Trump’s options: The US waits as Israel pounds Iran

CHRIS STEPHEN WRITES: The US president is letting Israel take the lead — but one misstep from Tehran and massive military power is poised to strike

By Chris Stephen

The X-factor in the Israel-Iran war is the possibility of US military intervention. While Donald Trump has yet to announce if America will join Israel’s bombing campaign, he has amassed massive forces in the region ready to strike.

Just days after Israel began its air strikes, the US deployed 27 aerial refuelling tankers to the Middle East, enabling a powerful fleet of strike aircraft already stationed in the region to conduct long-range bombing missions.

Substantial US naval forces are near the Persian Gulf, bolstered by elements of the Pacific fleet, including the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz. Britain has also deployed air assets, along with its largest naval combat fleet in many years.

These ships and planes were positioned weeks in advance, suggesting the US and U.K. believed Israel’s offensive was not just possible, but likely.

All this military power is focused on one concern: the threat that Iran might try to close the Strait of Hormuz to oil tanker traffic.

Iran wouldn’t need to physically block the strait, which is only 21 nautical miles wide at its narrowest. It could simply mimic its Houthi proxies in the Red Sea, launching land-based missiles at tankers. That would send insurance rates soaring and halt tanker traffic. Which, in turn, would trigger the only foreign policy threat Trump truly worries about — skyrocketing oil prices. The threat of Iran strangling global oil supply by targeting tankers in this narrow Gulf chokepoint has haunted every US president since Jimmy Carter.

It may seem counterintuitive that Iran’s regime — under attack from Israeli air strikes and widely despised at home — would invite even more enemies. But the logic of threatening Hormuz is simple: attacking the global oil market can bring diplomatic leverage, because no world leader wants their economy crippled by $200-per-barrel oil.

In the past, Tehran might have used the Hormuz threat to pressure Washington into restraining Israel. But times have changed.

Iran’s reliance on proxy militias — Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis — has alarmed other regional states. These groups aren’t just attacking Israel; Saudi Arabia has been locked in a proxy war with Iran in Yemen for more than a decade. Riyadh would welcome the weakening of Tehran’s reach.

Other Arab nations, including Jordan, have quietly supported Israel’s war effort. Despite condemning the Gaza campaign in public, they’ve opened their airspace to Israeli jets and shot down Iranian drones heading the other way.

That same mood is increasingly present in Washington, where the Gulf has long been a quagmire of frustration for American presidents. The US waged a de facto war with Iran in the 1980s after Iranian forces attacked US-flagged tankers. American forces bombed oil platforms and sank several Iranian warships. Many seasoned diplomats in D.C. now see a chance to finally break this regime.

But that doesn’t mean America is necessarily about to join Israel’s bombing campaign. Trump is at the moment playing the corner man in this fight — cheering from the sidelines as Israel batters its opponent. Only if Iran steps out of the ring will Trump throw a punch. But off the table is any notion of him becoming an honest broker, with his tweets today calling for Tehran’s unconditional surrender seemingly ruling-out a return to the peace table.

Iran’s military around the Strait includes hundreds of small missile boats and sea mines. British mine sweepers have been stationed in Bahrain since 2013 — paid for by Bahrain — to guard against exactly this scenario.

But the most serious threat comes from Iran’s land-based anti-ship missiles, particularly Chinese-made Silkworms. These weapons are hard to detect and easy to move. Iran’s long Gulf coastline allows launchers to travel undetected in trucks, making them difficult to pin down.

That’s one reason why the US — with Britain close behind — has assembled such an overwhelming force. To protect tanker routes, it must be ready to strike wherever and whenever a missile launcher appears.

American aircraft carriers will remain in deeper waters, while their jets refuel mid-air with support from the tanker fleet based in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE.

Flotillas of smaller warships — destroyers and frigates — are meanwhile ready to patrol the Gulf. Their helicopters, guided missiles, and naval guns can neutralize missile boats and shore launchers, even if they all come at once.

A ground invasion is not in the cards. But US Marines and Navy SEALs could conduct raids on Iranian coastal installations or disrupt key highways used to move missile trucks.

The other reason for the size of this force is basic military doctrine: if your enemy attacks you in one place, have the forces to strike him back in another. That’s where the deployment of B-52s, B-2 stealth bombers, and long-range cruise missiles comes in — many based out of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.

The B-2 garners special attention because it carries the GBU-57 “bunker buster” bomb. Officially called the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (nicknamed the “Mother of All Bombs”), it can destroy heavily fortified underground facilities like Iran’s Fordow nuclear site, buried under a mountain.

But Iran’s leadership fears another use of the bomb: assassinations. A big feature of Israel’s bombing campaign is how it always seems to know where to find Iranian leaders it wants to target. In the first hours, Israeli jets wiped out Iran’s entire air force general staff in their bunker—suggesting an insider tip-off.

Iran’s leaders know their regime is riddled with informants, meaning they can run, but not necessarily hide. They know also that the MOAB works not just by gouging out a crater but blasting a colossal shockwave that can collapse even the deepest shelters.

Trump likely believes Israel can win this war alone because Iran will run out of missiles before Israel runs out of bombs. Even if Fordow remains intact, the destruction of other facilities may cripple Iran’s nuclear ambitions. And with US forces poised to retaliate if the war expands, Tehran is effectively boxed-in. That, anyway, is the theory. American presidents are limited by Congress from starting unprovoked wars and unilaterally joining the fray might see Trump fall foul of the law. Equally, if Iran’s regime seems to be tottering and in need of a final nudge, the president may be tempted to use American firepower to provide it and face the legal consequences later.

But at least for now, Trump appears to be following the playbook of George H.W. Bush’s 1991 war with Saddam Hussein. The goal back then wasn’t regime change — it was to remove the threat. For Trump, the same logic applies. In simple terms, if you can’t remove a troublesome regime, at least pull out its teeth.

Chris Stephen , a veteran war correspondent in Libya, Iraq, and many other places, is also an expert on oil politics and international law. He is the author of The Future of War Crimes Justice, published in February 2024 by Melville House (London and New York) and Judgement Day: The Trial of Slobodan Milosevic (Atlantic Books, New York, 2005).