War is closer than peace right now.
After months of quasi-fighting alongside peace talks, the United States and Iran may be lurching closer to all-out war. As many as four U.S. service members were killed over the weekend in the Middle East.
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President Donald Trump is ordering more strikes in retaliation.
“The U.S. is planning for a wider war,” one U.S. official told my colleagues at The Washington Post.
What that looks like — and how effective it is — is unclear. Here’s how we got here and what could happen next.
The months-long ceasefire had always been tenuous. But it had opened the door, briefly, to the start of peace talks and a restoration of shipping through one of the world’s most important oil corridors, the Strait of Hormuz.
This month, that progress appeared to fall apart as ships were attacked in the strait, Iran targeted U.S. military bases nearby and the U.S. bombed Iranian sites in response.
Over the weekend, the U.S. military launched attacks in Iran that it said was designed to make it harder for the Iranian military to attack commercial ships passing through.
Iran appeared to retaliate. It has been launching missiles at U.S. military bases in the Middle East. Two U.S. service members were killed in Jordan, with another set of remains yet to be identified; another service member was killed in northern Iraq, The Post reports. In March, six service members were killed in a drone attack in Kuwait, and in total at least 17 have lost their lives since the conflict started in February.
The next big step would be to send U.S. troops to Iran, a dangerous and also politically risky move for Trump, given that the Iran war is already deeply unpopular with Americans.
It comes as the U.S. has a dwindling stockpile of weapons being used in the war, officials told my Post colleagues.
That could mean that an unpopular forever war — with higher energy prices — is possible. The average price of gas in the U.S. hit $4 a gallon on Monday.
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That’s a major political headache for Trump, Republicans say.
“It’s all about the cost of living for voters,” Sarah Chamberlain, president of the Republican Main Street Partnership, which supports GOP lawmakers in competitive congressional districts, said in a recent interview. “And if gas and grocery prices come back up, that’s going to be a problem.”
Despite the fighting, both sides seem to be leaving room for diplomacy, said Suzanne Maloney, director of foreign policy at the nonprofit Brookings Institution public policy organization, who has advised Republican and Democratic administrations on Iran.
Iran and the U.S. do seem to be close to reaching a deal on nuclear materials in Iran, said Mark Cancian, a military expert with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a bipartisan, nonprofit policy research organization. That was one of Trump’s several stated reasons for attacking Iran in the first place.
The strait may be trickier, both experts say. Iran is loath to give up its control over it. And despite Trump’s brief suggestion that the U.S. charge tolls for passage, most of the world doesn’t want to start a precedent in which countries can seize international waters and bring commerce to a halt. On Monday, rebels in Yemen (who are backed by Iran) announced a blockade of a nearby Red Sea oil route.
“I could imagine a situation where Iran continues to claim sovereignty but agrees to allow freedom of navigation,” Cancian said.
Maloney said that Iran may be willing to negotiate to stop the fighting, but that after Trump declared the peace deal over this month, Iran needs to see some concrete concessions from the U.S. rather than cycle between diplomacy and conflict.
“Even though they have been battered by this round,” Maloney said, “The Iranians aren’t likely to back down without some confidence that the U.S. has been deterred at least for the near term.”
Amber Phillips writes The 5-Minute Fix newsletter, a quick analysis of the day’s biggest political news. Send her an email here, or ask a question that could be featured in an upcoming newsletter.
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