United States President Donald Trump’s instincts are correct. He wants to end the current engagement as soon as possible. He is using both a carrot and a stick to achieve that result. The carrot he offers is to spare Iran’s electricity grid and energy industry from further destruction. The stick, of course, is more bombing and possibly a ground invasion.
He should lean more in the direction of the carrot.
Destroying Iran’s energy infrastructure would result in an environmental disaster and make it an economic basket case for years to come. It would create a legion of refugees who would eventually make their way to Europe and possibly the US.
These refugees, unlike those who left Iran after the Iranian revolution of 1979, would not be blaming the ayatollahs for taking away their freedoms. They would hate America for what it did to them and their homeland. They would be a destabilising force on the world stage. I guarantee this would come back to bite us here in the US.
Obviously, coming up with an immediate negotiated peace would be preferable, but even if there were no agreement, it would be good for the US to simply leave. If we called a unilateral ceasefire and simply left the region, the Iranian regime would have a vested interest in opening the Strait of Hormuz because it would help its economy. This would immediately lower oil prices globally.
And what if the Iranians continued terrorising cargo ships as they tried to move their product? Well, that would incite an immediate reaction from our allies, trade partners and competitors. It would not simply be our problem; it would be everybody’s problem. And my assumption is that the Iranian regime would back off pretty quickly in the face of a global reaction.
Regime change will not happen during this current campaign. Regimes do not collapse when bombs are dropping. But that does not mean that the current efforts have not been successful in weakening the governing structure.
As the Trump administration calls a halt to its ongoing campaign, it should also work to arm insurgent groups who have the will but not the weaponry to overthrow the Islamic republic. It is too much to ask our friends inside the country to keep bringing only knives to what clearly will be a series of gunfights.
Of course, the number one reason to end this war now is domestic politics. The American people do not want it, and they certainly do not want the higher petrol prices that have accompanied it.
Affordability is the buzzword among all the political pundits here in the US. But I do not think it is just expensive products that make voters grumpy. It is the anxiety that suffuses during any wartime engagement.
Voters do not know how this is all going to play out. They already have plenty of other things that are making them worried about the future. Artificial intelligence is threatening their livelihoods. Data centres are sucking up water and electricity and increasing utility prices. Political conflict has led to staffing shortages at the Transportation Security Administration, making air travel more uncertain.
Add war to the mix, with the threat of Iranian sleeper cells, and you have an American populace on edge. None of this is conducive to winning an election.
Republicans still have a chance to keep control of Congress – both the House and the Senate – but that requires that the Trump administration immediately change the focus from international conflict to domestic concerns. The American people care more about what is happening around their neighbourhoods and the cost of food at their dining room tables than about foreign adventures.
I still remember well when President George H W Bush had approval ratings of 91 percent shortly after the first Iraq War. But by the time he ran for re-election, voters cared less about the impressive celebratory military parade that he hosted in Washington, DC, in June 1991 and more about their own pocketbooks.
Bush did not have much of a vision thing, while his opponent, Bill Clinton, a draft dodger and notorious womaniser, was focused on the economic issues like a laser beam. It was the economy, stupid, he told his campaign team.
If Trump wants Congress to stay in Republican hands, he needs to remember that it is still the economy, stupid. Ending this war sooner rather than later makes it much easier to turn the focus back on the American people, right where they want it.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
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