Israel's Hormuz Problem

Why it's not just an American issue

From Israel’s perspective, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz presents a paradox. Israel doesn’t import Gulf oil, so is only impacted indirectly by global oil price spikes and associated economic damage, rather than the severe problems seen across Asia. The continued existence of a powerful Islamic imperialist power committed to Israel’s destruction is a far more significant – and perhaps existential – problem. Yet it was clear to anyone with access to Google or ChatGPT that Iran closing the Strait of Hormuz would pose the greatest threat to any joint Israeli/American attack on the country. Given these high stakes, why didn’t Israel ensure that the problem was accounted for?

To answer this, we first need to acknowledge a second paradox, which is that Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz is testament to just how effective the Israeli/American attack was. Over the past few decades, Iran has repeatedly flirted with full closure of the Strait, but has generally made do with more partial measures. During the Iran-Iraq War, both Iran and Iraq attacked merchant vessels in the Persian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz, but there was no full closure of the Strait. This led to Operation Earnest Will (July 24^th, 1987 – September 26^th, 1988), in which America protected Kuwaiti-owned tankers from Iranian attack. Authorized by UN Security Council Resolution 598, it was the largest naval convoy operation since World War II. Also, on April 18^th, 1988, during Operation Praying Mantis, the United States attacked Iranian naval targets in the Persian Gulf in retaliation for the mining of a U.S. warship four days earlier, the only time the U.S. Navy had sunk a major surface combatant since World War II.

Later, during the Second Lebanon War in 2006 Iran threatened to close Hormuz but never followed through. They did so again in 2008 when there was increased speculation about US/Israeli strikes during the final year of the Bush administration. Then, in January 2012, First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi threatened to close Hormuz if oil sanctions were imposed, while IRGC commanders described closure as “easier than drinking a glass of water.” In response, the United States Fifth Fleet declared that it would not allow closure under any circumstances, and Iran backed down, despite sanctions being imposed. Finally, in 2018-19, when Trump reimposed sanctions after withdrawing from the JCPOA, Iran seized tankers, shot down a US surveillance drone, and conducted limpet mine attacks on vessels in the Gulf of Oman, but did not impose a full closure. Throughout this lengthy period, the pattern remained consistent: Iran never followed through because the cost would have been too high for its own interests. It would have removed Iran’s own remaining oil export revenue, unified the world against Tehran, and invited a military response.

This time, though, the undeniable tactical success of the American/Israeli bombing and assassination campaign placed the regime in genuine existential danger, causing it to reach for its doomsday weapon, even if this meant cutting off its nose to spite its face. It also lashed out at its neighbors, including Qatar and even NATO bases in Turkey. Fearing its overthrow, the regime’s cost-benefit calculation shifted from the previous decades. For the first time, they had nothing to lose by closing the Strait, and potentially something to gain: a halt to operations, a divided world, and an economic crisis that might even result in more favorable ceasefire terms than Tehran had previously anticipated.

At the time of writing, though, and despite constant speculation - what Niall Ferguson has called the “endless almost-deal in Iran” - there is still no resolution. Which means Iran is continuing to suffer economically and its gambit has not yet paid off. There is still no “Persian Gulf Strait Authority” or oil-importing countries signing transit agreements with the Iranians. Iran has not yet secured the major improvement in its strategic position that it yearns for and that might make the massive cost it has paid for the war worth it. Even if this never comes to pass, though, the smart money - and I of course hope I will be wrong on this – is still on a deal eventually being signed without fully addressing Iran’s nuclear program in a way that would allow Israel and America to declare some sort of victory (given that the fall of the regime is off the table).

Danny Citrinowicz, a senior researcher at INSS who served for 25 years in Israel Defense Intelligence (IDI), including time as head of the Iran branch in the Research and Analysis Division (RAD), has emerged as one of the harshest critics of the war in Israel. While much of his analysis seems to portray Iran as some kind of uniquely immortal force on the stage of world history, he has argued convincingly that the only way for Israel to have achieved the maximalist aims of the war would have been to have addressed the Hormuz problem early on, soon after the decapitation attacks that assassinated Khamenei and others. How, though, might this have been achieved? Israel would have needed to convince the US to conduct rapid MCM operations, establish escort convoy infrastructure, and possibly launch pre-emptive strikes on Iranian coastal missile batteries and islands.

Even weeks into the war, the option was still on the table. Ferguson wrote that, early in April, Trump decided not to forcibly reopen the strait. He suggests that a plan to achieve this objective was presented to him by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Dan Caine, and the commander of the U.S. Central Command, Brad Cooper, and that it would have involved the deployment of thousands of special forces operators and Marines to Iranian territory and the forcible reopening of the Strait by Navy destroyers. Ferguson writes: “The reason he turned it down was the classic reason so many American presidents have recoiled from deploying “boots on the ground.” He dreaded the body bags and the coffins. He feared the stricken destroyer. Above all, he feared the media coverage and the popular revulsion. He was, in other words, like many another president before him.”

If the war does come to an end with the Iranian regime intact and the nuclear problem unresolved, the question will be whether it was worth it. It’s not my place to answer this question from America’s perspective, but from Israel’s vantage point I don’t share the view that the attack has made things worse, because this simply ignores the massive damage that has been inflicted on Iran’s military capacity, not to mention the urgency of attacking given the build-up of Iran’s missile program. No sensible country is going to pass up a free pass to wreak havoc on a sworn enemy committed to its destruction. So while this isn’t quite a case of coming at the king and missing, there will be a sense of regret at not ensuring that all the pieces were properly aligned on the chessboard before launching the war. Once again, though, this represents Israel’s perennial Achilles’ heel, of being the best in the world at planning the first 72 hours, but less good at planning week four, or eight, when the energy market is in crisis, prices are rising in America, and the Pakistanis are calling Washington.