World Review: Iran War Fragile Ceasefire, Strategic Mistakes, NATO Lives Another Day
A synopsis of this week's edition of World Review
Each week, I host a video podcast called World Review with Ivo Daalder where journalists from major news outlets around the world join me to discuss the latest global news stories of the week.
World Review can now be heard on Sundays, at 7:00 a.m. Central Time, on Chicago’s NPR station, WBEZ, or on the WBEZ app. We’ll still tape the show on Fridays, and post the video on YouTube and the audio version on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Now, on to this week’s show. We discussed Trump’s televised speech on Wednesday night, the global ripples of the closed Strait of Hormuz, and Israel’s 30-month war. Joining me this week were Catherine Philp, the World Affairs Editor at The Times, David Luhnow, the UK Bureau Chief at The Wall Street Journal, and Michael Birnbaum, the White House correspondent covering the Trump presidency for The Washington Post.
While I encourage you to watch or listen to the episode (and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts!), here are a few interesting things I took away from our discussion:
With a fragile ceasefire taking hold between the United States and Iran, it appears that no one, except perhaps Iran, has been left better off by the conflict. The U.S. has shown that it was unable or unwilling to achieve regime change or extract political concessions from the Iranian government. Instead, the world is left with a retrenched Iran, with a damaged military, but one that still has a tight grip on the Strait of Hormuz. The Gulf States’ model as islands of stability within the Middle East has been challenged and economies globally are beginning to feel the effects of higher energy prices. Catherine explores the “diplomatic theater” that we saw from the Trump Administration, suggesting that it pursued Tuesday’s ultimatum while also looking for diplomatic off-ramps and that’s part of how we’ve gotten to such an unclear resolution.
Could the Iran War be the America’s “Suez moment?” The 1956 Suez Crisis marked the end of the British Empire. Could the Iran War be the beginning of the end of the United States’ time as the leader of the international order? The United States has alienated many of its allies and didn’t even consult its closest, European partners before launching this war. America’s friends are left wondering if they should continue relying on U.S. leadership, particularly states in the Middle East who have had their security situations upended. Michael argues that there will still be demand in some places for U.S. leadership, such as in NATO. Small countries bordering Russia will still seek U.S. defense assurances, but in other parts of the world that demand for stability may look very different.
The NATO alliance may be in mortal danger. As I wrote this week, Trump has long been skeptical of the U.S. alliance on which the post-War international order has been built. Trump sees diplomacy as inherently transactional and does not understand how the mutual defense alliance benefits the United States, failing to recognize the difference when its starts an offensive war of choice in the Middle East. But Trump’s statements this week and the visit by NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte show we may have come very close to the brink. David calls the current situation “like a divorce” and that “things are being said that can’t be unsaid.” The Europeans’ confidence in American leadership is being permanently undermined and the alliance that underpinned so much peace and prosperity seems to be coming apart at the seems.
Those are my quick takes on this week’s episode here on World Review. To get the full story, please listen to the episode itself.