As of mid-week, the US and Iran were closing in on a deal, according to Donald Trump. “We’re in the final stages,” he said. “We’ll see what happens.”
Markets took that to mean the conflict’s likely nearing some manner of resolution, but during the same remarks, Trump threatened, in no uncertain terms, to resume military strikes as soon as this weekend.
“Either [we] have a deal or we’re going to do some things that are a little bit nasty,” he went on. “Ideally, I’d like to see few people killed, as opposed to a lot [but] we can do it either way.”
The US military, Trump emphasized, is “ready to go” in the event he doesn’t get “the right answers” from the “brotherhood” of current and former IRGC commanders running the country with supporting roles for a few senior clerics.
The “brotherhood” characterization comes from UT Chattanooga professor Saeid Golkar, an expert on the Guards. Golkar spoke to The New York Times for a short biographical piece on Bagher Ghalibaf, Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr, Mohammad Ali Jafari, Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei and Ahmad Vahidi, all of whom, you’ll note, have been profiled in these pages extensively (see the linked articles).
Trump indicated he’s willing to give diplomacy “a few days” to iron out remaining wrinkles in a provisional agreement to end the conflict, but Iran’s nuclear program, and particularly the fate of its near-bomb-grade uranium, remains a point of contention.
Earlier this month, Benjamin Netanyahu was unequivocal: The war isn’t over until that enriched uranium’s removed. Trump made promises to Netanyahu in that regard, and it isn’t clear he can make good on them.
About the best Trump can hope for from the Guards is an arrangement that transfers some of the material — which is widely believed to be in storage under Isfahan — to a neutral country, while the rest is diluted.
But on Thursday, a pair of senior Iranian officials told Reuters that Mojtaba Khamenei — or whatever’s left of Mojtaba Khamenei — told the Guards the country’s uranium “should not be sent abroad.” So that’s out, I suppose.
The same article reminded readers that Israeli officials previously said Trump gave Netanyahu assurances that the material would be “sent out of Iran and that any peace deal must include a clause” specifying as much.
The Guards have become more distrusting of The White House during Trump’s second term, as the US repeatedly attacked the regime after, and on at least two occasions, during, negotiations.
The good news is, “the two sides have started to narrow some gaps,” according to Reuters’ sources, who also indicated the regime remains open, in theory anyway, to the idea of diluting the uranium stockpile under IAEA supervision.
But the official position from inside Mojtaba’s bunker is apparently that none of the material will leave Iran. Unless it’s on a warhead.
I’m just joking on that latter bit. I hope.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg said Iran and Oman are in the process of establishing “some form of permanent toll system” in a bid to “formalize” control over the Strait of Hormuz.
Is this a bit of a powerplay developing between the the military/religious factions?
Nah, there’s no distinction. None of those guys want to ship that uranium out of Iran. Hell, I doubt even the moderates are excited about that idea.
” You say Uranium, we say say Iranium”.
I’ve stopped paying attention to Trump’s daily or even hourly U-turns, as he oscillates between striking out and slinking away. Whatever he says or does, just wait a day and he’ll reverse himself, the picture of frustrated irrelevance.
The US has lost all momentum and credibility while Trump is desperately looking for a way out, while Iran is acting like it has the upper hand and probably does. Xi offered Trump no help and just days later, Chinese tankers pointedly transited the Iran-controlled SoH.
It is pretty apparent that even if Trump orders some petulant airstrikes and sends destroyers performatively scurrying in and out of the Gulf, he will not order a signification ground operation at the SoH or the nuclear material. It is very apparent that airstrikes alone will not change Iran’s mind, unless to such an extent that Iran will use the rest of its missiles (70% of the pre-war stock, says US intelligence) on Gulf oil & gas infrastructure and there goes the global economy.
I’m sure Trump promised Netanyahu things but so what?
I think most likely near-term outcome is some MOU or LOI napkin scribble that ends the war in return for Iran’s promise to entertain future negotiations while it tightens SoH control and enjoys sanction-free oil exports and some of its frozen funds. With every month that we get closer to the midterms, Iran knows that Trump will be less able to start a new war.
So the market is right, the Iran war is effectively over, and the market is wrong, the global energy crisis is not over.
I would think that, if Israel can identify the location of every person of any political importance in Iran, then they must know the exact location of the uranium. If it is under Isfahan, then a strike would potentially kill a lot of people. A bunker buster would then become a sort of dirty bomb as it blew the uranium into a cloud over the city.