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Source: https://thedispatch.com/article/iran-trump-strait-of-hormuz-weapon/
Iran's New 'Nuclear' Weapon: What Happens If the U.S. Declines to Fight for the Strait of Hormuz
(The Dispatch) Eric S. Edelman, Reuel Marc Gerecht, and Ray Takeyh - Donald Trump appears on the cusp of an agreement to demilitarize, at least temporarily, the Hormuz Strait. Ancillary to this may be certain Iranian nuclear promises and U.S. sanctions relief. Whatever the actual details of this accord are, no matter whether it later, in part or entirely, falls apart, this agreement flows directly from Tehran dueling Washington to a standstill. An indisputable truth: A massive bombing campaign by Israel and the United States has allowed Tehran to see the incomparable utility of the Strait of Hormuz as a weapon against the global economy and its primary enemies. A reanimated Islamist regime—and we don't doubt that senior commanders in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps now think they are winning—might even refuse a generous nuclear deal because it's having so much fun humbling its foes. If the Islamic Republic can hold Hormuz hostage, Tehran will severely wound America's self-confidence, reputation, and capacity. Even if some arrangement can be made to allow commercial traffic to pass without paying tolls, once most of the U.S. armada returns home, the odds of the warships returning aren't good. The odds of the Islamic Republic demanding tolls later are a near certainty. The American and Israeli killings of Iran's leaders precipitated a shift within the regime, elevating those who had grown weary of what they regarded as Ali Khamenei's nuclear timidity in the face of mounting danger. A series of articles in Javan, a mouthpiece of the Revolutionary Guards, introduced a new doctrine dubbed 'offensive deterrence.' The series began by taking a swipe at the martyred supreme leader: 'Iran's previous doctrine was defined in controlling tensions below the level of war, but the 40-day war was the starting point for deterrence through expanding the geography of crisis.' The new Iranian leaders highlighted the geographical weapon that the regime had always boasted about in its propaganda but never attempted to use: the Strait of Hormuz. The world economy's critical dependence on this route makes this source of income absolutely unsanctionable and transforms the structure of Iran's political economy from crude oil sales to sustainable transit income.' Ali Nikzad, the deputy speaker of Parliament, went so far as to declare, 'The Strait of Hormuz is Iran's atomic bomb.' Unless the United States is leaving the Middle East with its tail between its legs, a bloody struggle with the Islamic Republic will continue. Iran's revolutionary elite knows that. Do we?