Are Iran and US headed to war?
The Americans believe eventually the Iranians will be forced back to renegotiate with them, but will Iran play ball?
Saturday 20 July 2019 09:07, UK
While America brings down an Iranian drone, the Iranians have offered the US an olive branch.
Should we be encouraged or worried? Is this crisis heading towards peace or war?
Iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif has told the Americans his government will allow in more rigorous inspections of its nuclear programme (which it insists is peaceful and civilian), if the US eases sanctions.
This is almost certainly going to be rebuffed but that is not the end of the story. The Trump administration says sanctions will only be lifted "once Iran gives up its nuclear ambitions", in the words of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
The US will see the offer as a sign of weakness from an Iranian government buckling under the pressure of its ever tightening sanctions.
The Americans believe eventually the Iranians will be forced back to renegotiate with them, even though the US has reneged on the Iranian nuclear deal or JCPOA despite having signed up to it after five years of tortuously difficult negotiations.
Diplomats in Europe are not so sanguine. They see the Iranians going in the opposite direction. Far from yielding to pressure, their behaviour is becoming more meddlesome, their rhetoric more belligerent.
And the US policy appears to be strengthening their position at home. Some 18 months after social unrest rocked cities across Iran, there are signs of greater unity against the aggression of the Great Satan, as Iranians refer to the US.
But here is the but. Iranians are past masters at hedging their bets. Mr Zarif's gambit leaves the door open to negotiations resuming.
The optimistic interpretation of recent tensions, mysterious tanker attacks, naval encounters, seizure of shipping, is this is all pre-negotiation posturing.
Eventually negotiations will have to start again and each side is currently strengthening its hand ahead of that happening.
The pessimistic view is all this is heading towards war. Donald Trump may have campaigned against US adventurism in the Middle East, it is argued, but it might serve his purpose to find a distraction.
Even without that "wag the dog" scenario, events may escalate anyway, beyond the control of either Washington or Tehran.
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The Strait of Hormuz is narrow and congested. The Iranians are using military speedboats to harass a superpower's fleet and its ally's, the Royal Navy. It takes only one collision and the ensuing loss of life to turn an accident into a casus belli.
Neither side may want war but such a clash may lead unstoppably to conflict. And with each encounter that becomes more likely.