A U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports is causing significant economic harm to Iran. The blockade is President Donald Trump’s main leverage toward forcing Tehran into a new nuclear accord.
Still, Iran’s own closure of the Strait of Hormuz energy transit chokepoint continues to cause global economic harm. U.S. allies in Europe are suffering amid rising energy costs. Government bailouts are being prepared, and economic projections reconsidered. Predictably, however, European leaders remain beholden to their favored strategy for international crisis resolution: talking in circles. This “talk” centers on efforts led by United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron.
To be clear, Trump has shown profound foolishness in deriding British military sacrifices in Afghanistan, threatening the Danish allied territory of Greenland, and now questioning the status of the U.K.’s Falkland Islands territory. That said, Starmer sucker punched the special relationship by prevaricating over U.S. use of British military bases. Starmer wants his talks to make Trump believe he’s serious about helping to resolve this crisis. Starmer and Macron claim their plan will involve 30 nations in helping to secure the Strait of Hormuz once a durable ceasefire is in place.
The problem is that their plan is distinctly unserious.
For a start, it reeks of weakness. Iran has recently launched or plotted numerous terrorist attacks on European soil. It engages in highly aggressive cyberattacks on European interests. It has attacked the European Union territory of Cyprus during this war. It has deliberately obstructed lawful energy supplies that are crucial to the prosperity and safety of European nations. All of this should have led the Europeans to help defend international shipping in the strait weeks ago. Instead, the French have deployed an otherwise impressive task force to sit in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. The British dithered and have subsequently struggled to send even one warship to the region.
Similarly, the U.K. and France have gone to great pains to note that their Hormuz plan carries no interest in challenging Iranian aggression. The U.K. defense secretary emphasized on Wednesday that the plan was “independent [from U.S. operations] and strictly defensive.” A U.K. defense spokesperson also noted that the plan centered on “escort and reassurance; it is not a mission designed for offensive interdiction or punitive strikes.”
Thanks for clarifying.
This is catnip to Iranian aggression and American disenchantment. It deserves the derision it is receiving from the Pentagon.
To be effective, any European Hormuz mission must be scaled in capability and durable in its ability to resist Iranian threats. On its face, this plan does not meet either of those requirements. More obvious is the absence of specific details after weeks of talks. And while the Europeans have an incentive to separate themselves from what their populations regard as “Trump’s foolish war,” they also have a strategic interest in showing Trump that they are not idle witnesses to Iran’s destabilization of international commerce and order. “International order” is something that the Europeans revel in talking about, for example.
The point bears emphasizing. While Iranian retaliation against U.S. military bases and Israeli/Sunni Arab interests across the Middle East (notwithstanding Iran’s penchant for attacking civilian targets) can be characterized as retaliation against combatant adversaries, the same cannot be said of Iran’s closure of the strait. Iran is trying to maximize economic pain on the international community. And the blunt truth is that Europe has shown itself impotent in the face of this serious attack on its interests.
As my 101-year-old grandfather observed to me this week, Europe’s response amounts to “a lot of yak yak yak, no action.” Europe appears politically and functionally impotent to defend its interests. The situation speaks volumes about the paper-thin thematic underpinning of Macron’s much vaunted ambition to boost Europe’s “strategic autonomy.” But it also underlines a key, enduring point of friction between the U.S. and Europe. Namely, that European powers love to use fancy meetings and press releases to conceal their functional inaction.
ECONOMIC INTELLIGENCE ON IRAN AND CHINA IS SHAPING TRUMP’S STRATEGY
Perhaps this naval mission will end up providing tangible benefits to security in the strait. Perhaps it will thus be restorative of a degree of trans-Atlantic trust and confidence. But I doubt it.
NATO still holds great value on both sides of the Atlantic, but the Europeans should look in the mirror as they wail about Trump’s sometimes idiotic rhetoric.