Now that the US-Israeli war with Iran has caused an economic crisis, Donald Trump wants all of the countries he has been trying to bully to bail him out.
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Donald Trump has spent the past year turning allies into adversaries, picking fights with (former) friends and foes alike, withdrawing from international treaties, trying to bully smaller countries into giving the US more favorable trade terms, and starting a war that threatens to upend the global economy.
On Saturday, the president seemed to realize that he will need the help of some of these countries to dampen the impact of the calamitous decision to attack Iran without a clear plan in place to protect maritime traffic in the Strait of Hormuz.
The waterway, the narrowest part of which runs along Iran’s coast, is vital to moving oil and liquefied natural gas from the Middle East to the rest of the world. Ordinarily, about 20 percent of these resources are transported through the Strait of Hormuz. Now, that figure is closer to zero as ships remain moored on either end of it due to concerns that Tehran will attack them if they try to navigate this bottleneck.
As a result, oil prices have soared. And not only that. The cost of other key commodities, like fertilizer, has also increased sharply, which will have a lasting effect on the global economy for weeks and months to come.
This has apparently finally also dawned on Trump, whose approval ratings have plummeted over the past year in part because he has not lowered the cost of living as promised. Instead, the president’s tariffs have made things more expensive, inflation largely remains unchanged from the end of the Biden administration, and now gas prices are skyrocketing.
The obvious solution to easing the pain consumers are feeling already (and will feel more in the coming days and weeks) is to try to get maritime traffic moving through the Strait of Hormuz again.
And while Trump declared on Saturday that the US and Israel “have already destroyed 100 percent of Iran’s Military capability,” that is clearly wishful thinking.
The past few days have shown that Tehran clearly still has the capability to attack the ships in the Strait of Hormuz.
That is why the president is now asking other countries to do his dirty work and keep tankers and freighters moving again.
“The United States of America has beaten and completely decimated Iran, both Militarily, Economically, and in every other way, but the Countries of the World that receive Oil through the Hormuz Strait must take care of that passage, and we will help — A LOT!” he wrote in a social media post.
Trump, who famously goes back on his word all the time and is not a reliable ally, said the US would coordinate with these countries.
“This should have always been a team effort, and now it will be — It will bring the World together toward Harmony, Security, and Everlasting Peace!” the president added.
What Trump conveniently ignores is not only that he withdrew from the agreement that had kept nuclear weapons out of the hands of Iran, but also that the reason this wasn’t a “team effort” is solely because of him (and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu).
In a second post, also intended to calm jittery markets, he claimed that “many countries” will send warships to keep the waterway open and specifically mentioned a few countries that he wants to contribute to this effort to clean up his mess.
“Hopefully China, France, Japan, South Korea, the UK, and others, that are affected by this artificial constraint, will send Ships to the area so that the Hormuz Strait will no longer be a threat by a Nation that has been totally decapitated,” he said.
Meantime, in an interview with MS NOW, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Saturday that the Strait of Hormuz is open to most ships.
“It is only closed to the tankers and ships belong[ing] to our enemies, to those who are attacking us and their allies,” he said. “Others are free to pass.”
Araghchi acknowledged that many of them may choose not to do so because of “security concerns” that are unrelated to Iran.
A video feed from China’s state-run English language TV channel CGTN that purports to show traffic in the Strait of Hormuz shows very limited movement.
It would be interesting to see what would happen if ships coming to and from a country like China, which is friendly with Tehran, were able to pass through the bottleneck. That would certainly make a difference to the eagerness of others to come to Trump’s aid.
Another question is whether all of the countries that the US president has tried to bully over the past year will realize that they have real leverage over him now.
Trump is desperate to get this situation under control. With the midterms coming up later this year, he cannot afford for prices to keep going up and his poll numbers to keep going down.
If other countries want to help, they should attach some strings to that assistance. After all, that’s what Trump would do.