Paul Adams
7.1K posts
@BBCPaulAdams
BBC Diplomatic Correspondent. Previously in Washington, Middle East and Balkans. Now a lot of Ukraine.
Please don't take this seriously because Oman won't, but there's a narrow passage in Musandam which in theory could be opened up to allow up to 25 meters draft depth for vessels to navigate through. The rocky land bridge at Maksa is only 228m wide. Suez Canal is 193km long.
It’s hard to escape the sense that the administration simply does not have a coherent strategy for Iran, and that what we are witnessing instead is a form of strategic improvisation. Washington does not want a war, yet it also does not want to appear politically weak by accepting terms associated with Iranian demands. The result is a prolonged state of limbo that deepens uncertainty in the global economy while doing little to convince Tehran to fundamentally alter its position. The constant policy shifts, contradictory public messaging, and oscillation between threats and diplomatic signaling all point to a deeper problem: the inability to build a sustainable and coherent Iran strategy. On one hand, there is fear in Washington of appearing to concede to Iran. On the other, there is growing recognition that escalation alone is unlikely to force the Iranian leadership to capitulate or accept maximalist American demands at the negotiating table. At the core of this problem lies a deeper issue — a persistent misunderstanding of how Iran’s leadership perceives pressure, deterrence, and strategic endurance. Many policymakers in Washington continue to approach Iran through frameworks developed for other geopolitical rivals, assuming that economic pressure, military threats, or diplomatic isolation will eventually produce strategic surrender. But the Iranian system has repeatedly demonstrated a high tolerance for prolonged pressure and a willingness to absorb significant costs in pursuit of regime survival and long-term strategic objectives. This disconnect helps explain why U.S. policy often appears reactive rather than strategic: alternating between coercion and de-escalation without a clearly defined end state. The administration understands the risks of military escalation, especially after years of instability across the Middle East, yet it has also boxed itself into a political environment where compromise is easily framed domestically as weakness. The consequence is a policy caught between incompatible objectives: avoiding war, avoiding concessions, maintaining deterrence, reassuring allies, and preventing regional escalation, all without a realistic framework for changing Iranian behavior. #IranWar
After a decade of fiercely attacking a previous deal with Iran, President Trump has authorized U.S. negotiators to consider a bargain that involves many of the same trade-offs one of his predecessors confronted. wapo.st/4eB9dM4
President Trump says the Strait of Hormuz is open. But do note Tehran says shipping traffic needs to follow the "coordinated route as already announced” by Iran. What's that route? My @Opinion video explainer, published originally last week, shows it.
Here’s today’s audio recording involving SANMAR HERALD (9330563).
The U.S. Faces a Strategic Deadlock with Iran The failure of the recent talks in #Islamabadtalks drives from the fact that Iran did not arrive at the negotiating table weakened or desperate. On the contrary, Tehran came with a sense of resilience, and even advantage and behaved accordingly. For weeks, the U.S. policy appears to have been guided by the assumption that sustained kinetic pressure had eroded Iran’s position enough to force meaningful concessions, particularly on uranium enrichment and freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz. But negotiations are not shaped by objective reality alone, they are driven by perception. And Iran’s perception is fundamentally different. From Tehran’s perspective, it has withstood pressure, absorbed blows, and demonstrated its capacity to retaliate across multiple arenas. That is not the mindset of a regime preparing to compromise. This gap between American expectations and Iranian self-perception now lies at the heart of a growing strategic deadlock. The options facing Washington are all "problematic": A. Renewed negotiations may simply reproduce the same dynamics, with Iran unwilling to concede and the U.S. unwilling to settle for less. B. Ending the confrontation without an agreement risks signaling weakness and undermining deterrence. Escalation, meanwhile, carries the most significant risks of all. C. A return to high-intensity conflict is unlikely to produce decisive results. While strikes on Iranian infrastructure, or even more ambitious military moves, could impose real costs on the regime, they would almost certainly trigger a broader response. Iran has both the capability and the willingness to expand the conflict horizontally, targeting U.S. interests, Israel, and regional partners. The result would not be a quick resolution, but a wider war with direct implications for global energy markets and economic stability. In other words, military escalation may satisfy the desire to reassert leverage, but it is unlikely to deliver a strategic breakthrough. This leaves Washington with a difficult but unavoidable conclusion: the burden of recalibrating strategy rests primarily on the United States. That does not mean conceding to Iranian demands. But it does require a more sober assessment of what pressure alone can achieve, and a clearer understanding of the risks embedded in escalation. The alternative is to continue operating under an illusion of leverage, one that recent events have already begun to expose. Complicating matters further are the mounting political and strategic constraints facing Washington. With a high-stakes meeting between President Trump and China’s Xi Jinping on the horizon, a global spotlight event like the Soccer World Cup approaching, and midterm elections looming, the U.S. has limited appetite, and even less time, for a prolonged military campaign. Large-scale options such as a ground invasion would require months to execute and sustain, with no guarantee of decisive results. Even extensive strikes on Iranian infrastructure, while painful, are unlikely to deliver a knockout blow. Instead, they risk entrenching the conflict and inviting retaliation across multiple fronts. Taken together, these constraints underscore a deeper reality: the United States is not just facing a tactical dilemma, but a strategic entanglement, one in which its military options are costly, its diplomatic leverage is limited, and time is increasingly working against it. Meanwhile, Iran remains defiant. The regime shows no indication that it is prepared to yield, certainly not under pressure, and not at this stage. Strategy deadlock. #IranWar
🚨Netanyahu’s statement comes after phone calls he held yesterday with President Trump and White House envoy Witkoff. Senior U.S. officials said Witkoff asked Netanyahu to “calm down” the strikes in Lebanon and open negotiations
