Last year it was China’s answer to tariffs, now it’s Iran’s retaliation to airstrikes – ‘America First’ keeps foundering on global economics
D
onald Trump is teaching the world a lesson, but not the one he thinks. The attack on Iran was meant to be a dazzling display of military supremacy. It has instead illuminated chinks in the US’s armour.
The US president’s formidable arsenal cannot summon up an insurrection from Iran’s tyrannised and leaderless opposition. It cannot force merchant ships to run a gauntlet of missile and drone attacks in the strait of Hormuz. The government in Tehran and the facts of geography that give it leverage over global trade are unchanged. Trump’s exasperation is showing. He urges tanker crews to “show some guts” by sailing into harm’s way. He calls on Nato members to provide naval chaperones and accuses them of cowardice and ingratitude for refusing. He comes across as peevish and flustered. Impotence is not a good look in a potentate.
The war has been a masterclass in strategic myopia in Washington. For the Iranian leadership, survival now counts as a kind of victory. For Benjamin Netanyahu, a friendlier regime in Iran was desirable, but a hostile one whose capacity to menace Israel has been reduced to rubble is an acceptable second-choice outcome. But that is not adequate compensation to Trump. He is burning dollars and haemorrhaging prestige every day that the Islamic Republic constricts the flow of oil and gas to the global economy.
