The Strait of Hormuz, although extensively analyzed both abroad – where such issues are pressing from their inception and not after the fact – and domestically – in a context that for decades now seems entrenched and sees us addressing it despite the abundance of highly capable international relations experts always with significant delay – resembles a triple noose… On one hand, the lever Tehran has chosen to pressure the US, its allies, and the entire West now seems to be “strangling” not only the capital that Iran cannot import by selling oil to its “own,” and on the other hand the US, which suddenly responded with a blockade to a blockade, is unable to “sell” domestically a victory that would have been impossible to achieve under the terms with which President Trump chose to start a war that none of his predecessors wanted or dared before him.

As for the “third parties,” those for whom these critical economic and energy straits are part either of survival or development, much has also been written, but far less has been done to normalize the situation – because resolving it primarily requires sacrifices…

With what Washington is attempting today and the new presidential plan to open the straits, it is impossible – that is a given – to remain in a state of ceasefire. Trump’s “Freedom” plan, which envisions American ships and military forces monitoring this passage in order to enforce its opening, is a plan that will bring more war, chaos, and above all imbalance, in an era that already has a surplus of exactly that element…

Trump’s plan is yet another attempt to drag Tehran into a negotiation that has been made clear will not take place. Iran has suffered many significant blows; it is a country where, internally, forces unrelated to governance are struggling to prevail for the first time in 47 years, and where US and Israeli strikes have given them the upper hand. The Revolutionary Guards bear no resemblance even to Iran’s “heavy theocratic” past and have absolutely no hesitation in choosing war whenever it is what keeps them in real, rather than formal – nominal – power. The new American plan is based on flawed premises, and just like the start of the war, even if we assume it will not fail, we can argue that it will be equally difficult to succeed.

The American President, who does not want a “bridge agreement” and is pushing for everything to be agreed – primarily nuclear issues, as he claims – insists on using the same methods that in practice have proven to certainly “hurt” Iran but not break it.

On the opposite side, the new regime has suddenly shifted from the narrative of “resistance” and “victory” to facing an enemy that last December brought thousands of Iranians into the streets – some of whom paid with their lives – protesting the country’s economic collapse, which after decades of sanctions stands on the brink of economic disaster. For 28 days now, American bombs are no longer falling on Iran, but survival remains harder to manage than facing American and Israeli next-generation fighter jets. After all, it is clear that even if slim, there are chances of surviving an airstrike; from hunger and poverty, there is no escape…

The so-far absent new leader and the Guards acting in his stead cannot answer a question crucial to the country’s own stability – one that the US is clearly exploiting by pushing toward a new, more massive social upheaval.

The mistake of the US and Israel here as well is that, by sweeping through on a war scale, they first planted alongside survival and fear the sense that perhaps there is ultimately no meaning in striving for real change. Who could blame an Iranian dissident when the choices practically offered to them over the past three months have been death by American weapons or by the theocratic regime? Iranian society is unable to mobilize primarily due to both internal and external violence, and this “paralysis” is a condition that is very difficult to overcome.

In conclusion, the solution for both poles would clearly be peace – but peace in conflicts of this scale presupposes concessions or even sacrifices. None of the parties involved, for different reasons, is willing to make them, and none seems to realize that the current situation leads to losses for both. The US cannot win with Trump’s approach and doctrine, and Iran, although it cannot be completely defeated, is equally unable to continue resisting as a theocracy – not as its people – in a situation that leads nowhere better. The stalemate is evident and clear for both sides, with entirely different consequences. The question at stake remains timeless and completely detached from the geographical location of the crisis: how do you win by losing?