Trump's Deadline Draws Near

As Donald Trump’s self-imposed deadline for Iranian acquiescence approaches on April 7, Iranian state media has reported that explosions have rocked Kharg Island, Tehran has rejected a ceasefire proposal, and Vice President Vance has been spelling out what a deal would mean for Iran. Are we witnessing the Madman Theory in action? Actually, what the world is seeing is the continuation of a strategy and an approach that Donald Trump has long embraced. If you look back over his career, he has said for years that the United States negotiates poorly, that its diplomats give the game away, and that Iran has posed an existential threat to the United States. In so doing, he has reiterated what successive American presidents, and presidential candidates, including Hillary Clinton, have said. It is, therefore, remarkable that he is receiving so much pushback considering that he is merely advocating what has been a bipartisan approach to dealing with Iran, albeit one that to date, presidents had talked about, but never actually initiated.

The important thing to remember about Donald Trump is that his approach to negotiation, as addressed in US Grand Strategy and the Madman Theory, is relatively straightforward. He begins with what would be thought of as an extreme position, which creates the room for compromise, and then makes a series of attention-grabbing statements to try and control the narrative. This has happened time and time again; last year it was tariffs, now it is Iran. His approach allows for deliberate, strategic pullbacks at the last-minute to enable more negotiations. There is clearly something going on behind the scenes with regard to Pakistan trying to agree to a two-week delay that is likely to be unveiled shortly.

However, the challenge Iran has is, where does it go now? Its leadership has been decapitated and knows that the White House wants a Western-friendly nation installed in Tehran, as do the population of Iran. It is, therefore, backed up against the wall and Donald Trump, has them cornered. It is, however, difficult to get an accurate impression of what is going on within the country because there is no reporting coming from within Iran. The internet is down, so at this point all one can go on is the bombardment that is taking place. Ultimately, the Iranians would be well-placed to try and find some sort of last-minute, face-saving deal, if they possibly can.

From an Iranian perspective, the Strait of Hormuz is almost the last card they have on the table, not least because it is a source of income for them. The Americans, however, are not the major purchaser of Iranian oil through the Straits of Hormuz. The greatest challenge that may emerge in terms of people suddenly realizing that they are running low on supplies comes from China and it will be interesting to see the approach that China takes if this does continue unabated. There have been reports of several vessels being able to transit the Strait of Hormuz in the last day or two, so it will be interesting to see to where they are headed and the extent to which China gets brought into this if its own oil supplies begin to dwindle, as is increasingly likely.

Whilst the United States is not directly affected by the oil supplies coming through the Strait of Hormuz, it is directly affected by the price of crude oil, and that has a knock-on effect on the price of petrol in the United States. It has gone up over a dollar a gallon in the last month, rising to a price point it was under the Biden administration, so it is quite amusing to hear Democrats lament the cost of petrol when it was perfectly okay when their president was in office. Indeed, many Democrats were indeed saying they would pay $12 a gallon if it helped improve the environment. Donald Trump is clearly suffering in the polls because of this foreign policy escapade, and I am sure everybody in the White House would like to see this rectified just as quickly as possible. But at this point, they really do have to go for broke, otherwise many people will be asking, “Why have you gone in and not gained the regime change that American presidents have been seeking for the last 40 years?”