Two months after the U.S. began a punishing air assault on Iran, President Donald Trump has scarcely progressed past the same spot he was at on Feb. 28: waiting for Iran to surrender.
Trump and Iran’s hard-line leaders both appear to be overestimating how close their opponent is to capitulating — driving their countries toward economic calamity as the worst energy crisis in history approaches a point experts say cannot be quickly reversed.
“If the Strait of Hormuz remains shut, it’s hard for me to see gas prices ever falling below $4 a gallon,” said Gregory Brew, a senior Iran and oil analyst at the Eurasia Group. Brew suggested that Iran will be able to withstand the U.S. blockade through May and potentially for many more months, given the regime’s willingness to ignore the suffering of its people.
The U.S., meanwhile, “is somewhat insulated from this energy shock, but it is not immune from its effects,” Brew said. If the strait remains shut, he sees gas prices “climbing as high as $5 a gallon by July, the peak of the summer driving season,” with fuel and fertilizer prices rising as long as the standoff continues.
Maximalist demands on both sides, meanwhile, show no signs of softening.
Trump repeated his claim Tuesday that a U.S. blockade of Iran’s ports is devastating the country.
“Iran has just informed us that they are in a ‘State of Collapse,’” Trump wrote in a social media post. “They want us to ‘Open the Hormuz Strait,’ as soon as possible, as they try to figure out their leadership situation (Which I believe they will be able to do!).”
Olivia Wales, a White House spokesperson, declined to provide further details. “The United States will not negotiate through the press — we have been clear about our red lines and the President will only make a deal that’s good for the American people and the world,” Wales told MS NOW.
Trump has told his top advisers that he is dissatisfied with Iran’s current offer, which includes a reopening of the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for the U.S. ending its blockade of Iranian ports but contains no agreement on Iran’s nuclear program, The New York Times and Reuters reported.
His top advisers have publicly argued that Iran is under enormous pressure and said Trump canceled a trip to Pakistan by Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner for talks because Iranian officials are unable to agree on their negotiating positions.
“The Iranians are in a tough position right now,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio told MS NOW in an interview Saturday. “Their decision-makers are divided.”
But outside analysts pushed back on the administration’s confidence. With no talks imminent, they warn the standoff is becoming increasingly dangerous.
“Both sides continue to have maximalist positions and don’t want to meet until there has been compromise from the other side,” Sanam Vakil, director of the the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Chatham House, told MS NOW. “This is a very dangerous place to be because the cost of the war will continue to mount and the risk of escalation will increase by the day.”
Ali Vaez, director of the Iran Project at the International Crisis Group, said Trump’s approach to negotiating with Iran was not working.
“President Trump’s persistent conviction that pressure alone can miraculously produce Iranian capitulation has not and will not yield a diplomatic breakthrough,” Vaez told MS NOW. “Unless Tehran is offered a face-saving off-ramp, there will be no deal. This is not a contest in which one side must blink first; the challenge is to choreograph a simultaneous blink by both sides.”
The core disagreement remains Iran’s nuclear program. The Trump administration has demanded that Iran agree to hand over all of its highly enriched uranium, which it could potentially use to build a nuclear weapon. The U.S. has also asked Iran to agree to a 20-year freeze of its nuclear program. But Iran has reportedly only offered a five-year freeze.
Officials from Pakistan, which has been acting as an intermediary between the two sides, said they will continue working for a diplomatic solution.
Officials from Oman, which mediated in three rounds of talks before the war began on Feb. 28, have discussed the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz with Iranian officials. “The Iranians were constructive” and wanted to “work out something sensible” for the strait, according to a Persian Gulf diplomat with knowledge of the talks between Iran and Oman. “But first, the war has to end;”
Rubio rejected any outcome that leaves Iran with control of the strait. “I don’t think there’s a country in the world that’s in favor — other than Iran — that’s in favor of closing the Strait of Hormuz and creating a tolling system,” Rubio told MS NOW. “That’s an unacceptable outcome that can never be normalized, and that will not be normalized.”
Vaez said he believed a deal was still possible — but only if both sides were willing to make simultaneous concessions.
“Such a synchronized move could create the political space necessary for the ceasefire to take full effect and for a second round of talks in Islamabad to proceed,” he said. “But if diplomacy is to produce more than photo opportunities, both Washington and Tehran will need to climb down from maximalist positions and demonstrate a measure of flexibility that has so far been in short supply.”
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