Open Discussions/ Gulf Cultural Club
* Patrick Cockburn (Veteran Middle East journalist, author, analyst)
Wars can be viewed by historians later, but while we are in the midst of the conflict facts and lies compete for attention and it is hard to understand what is happening. The US imposed a blockade on the Strait of Hormuz on April 12th and stated that in the first 24 hours, six merchant vessels “complied with direction from US forces” and turned around. A meeting in Islamabad, involving US Vice-President JD Vance and Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf ended without a deal but could be restarted on April 16th. Numerous contentious issues remain unresolved. It is possible that the ceasefire itself will be the settlement: The United States, Israel, and Iran will not come to a final deal, but the ceasefire will continue indefinitely, with the risk of a flare-up hovering over the region. In the second of its discussion meetings on the war on Iran and the transformation of the Middle East Open Discussion presents an update and analysis from acclaimed veteran Middle Eastern correspondent Patrick Cockburn.
Tuesday April 21st, 2026
Patrick Cockburn: I have some 15 minutes to speak about the background, current situation and future prospects of the war in the Gulf. I will do my best but let me apologise in advance if I deal scantily or even miss out on some details.
Let me say that I have reported and commented on many wars and conflicts in the Middle East, but this is the most transformative – and in unexpected and surprising ways.
This is in part because the US-Israel attack on Iran on 28 February was the culmination of a series of wars in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria that had already reshaped the balance of power in the region. These wars differed from past Israeli wars because they were fought in close alliance with America at every level after the IDF was plugged into US Central Command, Centcom, in 2021 – the closest partnership the US has had with any ally since it was allied to Britain in WW11 as Jon Alerman, my former colleague at CSIS, put it.
Training, intelligence and targeting were all done together, but ultimately with different goals – as we are now seeing. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants Israel to have a hegemonic role in the region – something only attainable by relying on American military and political strength. Paradoxically, the more military success the IDF has, the more it depends on Washington.
But what is the nature of the Washington it is dependent on? Multiple lobbies and coteries in the White House all vie for King Trump’s ear. Netanyahu by all accounts persuaded Trump to go to war and reluctantly agrees to ceasefires in Iran and Lebanon for now, but he will most likely try to undermine them. Who can say he will not succeed? US public opinion has turned against Israel but many in Washington will want “to finish the job” – whatever that may mean.
It has become almost conventional wisdom that the US/Israel have succeeded tactically and militarily, but lost strategically and politically. Iran has discovered that it has a weapon in its control of the Strait of Hormuz that gives it global leverage – unlike its possession of enriched uranium.
I have long though that the Iranian possession of the latter has always been foolish – it posed a potential but not an actual threat, the extent and imminence of which is easily exaggerated – as it is now by Trump and Netanyahu. Iranian nuclear policy under Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was like threatening somebody with an unloaded gun.
Why didn’t Iran close the Strait before? Because it thought this would provoke war with the US. But once that war had started this obstacle disappeared – and the Iranians are clearly surprised how easy it is to close down the Gulf. They have weaponised control of the Strait – and they will not retreat from this. The threat of war on Iran was Washington’s strongest card, but once it has been played – and Iran has survived – it is no longer the ace of spades.
But nor is it the two of clubs: Iran has been unable to put up any real air defence. Destruction has been massive and could get worse. It took Iraq thirty years to fully recover from the destruction by US missiles and bombs of its energy infrastructure in 1991. Clearly Israel wants to degrade Iran as a modern state and society by a scorched earth strategy – regardless of who rules in Tehran. Having essentially adopted forever wars as the only way it deals with its neighbours, I don’t see it backing away from this maximalist approach. But can it get the US to go along with it?
What should the Arab states of the Gulf do? Their political, military and economic vulnerability has been exposed. I don’t believe the Gulf security can ever be restored to what it was after its recent fall. Alliance with the US (and Israel) is obviously not a guarantee of safety. Friendly relations with Iran do not fend off Iranian attacks, which could be extended and redoubled if there is another military phase of the present war just over the horizon.
What should the Gulf states do? It seems to me they have little choice but to strengthen relations with the US – but also with Iran – and to seek guarantors elsewhere, which is easy enough to say – but who should these guarantors be?
The question is pertinent because a surprising feature of the new Middle East and global terrain is how marginal Russia, the EU and Nato have been in the Iran war – though their vital interests are involved? As with the Ukraine war, the UK, France and Germany pledge to do something post war, but nothing much for the moment. Russia was returning as a player in the Middle East until 2022, but has now largely disappeared? China is rather determinedly – and probably sensibly – on the sidelines.
The messiness and amateurism of Trump-type diplomacy pretty well guarantees that nothing will be more than partially resolved and the Gulf will remain on a knife edge. At the same, Trump clearly wants out of a disastrous war, but also wants to wave a victory flag.
Supposing the war resumed what would happen? Both sides have escalatory means: closure by the Houthis of the Bab -al Mandab between the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden is one. Strangely, though the three big previous Gulf crises – the Iran-Iraq war 1980- 88, the first Gulf conflict 1990-91, Second Gulf war 2003 and thereafter – all centred on Iraq but the country is now barely mentioned in the media – though a major oil exporter and the most unstable of the states in the Gulf.
Why is this? The media – but also politicians and diplomats – often have tunnel division during wars and crises. But Iraq remains the most divided Gulf state — and even before the war was facing an economic crisis. Washington and Tehran do not speak about Iraq much because for twenty years they operated a curious unspoken joint hegemony over the country, but this may now be breaking down. Neither wants to wreck Iraq again but they might end up doing so.
Iran probably could take over Iraq – since it is the other big Shia country and has plenty of assets there – but does not want to. Iraq as a sort of extra economic lung is important to Iran. Any takeover would be messy. The US has cards – the Kurdish and Sunni communities possibly – but not as many as does Iran. Trump did veto the leading candidate to be the next prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, but the joint Shia committee may choose Bassim al-Badri – who is even closer to Iran – instead.
Somebody once described a previous crisis in the Middle East as being like three-dimensional chess played by an uncertain number of players and with no known rules. This crisis is a great deal worse.
*Patrick Cockburn has been reporting from the MENA region since 1979. He is renowned for this coverage of the rise of the Islamic State, Iraq’s sectarian violence, and Kurdish issues. He has won numerous awards, including the Martha Gellhorn Prize (2005), James Cameron Prize (2006), and Foreign Affairs Journalist of the Year at the 2014 British Journalism Awards and is the author of multiple books, including The Rise of Islamic State: ISIS and the New Sunni Revolution and Chaos and Caliphate. Beyond the Middle East, he has also worked as a correspondent in Moscow and Washington
