In a statement after Trump’s ceasefire message, Iranian foreign minister Seyed Aragchi said that Iran would halt its “defensive operations” and allow safe passage through the Hormuz “via coordination with Iran’s armed forces”. He added that the US had accepted the “general framework” of the Iranian 10-point plan.
That plan includes the US withdrawing its military forces from the region, lifting economic sanctions on Iran, paying compensation for war damages and allowing Iran to maintain control over Hormuz. It is hard to imagine Trump actually agreeing to any of those conditions – a sign that the next two weeks of negotiations could be treacherous.
For the moment, however, this is a partial political victory for Trump. He made a dramatic threat and achieved the desired result. But the ceasefire is a reprieve, not a permanent settlement.
It remains to be seen if Trump can keep a lid on his ego long enough for the whole thing to blow over and Iran to get the concessions they want. The markets are reacting strongly to the news, but I am not convinced that the two week ceasefire will amount to anything if the Trump admin can’t leave the issue well enough alone. We’ll just have to wait and see if the war is more profitable for Trump and his insider trading buddies than it is politically volatile for him.
He’s obviously going to try and spin this as a victory if he does manage to pull out successfully, but it’s important to ask the question - what were the US war goals and did they achieve them? He should not get credit for starting a war and then ending it swiftly, that is the expected outcome. Seems to me that they’ve accomplished nothing and are bragging about cleaning up the mess that they created. Hopefully people will still remember come midterms this year.