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The Persian Gulf states did not want this war, nor involvement in it. In the weeks leading up to the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, Gulf leaders worked urgently to prevent escalation. They publicly emphasized neutrality and prohibited the use of their territories to launch offensive operations against Tehran. The objective was clear: avoid becoming a battlefield in a confrontation they neither initiated nor endorsed. With U.S. President Donald Trump setting maximalist demands aimed, essentially, at Iranian demilitarization—and backing up those demands with a massive military buildup—the die was cast, and the Gulf diplomatic effort failed.

Since the outbreak of hostilities, Iran has turned its Gulf neighborhood into a central theater of deterrence. U.S. military installations across the region have come under heavy attack. More troublingly, strikes quickly expanded beyond formal military bases to include civilian and economic infrastructure. Energy facilities, ports, and logistics hubs—critical not only to Gulf economies but also to global markets—have become pressure points in an Iranian survival strategy premised on rapidly raising and dispersing the costs of the U.S.-Israeli campaign to unseat the Islamic Republic.

The Persian Gulf states did not want this war, nor involvement in it. In the weeks leading up to the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, Gulf leaders worked urgently to prevent escalation. They publicly emphasized neutrality and prohibited the use of their territories to launch offensive operations against Tehran. The objective was clear: avoid becoming a battlefield in a confrontation they neither initiated nor endorsed. With U.S. President Donald Trump setting maximalist demands aimed, essentially, at Iranian demilitarization—and backing up those demands with a massive military buildup—the die was cast, and the Gulf diplomatic effort failed.

Since the outbreak of hostilities, Iran has turned its Gulf neighborhood into a central theater of deterrence. U.S. military installations across the region have come under heavy attack. More troublingly, strikes quickly expanded beyond formal military bases to include civilian and economic infrastructure. Energy facilities, ports, and logistics hubs—critical not only to Gulf economies but also to global markets—have become pressure points in an Iranian survival strategy premised on rapidly raising and dispersing the costs of the U.S.-Israeli campaign to unseat the Islamic Republic.

The Gulf states did not misread the risks. But they are now faced with the paradox of their position: politically neutral, operationally entangled.

What is unfolding is not a conventional regional war with clear fronts and fixed battle lines. It is a multidimensional confrontation in which geography itself is weaponized. Energy infrastructure, maritime corridors, intelligence networks, airspace access, and financial systems are all instruments of pressure.

For Iran, military logic is shaped by structural constraints. Tehran........

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