How long can Iran withstand economic siege by the US?

T he US is squeezing Iran’s economy with sanctions while overseeing one of the world’s biggest smuggling operations in which millions of barrels of oil are ferried past an Iranian blockade. At night, a fleet of 60 tankers in the Strait of Hormuz switch off their transponders and even the crew’s mobile phones. They hug the Omani coast as they sail into the Gulf of Oman while American jets shoot down any incoming Iranian missiles or drones. Most commented 1 I tried the new £419 Dyson toothbrush. 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Still standing after six months: stories of survival inside Iran Those hopes, analysts and officials say, may prove wrong again after the US and Israel launched the war in February believing that the regime could be toppled in weeks. But the renewed pressure may persuade the regime to return to the June ceasefire while possibly making concessions. Advertisement On Tuesday Iranian state television has reported that several explosions were heard in the country’s south along the strategic Strait of Hormuz. Top stories 1 Top five 2027 cruise and tour packages to book with Times Holidays Promoted content Top stories 1 Marine Le Pen pledges vote on banning Muslim headscarves in public Europe 2 Hamas official captured after Israeli airstrikes on Gaza Israel-Hamas war 3 UK borrowing costs hit an 18-year high in global bond sell-off Economics “Multiple explosions heard in the east of Bandar Abbas and around Qeshm Island,” state television said, adding that “no incidents or damage have been reported” so far in the southern Hormozgan province. Pro-regime supporters gather under a portrait of the supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, in Tehran in April Majid Saeedi/Getty Images It came after the US announced it had launched fresh strikes on Tuesday against Iran’s Revolutionary Guards in response to attempted attacks on commercial shipping and American forces. The Times View: US should intensify economic pressure on Iran The strikes, which began at 12:00 pm (1600 GMT), came after “recent attempted attacks by (the Guards) against commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and against American service members deployed to the region,” US Central Command said on X. Advertisement The regime has survived the war and become even more hawkish, while the country is in economic freefall: its currency, the rial, is trading at historic lows and inflation is above 80 per cent. Iranians queue for hours for petrol and bread, and the country is facing its worst unemployment crisis. Officials have repeatedly called on people to reduce and ration petrol and electricity consumption and are contemplating new quotas. “We need to save gasoline,” Mohammad Ghalibaf, the Speaker of the Iranian parliament, said on Tuesday. A funeral procession for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Mashhad in July Alfred Yaghobzadeh/SIPA/Shutterstock “It is bad but it’s not the kind of pressure that’s going to lead to economic collapse,” Ali Vaez, who heads the Iran project at the International Crisis Group, said. “One has to remember that it’s almost impossible to bring the Iranian economy to the verge of collapse because you can’t impose a hermetic seal of sanctions around Iran. It’s a big country and it has experience in circumventing sanctions.” The pressure has brought into the open the disputes among the regime’s camps, with relative pragmatists led by President Pezeshkian advocating for a renewed ceasefire that might salvage the country’s economy. “It is better that we bring the war to an end now as we are in a position of power and dignity,” Pezeshkian said last week. Mojtaba Khamenei , the hardline supreme leader who succeeded his father after his assassination at the start of the war, called for unity but issued a stern warning to critics who have emphasised the economic crisis. “Weakness, defects and deficiencies do not require narration and highlighting; rather, they require planning and action to resolve … the problem,” he said in a written statement. Advertisement An anti-Trump billboard in Tehran. Below, a mural next to the US embassy BBC Persian/VOA Persian/Manoto TV/Iran International TV Iran’s Directorate General for Foreign Media Iran had brutally crushed an uprising in January that was triggered by the country’s economic crisis, which predated the war that began a few weeks later. Another uprising would probably meet the same fate, analysts believe. “A popular uprising by itself cannot succeed,” Farzan Sabet, an Iran expert at the Geneva Graduate Institute, said. “It needs foreign military intervention. You had that last time but the foreign military intervention came too late. Again unlike the shah [who was toppled in 1979] the Islamic Republic is not going to surrender, so you physically have to take power from them.” But hardliners such as Khamenei, who believe they can extract more concessions from the US and recognition of Iran’s claims to the strait, are on the back foot as they lose control over the waterway while the economy heads towards hyperinflation. A poster of Khamenei in downtown Tehran Vahid Salemi/AP Energy experts had been slow to realise the scale of the US-led efforts to break Iran’s chokehold on the strait, which before the war accounted for 20 million barrels a day in shipped oil. The transits were difficult to track, but the emerging picture is of a significant amount of oil coming through the strait every day. “The Iranians are doing what they can to disrupt the trade,’’ said Gregory Brew, an expert on the oil trade and a senior analyst with the Eurasia Group. “They’re still shooting at ships, they’re still hitting ships, they’ve shot over a dozen ships over the last ten days or so. So it’s not that their capability to target vessels has gone away, it’s that regional actors and the US have found ways to manage it.” Advertisement War and peace newsletter Tom Newton-Dunn’s concise guide to global conflict – with reasons for optimism. Sign up with one click You’ve successfully signed up to the War and peace newsletter Explore our newsletters An error occurred. Please use the link below. War and peace newsletter Explore our newsletters Oil companies such as the United Arab Emirates’s Adnoc snapped up dozens of large tankers in recent months as part of the US-led effort and launched what one expert described as “a pendulum service around the strait’’ that brings oil through the waterway and loads it into waiting vessels. “They’re operating [in the] dark in and out of the Gulf and they’re essentially concentrating the risk to 50 to 60 vessels,” said Richard Meade, editor-in-chief of the shipping journal Lloyd’s List. Vessels near the Strait of Hormuz on Monday Reuters American officials have claimed that the operation is bringing out half or more of pre-war oil levels, with estimates varying from seven to 16 million barrels a day. “The further we get in this new normal the more it becomes apparent that the US numbers are probably not as inflated as we once thought,’’ Meade said. “Although it is difficult to make accurate daily assessments.” Fearing the loss of Hormuz, Iran has doubled down on targeting the ships by rebuilding its radar and missiles near the coast, with the US conducting airstrikes and contemplating another campaign to degrade Iran’s capabilities. Michael Evans: US should have known air power alone is not enough to win a war Advertisement Analysts say the new dynamic may empower pragmatists in the regime who are pushing for a return to the June memorandum of understanding with the US that ended the first phase of the war. “While I don’t see the success of economic pressure leading to regime collapse, it’s possible that should the economic pressure get sufficiently bad, it might empower one side of Iran’s political spectrum … for Iran to re-enter the memorandum of understanding likely under worse conditions,” Sabet said.