AA Edit | US-Israel-Iran War: Talks The Only Exit, But When?

More questions have arisen than answers can be provided to as the US struck more than 200 targets in three days in replying to Iran’s strikes on oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz and Iran responded to that by launching missiles at Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar. In the absence of clarity on the ceasefire, which US President Donald Trump hinted “is over”, and the talks which remain stalled despite assumptions that the negotiations will somehow continue.

The world is tired of this clash of egos between the US President and whoever is running Iran now as it brought the days-long funeral for their leader Ayatollah Khamenei who was killed on February 28 in the US bombing of Tehran to an emotional close. Neither Iran hitting ships and US bases in the Gulf nor the US striking Iranian targets is new. The fact remains that this pointless war is still in its stop-start-stop phase and the ceasefire can no longer be called one.

As oil-consuming nations move on from dependence on crude oil and gas from the Gulf, the main losers from the war action are the US, now hurtling towards the midterms amid rising petrol prices and inflation, and the Iranian people who are hapless spectators as their country is being bombed ruthlessly and deaths are mostly confined to civilians in latest military action.

Until the hotheads in Iran realise that using the chokehold of the strait in fits and starts by hitting cargo vessels and oil tankers will prove counterproductive and the US is denuded of its grandiose views of its global military superiority in the age of the modern wars that are fought with missiles and drones rather than territorially, West Asia will remain a live theatre of war action that may remain inconclusive.

Latest bombing action by the US, mostly against military targets in Iran, is being touted as the only way to ensure uninterrupted navigation through Hormuz and stave off another hindrance that could trigger the next big shock to global energy markets. Iran sees US action in guiding ships through the southern tip of Oman as sneaky flouting of the MoU and hence its sporadic acts of targeting ships in Hormuz. Breaking this cycle of aims and counter aims is going to be the key to the calling off hostilities again and resuming talks.

The day appears to be far off when Mr Trump can walk off from the Iran war by projecting himself as the victor even as a resilient Iran appears ready to take more pain as it tests the limits of its single biggest bargaining chip which is the Strait of Hormuz. The only path away from this madness of strikes at ships and bombing by the US is to fall back on the MoU and resume talks in earnest and see who can compromise how much for peace to prevail.

As the oil prices may rise again from the near pre-war levels they had hit when optimism over negotiations had soared in the time of the so-called ceasefire agreed upon through an MoU signed by the two principal combatants, the world will have to face paying a higher price. For instance, the three major Indian fuel retailers may have lost close to Rs 50,000 crore in the June quarter and may bleed more as the government has been unable to raise prices again due to political compulsions. Like the rest of the world, India can only hope that the madness ends soon.