United States President Donald Trump has stated on his social media platform Truth Social that he will not attack Iran before the November 3 midterm elections. But he also told a Republican convention in September that the conflict “is going to end immediately after the elections”, and the US military has been sending more forces to the region in recent weeks. Meanwhile, Iranian attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz have surged to their highest level since the war began, with an Iranian official telling the news agency that Tehran has begun using different offensive tactics against vessels it considers to violate its restrictions.
As control of the Strait of Hormuz remains central to the US-Iran conflict, what military options does Trump have left, and what would each cost? Al Jazeera spoke to military analysts to find out more: The US and Israel first launched an attack on Iran on February 28, triggering counterattacks by Iran against US military assets and other infrastructure in Gulf countries and Jordan in the following months. Iran also closed the Strait of Hormuz, which carried at least 20 percent of global crude and liquefied natural gas (LNG) supplies before the war, sending global energy markets into chaos.
The price of Crude Oil – the global benchmark – rose from about $72 a barrel the day before the war began to a high of nearly $120 a barrel earlier this year. On Thursday, it was trading at about $104. A June ceasefire agreement collapsed over control of the strait, and Washington has kept up a naval blockade on Iran’s southern ports while Iran has continued to attack ships attempting to pass through.
Indirect talks via Pakistan and Qatar continue – along with the exchange of various proposals from each side – but Trump rejected Iran’s latest offer to reopen the strait last month. The US has “enormous military capability that Iran can’t match”, but it has not delivered the outcomes Washington wants, Afzal Ashraf, a visiting fellow in international relations and security at Loughborough University in the United Kingdom and a former senior Royal Air Force officer who served in Iraq, told Al Jazeera. It has at least three aircraft carrier strike groups in the Gulf, or heading towards it.
The USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group, carrying about 7,000 sailors and 2,000 Marines, is sailing to the Middle East to join the carriers already there. The US also maintains a host of military assets and about 50,000 soldiers at different bases in Middle East countries. The US naval blockade on Iranian ports and the naval escorts for commercial ships it has been providing through the Strait of Hormuz are the status quo, which it can continue.
This is the most likely course of action, Patrick Bury, a senior associate professor at the University of Bath and former NATO research analyst, told Al Jazeera. Before the war began, the Strait of Hormuz typically handled about 125 large commercial vessels a day, carrying an average of 17.1 million barrels of oil. This collapsed with the closure of the strait in March.
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