and, in a confused hail of intensified firepower, might not defend for a few hours, letting an airborne drop go ahead. The casualties are going to be high, but Trump believes it's worth it to save some face. In the worst-case scenario, Iran may still control the straits, but at least Trump can say we put U.S. forces on some of their islands.
Another aspect of any invasion, which would involve marines and light infantry already in the region, would be the role of the GCC states. Is it possible that he is waiting for at least one country to join, such as the UAE ? Its leader has even stated on social media that he is ready to send troops to support the Trump move, whatever it is. If we are to believe what is being presented to us on social media, GCC countries are largely furious with Trump, with Saudi Arabia's crown prince even going as far as to state that arms deals with the U.S. are now over.
There have been enough military analysts now who all have agreed that some sort of a second incursion is imminent, yet none are sure of which one is likely. Pentagon advisor and commentator Colonel Douglas MacGregor believes that an intense missile bombardment which would last for three days would be used as a strategy to distract Iran's forces to try and get a land invasion under way, but warns of very high casualties.
So Trump's final throw of the dice is a second incursion with the stakes even higher and no element of surprise, which makes the whole debacle feel more banal and surreal, matched only by the absurd comments he makes each day to the press. The U.S. president seems completely detached from reality and indulging himself in a number of fantasies about the realities of the war, encouraged by the small coterie of White House journalists who simply refuse to question these idiotic statements which are getting more ludicrous by the day. The Iran war is making Trump appear more and more like a performing clown who is not even funny. These latest threats to blow up desalination plants or oil infrastructure would only be met by an Iranian response right across the entire region, which is the real reason why Trump has left them to one side. The truth is that he is doing what he has always done: pretending to negotiate while preparing for his next surprise attack. The only problem is that it is not a surprise and even more insane than the first one.