No US bomb attack against targets in Iran has occurred in over a month. It may be related to the mid-term elections for the United States Congress on November 3. The opinion polls are clear: the war in Iran is unpopular, even among Trump's core voters. Six out of ten Americans oppose the US military operation and even more believe that Trump lacks a clear objective with the war. Things will not get better if the conflict drives up fuel prices and other costs of living in the US.
Normally, the President of the United States should have reason to hold on to the relative calm, so that voters are not reminded of the war and vote out Republican candidates for Congress.
The information about an imminent attack on Iran may therefore appear surprising. Trump apparently wants to end the war, preferably before the election, which is followed by an opening of oil shipments from the Persian Gulf and falling gasoline and diesel prices.
But US military operations have so far raised oil prices, not lowered them. Nor is it likely that an escalated bombing war will cause Iran to throw in the towel in the short time remaining until November 3.
A new bombing campaign would expose the remaining US troops in the region and allied Gulf states to Iranian counterattacks, but also increased attacks on merchant ships in the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump has made various offers and has now said that the war may resume, but only after the midterm elections. In his speech at the UN General Assembly in September, Trump threatened to "wipe out the Islamic Republic" if there is no settlement.
One possible explanation for the White House leaks about renewed hostilities could be that the US is using the threat as leverage in the ongoing negotiations with Iran. The Iranian leadership recently submitted a negotiated offer to open the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for the lifting of some US sanctions. The US said no and submitted a counteroffer with unknown content. Trump claimed at a campaign rally this week that Iran's leaders are under so much pressure that they are ready to give in.
What Trump can't get past is that when the United States, together with Israel, launched the bombing war against Iran in February, he broke his explicit election promise not to drag the United States into another "endless war."
Trump boasted of great success and declared victory repeatedly. He presented the war as an example of the US military being invincible.
Still, there is no end in sight to the war, which is now in its eighth month. Iran was certainly severely crippled economically and militarily weakened. But the ayatollahs' regime in Tehran survived and all indications are that it is now ruled by an even more hard-line faction. In addition, Iran gained a new weapon: control over the Strait of Hormuz, vital to the world economy.
Thus far, the Iran war has not given Trump what he hoped for, neither in the form of regime change in Tehran nor Iranian concessions to US demands to give up uranium enrichment. Instead, the US's position of power in the region has been eroded. The threat of Iranian drones and robots has forced the United States to reduce personnel at military bases in Bahrain, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. The American aircraft carriers are allowed to stay out of the Arabian Sea. And most recently, after the terrorist incident at the British Fairford air base, the United States has evacuated its strategic B-1 bombers, reducing the possibility of a quick attack.
The US is nevertheless on the way to a reduced military presence in the Middle East. In September, the last US combat forces left Iraq and soon the same will happen in eastern Syria. In the longer term, the United States is withdrawing from its role as the leading world power. It is largely voluntary, in keeping with Donald Trump's line of only engaging abroad where there is a direct American interest. According to the "Donroe Doctrine", the US must prioritize the immediate area, i.e. the Western Hemisphere.
It is in line with what Trump has been up to since his return to the White House: he has threatened Greenland/Denmark, Panama, Cuba and Canada with military aggression and carried out a nighttime commando raid on Venezuela to kidnap the country's president.
