US President Donald Trump is invoking his Venezuela playbook with a pledge to blockade Iranian ships. But Iran poses more complicated logistics, higher risks for American soldiers and a more resilient enemy. If successfully enforced — and how it will be enforced is far from clear — such a move would amount to a bet that economic pain inflicted on Tehran will be enough to force it to accept US demands before the Persian Gulf nation’s own effective closure of the waterway upends the global economy. The plan is for the US military to wait outside the Persian Gulf for ships sailing from Iran to leave the region. That echoes a tactic employed in Venezuela that — alongside the capture of Nicolas Maduro — allowed Trump to wrest control of the Latin American nation’s oil.
This blockade is intended hit Iran’s exports, currently the only oil still leaving the region in any volume and an economic lifeline for Tehran. The question is how big the impact will be. Iran’s oil exports are far higher than Venezuela’s during the blockade of the Latin American country, meaning that a higher level of military intervention will be needed. Tehran also continues to pose enough of a military threat to keep shipping through Hormuz all but halted to other nations’ trade, despite a fragile ceasefire being in place.
