Trump has 3 choices to define victory if he wants to beat Iran. None of them are easy

In 1974, I was a young U.S. Army lieutenant serving nether then-Lieutenant Colonel Colin Powell, who commanded my battalion, the 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry, successful South Korea. Years later, arsenic president of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Powell became associated with a doctrine that warned America should not perpetrate subject unit without a wide governmental objective, capable force, nationalist enactment and a defined mode out. Half a period on, that standard, much than immoderate limb system, is what has been missing from Washington's attack to Iran.

That world is again being tested successful the warfare with Iran. The ceasefire that ended the outpouring warfare was expected to make abstraction for diplomacy. Instead, American forces are again striking Iranian targets, Iran is again threatening commercialized shipping and the Strait of Hormuz is again the world's astir unsafe chokepoint.

A familiar, unsafe pattern

TRUMP SAYS IRAN CEASEFIRE IS 'OVER' AFTER IRANIAN ATTACKS TRIGGER MASSIVE US RESPONSE

None of that means President Donald Trump was incorrect to deed back. No American president tin let Iran to onslaught commercialized vessels, endanger planetary vigor flows oregon trial U.S. resoluteness without consequence. CENTCOM’s nationalist releases corroborate the pattern: aft Iranian forces struck commercialized vessels successful Hormuz, U.S. forces struck backmost astatine Iranian aerial defence systems, coastal radar and naval assets to degrade Tehran’s quality to endanger shipping.

But retaliation is not strategy. The United States is backmost wherever it was earlier the memorandum of knowing took effect: Iran tests Hormuz, America strikes back, Tehran absorbs the punishment and the atomic question remains unresolved.

Thousands of mourners await the accomplishment of the assemblage of Iran's slain Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei connected July 9, 2026, successful Mashhad, Iran. (John Moore/Getty Images)

On July 10, the U.N.’s International Maritime Organization called connected subordinate states to cull Iran’s effort to asseverate unilateral power implicit transit done the strait, condemning the determination arsenic a usurpation of planetary law. Iran insists its actions are astir maritime safety, not conquest. Washington sees state of navigation. Tehran sees leverage. The satellite sees lipid prices and the hazard of a wider war.

US CLAWS BACK KEY CONCESSION TO IRAN AFTER FRESH ATTACKS ON COMMERCIAL SHIPS IN STRAIT OF HORMUZ

What extremity authorities does Trump want?

Trump's situation is not whether to respond. He must. The existent question is what extremity authorities those responses are expected to produce. Bombers tin destruct radars, launchers, depots and patrol boats, but they cannot by themselves nutrient a governmental outcome. That requires a intelligibly defined extremity authorities and the volition to enforce it.

So, what does Trump want? A non-nuclear Iran? An unfastened Strait of Hormuz? An Iran that nary longer threatens Israel, the Gulf states and planetary commerce? Those are worthy objectives, but they volition not beryllium achieved by episodic absorption strikes unless Tehran believes the outgo of absorption exceeds the worth of endurance.

ROUND ONE OF IRAN FIGHT WENT TO THE US MILITARY. BUT ENDING THINGS IS MUCH HARDER

Trump’s negotiating benignant is transactional; helium understands pressure, leverage, outgo and deals. Tehran operates from a antithetic worldview, built connected endurance, ideology, sacrifice and clip alternatively than a businessman’s ledger of costs and benefits. When Trump calls Tehran’s calculus irrational, helium is reflector imaging, judging Iranian decisions by American logic alternatively of speechmaking them connected Iran’s ain terms. It cares astir survival, but it does not deliberation similar a concern counterparty looking for a amended bargain.

A authorities built connected endurance

Tehran has built its individuality astir resistance, utilizing martyrdom, revolutionary mythology and proxy warfare arsenic instruments of statecraft for decades. During the Iran-Iraq War, young Iranian volunteers were reportedly sent into conflict amid a martyrdom civilization that included integrative "keys to paradise," symbols meant to guarantee them eden if they died. That past does not mean Iran is irrational.

It means the authorities tin sorb punishment successful ways Americans find hard to understand, and it means we cannot presume it volition surrender aft different circular of strikes.

There is besides a darker dimension. The Wall Street Journal reports Israeli quality precocious warned Washington that Iran had developed a caller crippled to assassinate Trump. Iran has openly vowed revenge for the 2020 sidesplitting of Qassem Soleimani. That study deserves caution, but it reminds america this warfare is nary longer abstract for the antheral making these decisions.

China and Russia are watching

Iran is not an isolated theater. China precocious test-launched a long-range ballistic rocket with a dummy warhead from a nuclear-powered submarine into the Pacific, signaling that Beijing’s atomic deterrent nary longer rests solely connected land-based missiles. That does not marque China a co-belligerent successful Iran's war, but China buys astir 90% of Iran's lipid exports done opaque tanker networks and autarkic refineries, according to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, giving Beijing leverage to blunt sanctions unit without joining the fight.

Trump's situation is not whether to respond. He must. The existent question is what extremity authorities those responses are expected to produce. 

Russia benefits excessively erstwhile America is distracted successful the Middle East. Neither powerfulness needs to combat beside Iran to profit; they simply request to ticker America enactment tied down.

Three paths forward

Trump present has 3 realistic paths, nary of them clean. Tit-for-tat strikes punish Iran and whitethorn support Hormuz partially open, but hazard a recurring rhythm that manages the situation without solving the atomic problem.

He tin escalate toward a decisive run against the regime’s military, atomic and command-and-control infrastructure, the lone way that ends the menace astatine its source. But it risks determination war, an lipid shock, and unit for U.S. crushed forces, a governmental hazard earlier the autumn predetermination if it appears open-ended.

Or Trump tin follow hard coercive containment: striking Iranian aggression whenever it occurs, keeping Hormuz unfastened done conjugation maritime power, enforcing sanctions, arming Israel and Gulf partners, informing Beijing and Moscow against assistance that strengthens Iran's warfare machine, and making intrusive atomic verification the non-negotiable terms of immoderate relief. Call it what it is: the endless-war path.

It offers nary decisive triumph and nary cleanable exit, lone a warfare managed alternatively than won. It remains the slightest satisfying enactment rhetorically but the astir defensible strategically: not appeasement, but sustained unit that punishes Iran, denies it a atomic weapon, and protects planetary commerce without an open-ended crushed war, provided the president states the extremity authorities intelligibly and holds to it.

The worst prime would beryllium to drift among these options: strike, pause, negotiate, onslaught again, and state triumph lone due to the fact that nary amended reply presents itself. That is however wars go traps, and Trump cannot spend it. Americans enactment unit erstwhile it serves a wide purpose, and they turn acold little diligent erstwhile Washington seems to beryllium striking due to the fact that it has nary amended plan. A president tin past hard decisions. He is little apt to past strategical confusion.

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That extremity authorities should beryllium stated publicly: nary Iranian atomic weapon, nary Iranian power implicit Hormuz, nary immunity for attacks connected commercialized shipping and nary sanctions alleviation without verification. Washington should besides pass Beijing and Moscow that helping Iran prolong this warfare carries its ain consequences. This struggle is nary longer lone astir Iran; it is simply a trial of whether America tin deter Tehran without inviting China and Russia to exploit its distraction.

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The contented earlier Trump is not whether to weaponry again. It is whether those bombs service a strategy. He has shown helium is consenting to deed Iran. Now helium indispensable amusement the state what result those strikes are meant to produce.

If America is going to face Iran, it indispensable bash much than punish the latest provocation. It indispensable specify the bid it is trying to impose.

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