As he takes stock of his Republican Party’s midterm drubbing, President Donald Trump now faces the difficult question of what to do about his unpopular 8-month-old war against Iran.
For weeks, Trump has threatened to return to a full-scale bombardment of Iran once the US elections were in the rearview mirror if Tehran did not come to a settlement under terms acceptable to him.
In his first comments on Wednesday after Democrats’ resounding election victory — a wave powered in part by the American electorate’s dissatisfaction with the war — Trump largely agreed with Vice President JD Vance, who publicly ruminated on the war being a catastrophe for Republicans.
“It’s largely true because it drove gasoline up a little bit,” Trump said. Still, he doubled down on his decision to launch the conflict despite its big political cost. “At the same time, if I had to do it again, I’d do it again,” he said.
The strikes, and counterstrikes, have caused tens of billions of dollars of damage in the region. And the conflict has reached into the pocketbook of families around the globe with elevated gas prices and rising costs in just about every sector.
Now, as Trump ponders his next move, the stakes couldn’t be higher for Iran, the Middle East and the global economy writ large.
While oil is flowing again from the Strait of Hormuz with the help of US Navy escorts for international tankers, the conflict has spread to the Red Sea with Iran-backed Houthi rebels and a Saudi Arabia -led coalition fighting it out.
The situation in the Red Sea remains particularly volatile. The Houthis are attacking Yemeni civilians and Saudi infrastructure, and are looking to bolster ties with militant groups across the Horn of Africa.
The attacks by the Yemen-based Houthis on areas controlled by the internationally recognized Yemeni government have also worsened a growing humanitarian crisis.
The threat that the region faces from Iran and its proxy groups, noted a senior Yemeni government official, “did not change overnight” with the US elections, urging Washington to avoid hasty decisions. The official was not authorised to comment publicly and spoke on the basis of anonymity.
“There’s reason to suspect that Trump may feel less restrained given that the political damage is done,” said Brian Haggerty, a former senior analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency who focused on Middle East security issues.
“At the same time, the strategic calculus or the strategic logic of what you hope to achieve through an escalation of strikes against Iran is no different today than it was a week ago or a month ago.”
