The war between the United States and Iran persists in a dangerous strategic stalemate. As Washington maintains a punishing economic and maritime blockade, Tehran continues to restrict passage through the Strait of Hormuz, imposing mounting costs on the United States, its allies, and the global economy. Neither side appears prepared to concede.

The Pentagon is sending a third aircraft carrier strike group to the region, while the Trump administration is reportedly considering strikes against Iranian nuclear and energy infrastructure, potentially using the GBU-43/B bomb, known as the “mother of all bombs.” Both moves support the possibility of the United States attempting to break this stalemate through force. Iran, meanwhile, has in recent weeks intensified attacks on commercial vessels attempting to transit Hormuz outside its designated route, with strikes becoming more frequent and destructive.

Washington appears to be continuing to misread the Iran it is confronting. The wars of 2025 and 2026 accelerated a fundamental shift in Tehran’s strategic thinking, away from years of relative restraint and toward a determination to impose sustained costs on the United States and its allies. Iranian leaders increasingly believe that their earlier restraint invited further attacks rather than deterring them, and that absorbing more punishment without retaliating forcefully would only encourage additional aggression.

Tehran is still willing to negotiate, but it is far less prepared to give up its leverage based on American assurances that it has little reason to trust.

A failure to understand this changed posture makes another round of American or Israeli strikes particularly dangerous: Rather than compelling Iran to surrender, it would likely provoke an even more damaging Iranian response. Tehran’s growing willingness to escalate does not mean it has abandoned diplomacy. The challenge for President Donald Trump is that the Iran emerging from this war is one less willing to yield to coercion, which remains open to a settlement based on meaningful reciprocal concessions.

Washington’s Options—and Their Limits

The central question is whether Washington is preparing to break the stalemate militarily. But as Carl von Clausewitz famously argued, war is a continuation of politics by other means. Whether Trump chooses to escalate therefore depends on his assessment of the political objectives at stake and whether further military force can advance them. The buildup of American forces alone tells us little about that calculation, particularly after months of warfare and economic coercion have failed to compel Tehran to yield.

How Washington perceives the war will determine what it believes it can do to break the current stalemate. If Washington sees continued economic hardship as eventually forcing Tehran to accept its demands, it can maintain the blockade and continue the war of attrition. But if the United States and Israel launch another major attack, it would suggest at least one of them no longer believes the current balance of pressure is working in their favor, or that they can afford to wait for Iran to buckle. Such an escalation would presumably seek to shift that balance by inflicting enough additional damage to compel Iranian concessions, particularly on the nuclear issue, where Tehran has resisted demands to surrender its stockpile of highly enriched uranium upfront, and over the future of the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran is seeking a new arrangement that preserves its leverage over maritime traffic.

Further attacks are likely to backfire, particularly given Tehran’s growing conviction that restraint has only invited further aggression. Iran has considerable scope to intensify its own pressure through Hormuz and strikes on regional energy infrastructure, driving up oil prices more, further disrupting global markets, and making the war even more costly for Washington to sustain. Tehran may also escalate on its own if it concludes that the existing level of disruption is insufficient to force American concessions. In either case, a new round of escalation could shift the balance of pressure further against Washington, leaving Trump in an even more difficult position despite inflicting greater destruction on Iran.

For Tehran, the experience of the war has reinforced the belief that surrendering its leverage before securing concrete American concessions would leave it vulnerable to renewed pressure and attacks.

A failure to understand Tehran’s own political calculus is a persistent problem in Washington, and one often at the root of maximalist attempts to compel changed behavior by coercion or force. Should the Trump administration pursue force despite Tehran’s changed posture, it will be repeating the failure of many presidencies before it.

The remaining options are political. Trump could unilaterally ease or end the blockade and effectively abandon the effort to compel Iran’s surrender, though that appears unlikely under present circumstances. Another similar possibility, according to CNN, is a final, spectacular military strike, potentially involving the “mother of all bombs,” designed to give Trump a symbolic “victory” he can declare before withdrawing. Some military planners have reportedly discussed what amounts to a “fireworks show,” even if the strikes fail to achieve Washington’s stated objectives. But such an exit would depend on Iran’s response, and Tehran could instead retaliate with further attacks on shipping and regional energy infrastructure, making it harder for Trump to declare the war over.

More realistically, Washington could negotiate a compromise to end the confrontation, accepting that any durable settlement will require meaningful concessions from both sides, including reciprocal steps on sanctions, Hormuz, and the nuclear issue.

The two sides remain far apart, however, on what a negotiated settlement would entail. Tehran continues to insist on seven conditions for ending the war, including lifting the blockade and sanctions, and presented mediators with a proposal during the United Nations General Assembly in September. The proposal reportedly builds on the June Islamabad memorandum of understanding (MOU), but changes the sequencing of concessions:........

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