A new kind of ‘ceasefire’ between US and Iran where talks, strikes are part of the same process
The United States and Iran have adopted a volatile new ceasefire where diplomatic talks and military strikes function as integrated tools. Both nations maintain this risky balance to exert pressure and manage regional conflict without escalating into a full-scale war.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio (far left) and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent listening as President Donald Trump (centre) speaks to the media on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Ankara on July 8.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Jonathan Eyal
Published
- The US and Iran use both talks and military strikes as part of a continuous process, not opposing actions, to manage their conflict around the Strait of Hormuz.
- Iran claims control over the Strait of Hormuz, interpreting a vague MoU to assert dominance, while the US rejects any change to the strait's legal status and responds to Iranian attacks.
- Rising tensions involve Gulf Arab monarchies opposing Iran's aggression, internal Iranian power struggles, and a risky balance where all sides avoid full-scale war but maintain military pressure.
LONDON – The United States and Iran have now perfected a new kind of “ceasefire”, one that no one respects yet no one abandons, a game in which the guns still fire because both sides believe that talking and shooting are not opposing alternatives but instruments in the same process.
What has unfolded across the Gulf over the past 48 hours – two consecutive nights of US air strikes on Iran and Iranian missile barrages against Arab monarchies in the region – looks like the collapse of the June memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the US and Iran. The reality, however, is that the current violence does not spell the failure of diplomacy, but merely, its continuation by other means.
source: The Straits Times https://www.straitstimes.com/world/middle-east/a-new-kind-of-ceasefire-between-the-us-and-iran-talks-strikes-are-instruments-in-the-same-process?ref=top-stories
