It feels good when I stop

Evaluating the new deal with Iran

Why are you hitting yourself in the head with a hammer? Because it feels good when I stop.

This old joke applies to reports that the president is approaching a deal with Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. It feels good to stop.

Cessation starts to look like achievement only because the baseline got moved. The president is a long way from the unconditional surrender he demanded eleven weeks ago. The vital issue of Iranian nuclear weapons is not resolved by this agreement — it is deferred. As the New York Times puts it, all this does is begin to restore the status quo to roughly where it was on February 28, when Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched a war to end Iran’s nuclear and missile programs.

A deal would undoubtedly be a good thing. De-escalation is better than not, despite the Secretary of Defense once boasting that the United States “negotiates with bombs.”

Three months later, the administration is negotiating with diplomats in Islamabad over the same enrichment questions the Obama administration negotiated in 2015. The bombs played some role in getting there, but the negotiating position they purchased is not obviously stronger than the one sanctions had already produced in 2015 ¹ — and it cost considerably more to reach. Iran arrived at the table still holding eleven tons of nuclear fuel, 75 percent of its mobile launchers, and the Strait of Hormuz. The diplomats the administration once dismissed as naive never managed to leave Iran that well-armed at the start of a negotiation.

Understanding exactly what has been gained here sharpens the biggest question of this war: was it worth it. It is entirely possible that Tehran’s creeping enrichment and regional provocations had made diplomacy a dead letter, leaving the administration with no reasonable choice but force. But-- and, as the footnote shows², it’s a big but-- -- even if war was the only way out, the critical question remains: did this particular war achieve that objective, and did it purchase enhanced leverage or merely an expensive return to the status quo?

The preliminary Strait of Hormuz agreement establishes the measurement framework for evaluating whether the war was worth it.

What’s being heralded is the reopening of the waterway through which roughly a fifth of the world’s oil passes, and the possible relief to a global economy that has been absorbing the shock since March. The end of the hammer blows will be welcome — if it actually happens. But a new development should not age out the reality that the relief is from a crisis of the hammer operator’s making. Stopping the bleeding when you stab yourself does not make you a healer.

The bill so far: $28 to $35 billion, nearly a billion dollars a day for 38 days. More than 1,100 JASSM-ER cruise missiles — long-range stealth weapons designed not for Iran but for a war with China. Roughly 1,500 remain in inventory. More than 1,200 Patriot interceptors, at $4 million each; the United States produces about 600 a year. Thirteen American service members dead. The Pentagon has already begun diverting weapons promised to allies — six HIMARS launchers Estonia had paid for, similar shipments to other NATO and Asian partners. “If we’re running low after a few weeks of fighting Iran,” said Todd Harrison of the American Enterprise Institute, “we’re nowhere near where we need to be for Russia and China.”

That is the price of arriving at a deal that reopens a strait the president’s war closed.

The formula for the ultimate evaluation runs something like this: compare what the constraints of the JCPOA had done to contain the Iranian nuclear program against the final outcome of this war — Iran’s residual ability to build a weapon, threaten the region through proxies, and deliver warheads by ballistic missile. The JCPOA didn’t cover ballistic missiles or proxies. If the post-war deal does, that would be a genuine achievement for Trump — and the one area where the ledger might show a return on what was spent. But that negotiation hasn’t started. The administration has agreed to talk about it later.

The urgency to get a deal just to reopen the Strait tells us how highly the president prices the costs of this war. The previous demands — unconditional surrender, total disarmament, the end of enrichment — are no longer on the table. The landlord who once wouldn’t budge on price hasn’t dropped the rent yet, but he’s promising to repaint, restore the carpet, and put in a new refrigerator.

Further gains from continued negotiations would be welcome. But the ability to win big concessions would seem to be undermined by this deal, which locks in the value of the Strait of Hormuz as Iranian leverage. Tehran held the chokepoint, extracted a de-escalation without surrendering its nuclear stockpile, and now enters the next phase of talks knowing exactly what card worked.

We’ll see how the administration frames this stage of the process. Previously, when the president and his team have heralded great victories with respect to this war, the public has not bought the sales pitch. Nearly 60 percent of the country thinks the war was a mistake. Seventy-eight percent say the United States has not met its goals. If the president oversells this development, he’ll contribute to those trends — the boy who cried victory one too many times.

The deal isn’t done. The nuclear question isn’t answered. Iran still holds more than eleven tons of nuclear fuel, including 970 pounds near bomb grade — buried under rubble but not destroyed. The $28 billion, the 1,100 cruise missiles built for the Pacific, the thirteen dead — those are spent. What the country has purchased for that price, so far, is a conversation.

If you have more time, try out Stack the Week, an experiment in delivering the news.

1. Iran’s February offers—made under sanctions pressure alone—included a multi-year enrichment freeze and blending down its entire stockpile of near-weapons-grade material, concessions that arguably exceeded what the JCPOA achieved. This raises the question: if sanctions were already producing unprecedented Iranian flexibility, what exactly did the bombs purchase that patience could not?”

2. But reporting from the Geneva talks suggests otherwise. Days before the strikes, Iran had offered what Oman’s foreign minister called ‘very breakthrough’ commitments—a 3-5 year enrichment freeze, blending down its 440kg stockpile of 60% uranium under international supervision, and full IAEA verification. These concessions went beyond the JCPOA’s limits. The administration chose not to pursue them.”