Since the second week of July, the United States military has been pounding targets in Iran after a fragile ceasefire collapsed when the Islamic Republic attacked commercial vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz. US forces appear to have struck at least 500 Iranian military and infrastructure targets during nearly two weeks of renewed strikes. While the immediate operational aim appears to be weakening the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, particularly along the Persian Gulf coast, the broader political objective remains unclear.
Does Washington simply want Tehran to abandon its attempts to control shipping through the Strait of Hormuz? Or has President Donald Trump decided to continue and broaden the campaign in pursuit of a decisive defeat of the IRGC? It is difficult to reach a sound judgement on the basis of the President’s shifting statements. Other senior officials have remained conspicuously quiet about the war’s ultimate aims.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who was largely excluded from negotiations with the Iranian regime, may prefer to let those who promoted the agreement with Tehran deal with the consequences of its collapse. Vice President JD Vance and others who advocated signing the June Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) have had little to say since it unravelled following what appeared to be a suicidal provocation by the Islamic Republic.
News reports indicate that additional weapons, aerial refuelling tankers and possibly troops are being sent to the region. This could signal preparations for a prolonged conflict requiring both military endurance and a clear demonstration of Washington’s determination to compel Tehran to accept its demands. Alternatively, it may point to plans for a broader campaign intended to inflict a more decisive defeat on the Islamic Republic.
Qatar, Tehran’s de facto regional ally, has once again entered the diplomatic fray, urging Washington to halt the attacks and return to the June agreement. Yet Doha has apparently been unable to extract a firm commitment from Tehran guaranteeing the free passage of tankers and other commercial vessels through the Strait.
The fear among many observers is that President Trump could once again change course abruptly. In April, he began looking for ways to end the 40-day air campaign just as the Iranian regime appeared to be approaching defeat. Targeted attacks on senior leaders largely ended after the first two weeks, and Trump began referring to supposedly cool-headed figures in Tehran with whom he believed agreements could be reached.
He must now be asking what became of those “reasonable” officials, who violated the June agreement in less than a month. He also knows that oil prices are likely to remain elevated for as long as the IRGC retains the ability and willingness to threaten commercial shipping.
Any new agreement that falls short of securing Iran’s complete acceptance of freedom of navigation would be portrayed as another defeat for the administration. Would Trump nevertheless accept a deal limited to the Strait of Hormuz, provided that it guaranteed the free passage of commercial vessels and allowed him to halt the air campaign? The answer is probably yes.
That prospect alarms Western, Israeli and Iranian opponents of the Islamic Republic. They argue that Tehran cannot be trusted and would renege at the first opportunity, particularly now that it has discovered how much leverage it can exert through the Strait of Hormuz. In their view, the regime is not merely an unreliable negotiating partner but a permanent source of instability that must ultimately be removed.
Trump said on July 22: “From this point forward, any time the Islamic Republic of Iran shoots at a ship in the Strait of Hormuz, whether it be by Missile, Rocket, Drone, or any other device or weapon, the United States will bomb and destroy ONE BRIDGE OR POWER PLANT.”
The statement points towards a limited strategy centred on the Strait of Hormuz. Trump is threatening to impose escalating costs whenever shipping is attacked. His critics, however, argue that the Iranian leadership cares little about the destruction of civilian infrastructure, provided that it can preserve its security apparatus and continue ruling over the ruins.
One Iranian activist responded by warning Trump that the threat would prove ineffective: “Oh, don’t worry. The regime will help you bomb all of Iran’s infrastructure and will continue to shoot at ships in the Strait of Hormuz until you finally wake up and remove the IRGC commanders and reformist clowns, one by one.”
Opposition figures hope that eliminating the regime’s senior leadership – an objective that appeared to form part of Israel’s strategy in March – would increase the likelihood of its collapse. If Iranians believe that the United States is aggressively targeting the officials responsible for their repression and economic misery, they may once again find the courage to challenge the Islamic Republic.
At that point, the IRGC would almost certainly deploy its Iranian and Iraqi militias to suppress the uprising and kill protesters. This would be the decisive moment. If Israel were permitted to use drones against IRGC units deployed in the streets, protesters might have a genuine opportunity to seize key government buildings and accelerate the regime’s collapse.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi recently acknowledged that Mashhad, Iran’s second-largest city, had come close to falling to protesters on January 8 and 9 before the IRGC opened fire with machine guns, killing thousands. Despite widespread expectations at the time, neither the United States nor Israel intervened.
The central question, therefore, is not whether Washington possesses the military power to inflict further damage. It is whether Trump is prepared to define and pursue a political objective beyond protecting shipping. Without such clarity, even a successful air campaign risks ending in another temporary agreement that leaves the IRGC weakened, but still capable of rebuilding, threatening the Strait and crushing its opponents at home.
Mardo Soghom is a former deputy editor and regional director for West Asia at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
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