Is the U.S. taking the upper hand in the battle of Hormuz?

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Weather News September 29, 2026 e-Paper

Published – September 29, 2026 07:17 pm IST

U.S. President Donald Trump. File
| Photo Credit: AP

“I have a big decision to make. Will a deal be made with Iran that lets them rebuild and create a far greater country than it ever was before? Or do I annihilate the Islamic Republic? Do I drive them into hell with no chance of survival and no hope of future greatness?” U.S. President Donald Trumpsaid in his UN General Assembly address on September 22. “I believe we’ll make a deal right after the [midterm] election because it doesn’t make sense for them not to,” he added. In the speech, in which Mr. Trump vigorously defended his performance as the President of the U.S., there were 10 references to Iran’s nuclear programme, which he claimed the U.S. had obliterated after its June 2025 bombing. “I will never allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon,” he said. Iran has an advanced nuclear programme but has repeatedly said that it was not seeking to build nuclear weapons.  

Mr. Trump’s speech signalled a change in the approach of the administration towards the Iran conflict. In June, when the U.S. signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Iran, Washington agreed to make concessions in return for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, while the nuclear talks were pushed to the back burner. But now, as the stalemate continues, the U.S. seeks to bring the nuclear file back into the negotiations.

Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi were also in New York to attend the UNGA. On the sidelines of the assembly, Mr. Araghchi held indirect talks with U.S. officials, seeking to find a way out of the current impasse. Tehran submitted a seven-point proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz in return for the U.S. lifting its naval blockade on Iranian ports, issuing sanctions waivers and releasing Iran’s frozen funds. In effect, Iran wants the U.S. to return to the June 17 MoU. While Iran’s demands remained unchanged, it offered to fast-track the timeline. If the MoU had promised to reopen the Strait of Hormuz in 30 days, Iran now promises to reopen the waterway, which it blockaded in the initial days of the war, in seven days. But Mr. Trump said he rejected the Iranian offer. 

Iran, according to Omani Foreign Minister Badr bin Hamad, was ready to make concessions on its nuclear programme on February 27 to avoid war. But Mr. Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chose not to take the deal and started bombing Iran on February 28, killing its Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The war appears to have hardened Iran’s position on the nuclear question. 

The blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, through which one-fifth of the world’s oil and gas moved before the war, provided additional leverage to Tehran. Iran sought to tie the reopening of the strait to concessions from the U.S., while keeping its trump card, the nuclear file, close to its chest. The U.S. toed this line when it signed the MoU, which was largely seen as favourable to Iran. But after the collapse of the MoU, the U.S. has been trying to rebuild its lost leverage by easing Iran’s grip on the strait and adding more pain on Iran through economic squeezing. 

The U.S. attempts to open a safer route along the Omani coast to help tankers get in and out of the Strait of Hormuz have been relatively successful. Whether with Iran’s tolerance or not, shipments through the waterway rose to almost 80% of its prewar levels in September. Before the war, the Gulf region exported nearly 19 million barrels of oil a day through the strait, which fell to a trickle in the first phase of the war, pumping up oil prices. Shipments rose to almost 13 million barrels a day in September, according to ship tracker Huax.      

While Arab countries, including Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the UAE manage to sell their crude oil out of the strait, Iran’s oil exports collapsed as it faces the American blockade in the Gulf of Oman. As petroleum exports from the Gulf rebound, Mr. Trump believes that Iran is losing its Hormuz leverage. Hence, he insists that the nuclear file be brought back on the table as part of any deal with Iran.

But Iran insists that its core positions have not changed. Even though Mr. Trump said he rejected the Iranian seven-point proposal, Mr. Araghchi said on Tuesday (September 29, 2026) Tehran was expecting an official American response. Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, in a statement released on Monday (September 28), hailed the “defenders of Hormuz” and added that U.S. forces would be forced out of the Arabian Sea. It is true that Iran is facing the economic heat of the U.S. blockade, but Tehran seems prepared to take the pain and not to submit to U.S. demands. And if Iran believes it is losing its leverage, it could also escalate the crisis militarily. 

This leaves Mr. Trump in a dilemma. He would like to see whether Iran would buckle under economic pressure. But sooner or later, he would face two key questions: Is the U.S. blockade of Iran, along with its guided assistance to vessels in Hormuz, for which Washington has committed enormous military resources, sustainable in the long term? And what should the U.S. do if Iran refuses to buckle under the economic pressure?

Published – September 29, 2026 07:17 pm IST

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Fonte: The Hindu – International