Tehran warns ‘we have not even begun’ as US and Iran trade fire in Strait of Hormuz after
MARK ALMOND: Tehran is suffering and the mullahs could run out of cash
by Mark Almond for the Daily Mail
Does President Trump stand any real chance of re-opening the Strait of Hormuz, as he has promised to do? Is it, as some have claimed, an exercise doomed to fail?
On Sunday, throwing down yet another gauntlet to Iran, Trump announced that the US navy, backed by 100 aircraft, would free the 2,000 ships and 20,000 crew trapped in the Persian Gulf.
The grandly named ‘Operation Freedom’, due to have started yesterday morning, was supposed to end Iran’s stranglehold on the world’s energy and fertiliser supplies.
So far, we are yet to see much sign of it.
Perhaps that’s no surprise. The risk to Washington is all too obvious: a direct Iranian hit on an American vessel – let alone a sinking – could be enough to inflame opinion at home and force the US navy into a humiliating retreat.
But that’s not to say the enterprise is completely hopeless, not least because, for all the triumphant rhetoric of the mullahs, Iran and its people are suffering grievously.
