THE LOGIC OF THE IRANIAN ESCALATION I have been complaining for three months that Iran’s theory of victory was no longer viable. While it neutralized US escalation threats with tit-for-tat counters, it relied on the Hormuz squeeze to force the US into capitulation on the Hormuz question. Once Iran lost the Battle of Hormuz and flows returned to prewar levels, it was clear that this was not going to work. The costs that they were able to impose through the Hormuz squeeze were incommensurate with their ask. The US was not going to surrrender the Gulf to Iran because oil was around 100 dollars a barrel. The Iranians tried for a while to regain control of Hormuz by striking more and more tankers. That failed. Now they have given up on that idea. The Iranians have now declared that instead of hitting tankers, they will his US bases in the region if the US continues the game of cat and mouse. This is a decisive escalation. It is decisive because it forces a strategic decision. In effect, the Iranians have come around to my view and are now seeking a strategic decision. The US cannot back off because of the threat itself. Iran actually has to hit US bases to show that it means business. Once that happens, the US is left with only two options: concede on the Hormuz ask or try to defeat Iran. What they cannot do is absorb the losses Iran can inflict on US bases. This was always the logic of my argument that they needed a strategic counterbase offensive to persuade the US to capitulate on the Hormuz question. The Adminstration thought it could wait until the after the midterms to sort this out. That is no longer possible. Fittingly, the best option for the Administration now is to embrace Bibi's Hail Mary pass. It's not going to get them anywhere. The renewal of high intensity war will impose high costs on all three warring parties (unless the Israelis chicken out, not an unlikely scenario), and all bystanders. But ultimately, after all the damage is done, we will have to go back to the table. It is now hard to see how the US can avoid a second strategic defeat. The problem remains that the balance of resolve favors Iran. The only way around it was to disarm Iran and reduce it to a nuissance. Already in March, that was shown to be impossible. So we might be looking at the endgame here. The US will expend more weapons, deplete more of its magazine, lose operational use of more of its bases, until eventually it will give up and realize that the second missile age simply does not admit an American sphere of influence near a great missile power.