The completion of six months of the US-Iran conflict is an occasion to draw some broad conclusions. As things stand now, the West Asian geopolitical order is unravelling further exposing the historical fault lines which were bottled up in the post-World War II political settlement and which was sought to be tilted towards the west following the collapse of the Soviet Union (1991). These trends have global ramifications including for India in multiple ways.
The current situation, in a way, stems from the loosely worded text of US-Iran MOU (June 17) reflecting US eagerness for its conclusion. US expectations of opening of the Strait of Hormuz and its sequencing of sanctions relief in response to Iranian concessions on the nuclear issue remained unrealised in the face of the latter’s assertiveness, anchored in its control of the Strait of Hormuz and the weakened confidence in the Gulf states in the US ability to ensure their security despite their long-standing military ties which underpinned the regional geopolitical order.
Now, Iran has closed the Strait asserting its legally untenable position, twisting the phrasing of the MOU, to claim the entire Strait, including the Omani territorial waters, as a sovereign right. The initial benefit from the sale of US-unsanctioned Iranian oil did not last for too long as the US Navy reimposed blockade on its waters. US bombings in two short, sharp spells (June 26 and July 7-9) and the US Navy's attempt to provide protection to commercial shipping through the Omani waters did not succeed because of Saudi refusal to allow its airspace covering the maximum length of the Persian Gulf coastline. Recriminations between the two sides over the breach of the MOU also relate to Israel, which has publicly distanced itself from it, covering its own conflicts with Hamas and Hezbollah.
As elsewhere, a kind of ‘middle power diplomacy' seems to be emerging in this no-war-no-peace situation. Unlike the previous instance, Oman is actively negotiating with Iran a supposedly joint traffic management/revenue sharing system for the Strait despite US military threats; there is no joint Gulf countries' position but all are keeping their communications open with Iran. Saudi Arabia has finalised its own security arrangement with mutual defence pact with Turkey and Pakistan. UAE has stopped, under US pressure, its financial relationship with Iran; Iran has been dismissive of this UAE announcement. Following US announcement of unspecified ‘Economic D-Day’ sanctions against Iran and secondary sanctions against countries trading with Iran--unlike the past--the latter has threatened similar steps against compliant countries. Iran has also declared that this nearly concluded agreement with Oman will not come into effect with the Strait remaining closed until US fulfils all its MOU obligations – the IRGC hardliners, in fact, demanding its military withdrawal. US attacks (August 30) on Iran’s Larak Island to prevent the IRGC from mining Omani waters and retaliatory Iranian attacks on its Jordan bases might suggest that US has not given up its efforts to secure commercial shipping through those waters despite Oman-Iran negotiations--a potential trigger for escalatory conflict dynamics.
{{/usCountry}}As elsewhere, a kind of ‘middle power diplomacy' seems to be emerging in this no-war-no-peace situation. Unlike the previous instance, Oman is actively negotiating with Iran a supposedly joint traffic management/revenue sharing system for the Strait despite US military threats; there is no joint Gulf countries' position but all are keeping their communications open with Iran. Saudi Arabia has finalised its own security arrangement with mutual defence pact with Turkey and Pakistan. UAE has stopped, under US pressure, its financial relationship with Iran; Iran has been dismissive of this UAE announcement. Following US announcement of unspecified ‘Economic D-Day’ sanctions against Iran and secondary sanctions against countries trading with Iran--unlike the past--the latter has threatened similar steps against compliant countries. Iran has also declared that this nearly concluded agreement with Oman will not come into effect with the Strait remaining closed until US fulfils all its MOU obligations – the IRGC hardliners, in fact, demanding its military withdrawal. US attacks (August 30) on Iran’s Larak Island to prevent the IRGC from mining Omani waters and retaliatory Iranian attacks on its Jordan bases might suggest that US has not given up its efforts to secure commercial shipping through those waters despite Oman-Iran negotiations--a potential trigger for escalatory conflict dynamics.
{{/usCountry}}Whilst both Saudi Arabia and Iraq are intent upon optimisation of the Saudi Arabian pipeline delivering oil to the Red Sea, UAE is doing the same using its north-south corridor bypassing the Strait. In addition to exchanging air strikes, Houthis are also targeting Saudi-connected shipping--indiscriminate despite their statements--through the Bab el Mandeb Strait and attacking the UN-recognised Yemeni government ignoring the frontlines frozen since the 2022 UN-brokered ceasefire hoping to control its oil resources.
A significant development in the emerging strategic landscape is Turkey's military presence in Lebanon, northern Syria, the Gulf, the Horn of Africa and the eastern Mediterranean which has considerable potential for conflict with Israel, opening the space for the Iranian ‘proxies’. Possibility of clash between Iran and Ukraine, and the former’s strategic link with Russia constitute a still broader landscape for the West Asian conflict dynamics. A diminishing US military profile in the region suits Chinese interests as it studies US war-fighting techniques in a distant theatre whilst its Gulf engagement has negative implications for its force posture in the Western Pacific. Depleting US air defence munitions, especially Patriot interceptors, constitute a favourable factor for Russia in the Ukraine conflict with major’s ramifications for NATO's European members’ own force posture in the European--rather Eurasian--theatre.
Iran’s approach is to negatively impact President Trump's standing in the US midterm elections and utilise the space to create a feasible management system for commercial traffic in the Strait for revenue generation on a substantial scale. The military option--even, perhaps, after the midterms--having been forsaken, the US aims to intensify pressure on Iran’s already dire economic situation as a negotiating pressure leveraging the manifest chasm between the hardliners and the moderates. US restraint in damaging Iran’s oil infrastructure is indicative of concern about declared Iranian threats against the oil and other civil infrastructure in the smaller Gulf countries and its global stakes in a modicum of stability in the energy market and of the region for the eventual functioning of the Strait. Iran is also conscious of its own stakes in the regional stability. The prospects of economic sanctions remain blurred considering their impact on US’s Gulf allies and its own mutual economic dependency in its complex relationship with China; given its comfortable domestic energy situation, China is now a significant influencer on global energy market through its purchase decisions. Like rest of the world, Russia and China are also invested in Gulf stability.
The regional stability risk from unpredictable conflict dynamics inheres in multitudinous moving parts, not least being State fragility, food and energy crises in the region and beyond, climate change, and cumulative impacts of global hotspots. This is the context of the ramifications for Indian national interests concerning the Saudi-Turkish-Pakistani defence pact. India has fared well thus far through nimble energy management and largely reflationary fiscal policy but vulnerability to external and internal shocks remains.
(The views expressed are personal)
This article is authored by Yogendra Kumar, former ambassador and author, New Delhi.