Conrad Black: How Trump can defang Iran

U.S. President Donald Trump Photo by Alex Brandon/POOL/AFP via Getty Images

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The Iran war is now in an artificial stasis, in which practically all of the vast international coalition of people who are repelled and horrified by U.S. President Donald Trump, in the United States and elsewhere, have reflexively bought into the Iranian claim that since that ghastly regime has ostensibly survived, Iran is winning the war.

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This is a false conception. This has been the most one-sided war between serious combatants in modern history. Iran has been deprived of much of its military capacity, including related defence production, and is now being tightly blockaded by sea. American casualties have been minimal.

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Trump has threatened to destroy Iran’s bridges and electrical grid, but is understandably reluctant to take such a step without having been evidently provoked by escalated violence from Iran. He has been inconvenienced by such interventions as those of Pope Leo XIV, who has unjustly criticized the United States while whitewashing the evil and blood-stained regime in Iran. (The Holy See has also been relatively silent about the persecution of Christians in Nigeria and elsewhere, where the Trump administration has been of considerable assistance.)

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When he threatens escalation, the anti-Trump legions accuse him of barbarism and of having plunged the country into a war that cannot be won without recourse to rank inhumanity. When he turns to negotiation, it is TACO (Trump always chickens out). But Iran and all of Trump’s critics are in positions of great vulnerability.

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Trump‘s enemies, anti-Americans and critics of Israel generally have allowed the semi-clerical thugocracy in Iran not only to put over the fraud that their survival is a victory, but that the Americans have no way of winning because Iran can shut the Strait of Hormuz and generate an unsustainable worldwide energy crisis before the U.S. can strangle Iran.

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To complete and accelerate that strangulation, the United States must destroy the oil-storing and shipping capacity on Kharg Island, and seize or destroy Iran’s floating oil reserve in a number of large tankers on the high seas or at distant ports. These two steps are easily within the ability of the United States, and if they are taken, Iran will be completely bankrupt and unable to pay anybody, and particularly those who prop up the regime.

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On the other side, it will be a relatively easy task for the United States to assure the full flow of oil through the Straits of Hormuz from all exporters except Iran. This will require organizing convoys of approximately 30 tankers three times per day, placing U.S. Marines on board with equipment to take anti-drone and anti-boarding party measures and assist in any necessary damage control.

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Approximately 10 U.S. destroyers and some other specialized ships will be needed to clear underwater drones and mines ahead of the convoys. The airspace above the convoys would need to be completely controlled by U.S. jets, attack helicopters, AC-130 gunships and other specialized aircraft capable of immediately destroying swarms of small craft, drones and other intrusions. Raiding parties of elite units to repel Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps attack positions would also need to be available.