The Iran war turns out to be both harder and more necessary than Americans expected

Iran doves in past U.S. administrations hoped that a mix of conciliation and deterrence would allow America to coexist with Iran. 

Those hopes reflected confidence that Iran’s sophisticated civil society would ultimately either overthrow the Islamic Republic or drive its evolution in a more moderate direction. 

Iran hawks united around two ideas. 

The first was that the commitment of Tehran’s rulers to dominate the Gulf made long-term coexistence between Washington and the mullahs impossible. 

The hawks’ second point was that the security of the Gulf remains a vital American interest. 

We may not need its oil and gas ourselves, but between the consequences to the American economy and financial markets of an interruption in supply to key economic partners and allies and the importance of certain non-oil imports from the region (like fertilizer), the U.S. needs to keep the Gulf open.

Currently, Iran’s ability, at least temporarily, to close the Gulf and inflict major damage on its neighbors, even after airstrikes from Israel and the U.S., underscores the unacceptable danger that Iran’s military power poses to the region. 

So here we are. Despite military successes by air and sea, Israel and the U.S. have so far been unable to keep the Gulf open or to protect the Gulf states from Iranian attacks.

Domestically, Democrats are mostly locked into opposing a war that many doves think the president could and should have avoided. 

Walter Russell Mead WSJ March 23, 2026

https://www.wsj.com/opinion/hawks-and-doves-got-iran-wrong-4af36874

Diskussioner pågår bland Natos medlemmar om vilken som är den bästa strategin för att få i gång fartygstrafiken i Hormuzsundet.

Diskussioner pågår bland Natos medlemmar om vilken som är den bästa strategin för att få i gång fartygstrafiken i Hormuzsundet

Edward Luce, Trumphatet och Englunds Lag

https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/03/edward-luce-trumphatet-och-englunds-lag.html