Iran imposes a fait accompli in Hormuz, while the Houthis threaten Bab el-Mandeb. The region possesses deterrent power—but who holds the decision to achieve a decisive outcome?

Prepared and Analysed by | Strategic Media Department – BETH Press
Supervised by: Abdullah Al-Omairah

What is happening in the region is no longer a military war in the conventional sense.

A conventional war is measured by the territory occupied, the forces advancing, the facilities destroyed, and the adversary retreating.

What is happening today goes far beyond that.

Iran is attempting to turn its geographical position on the Strait of Hormuz into political and financial authority over global trade. It is demanding that vessels pass through a system of its own creation and seeking to make the payment of transit fees part of any future settlement.

On the other side, the Iran-backed Houthis have declared a naval blockade that threatens not only Saudi Arabia, but the world and its interests. They have also begun considering fees on vessels transiting the southern Red Sea, with assistance from Iranian advisers, according to information reported internationally.

The fees have not yet been imposed at Bab el-Mandeb, and no date has been set for their collection. But the mere shift from missile threats to contemplating the establishment of an “authority” that regulates passage and collects money reveals that this is far more than a passing military attack.

We are witnessing an attempt to create parallel sovereignty over two international waterways:

Iran at Hormuz.

The Houthis at Bab el-Mandeb.

Between them stand the Gulf states, energy exports, Saudi ports, and the movement of trade between Asia and Europe.

The question, therefore, has become larger than the number of missiles and ships:

How have two actors—one a regime exhausted by war and sanctions, the other an armed group that does not represent a state—come to behave as though they hold the keys to the world’s maritime gateways?

Herein lies the most painful paradox of this war:

The aggressor possesses limited power but enjoys freedom of decision, while the region’s states possess immense capabilities yet operate within a dense web of calculations, commitments, and constraints.

The true balance of power is therefore not measured solely by the number of aircraft and missiles, but by freedom of decision: Who can move quickly? And who, before taking each step, must calculate the risk of escalation, protect the economy, coordinate alliances, and anticipate the day after?

From this paradox arises the question that governs this entire analysis:

Is the problem the ability to respond, or the possession of the authority to pursue a decisive outcome?

Does the United States appear incapable because it cannot end the threat, or because it does not wish to end it in the manner and at the time preferred by the region’s states?

Is Washington following a course designed solely to achieve its own strategic objectives, even if the danger to its allies persists?

Or has everyone become hostage to a complex equation: the region’s states fear the cost of war, the United States fears the cost of what follows, while Iran and the Houthis benefit from the hesitation of both?

And does the American security umbrella protect the region’s states, or has it begun to place a ceiling on their decisions?

From Threats to Tolls

Closing a strait is a military act.

Imposing fees on it is an attempt to transform military force into a permanent right.

That is the more dangerous shift.

Iran does not merely want to deny passage to one vessel and permit another. It wants international discussion to move from rejecting its control over Hormuz to negotiating the terms of that control.

It may begin with a temporary phrase:

Fees for navigational services.

Then become:

Fees for protection.

Before effectively turning into:

Pay to pass.

At Bab el-Mandeb, the Houthis appear to be attempting to reproduce the same model: threaten first, grant selective passage next, exempt certain countries, and finally convert coercion into a collection system.

Available information indicates that China could be exempted from the proposed Houthi fees following contacts intended to secure the passage of its vessels. Should that happen, the fees would not be payment for a general navigational service. They would become an instrument of political discrimination between states—rewarding those that reach an understanding with the group and punishing those that refuse to submit.

This is not the regulation of navigation.

It is geopolitical extortion wrapped in administrative language.

Has Hormuz Been Closed?

The precise answer is that it has been closed to normal traffic, but it has not become a wall through which no vessel can pass.

Passage remains possible for some ships, whether under military protection or through arrangements and routes approved by Iran. That is why some American statements describe the strait as remaining open, while other reports describe it as closed or severely restricted.

The two accounts are not entirely contradictory.

The strait may be geographically open, but it is not commercially open in the normal sense. Freedom of navigation does not mean that a vessel may pass only after negotiations, protection, or selective approval. It means that all vessels may transit in accordance with the law, without extortion, discrimination, or fear.

Since early May, American forces have assisted the passage of approximately 900 commercial vessels and large quantities of oil, according to United States Central Command. Yet the need for military force to enable a ship to exercise its inherent right of passage reveals that freedom of navigation is no longer normal. It has become a security operation.

Iran has therefore achieved part of its objective even without a total closure:

It has made the world negotiate over a right that was never supposed to be negotiable.

An Unlawful Fait Accompli

International law does not permit a state bordering an international strait to impose fees merely for granting passage.

Charges may be levied for specific services, such as pilotage, towing, or certain port services, provided they do not become transit fees and do not discriminate between ships or countries.

The Strait of Hormuz is not a man-made canal that one state may treat as a commercial facility under its ownership. It is a natural international waterway lying between the territorial waters of Iran and Oman.

Oman therefore proposed a joint regional mechanism under which contributions would be voluntary and allocated to navigational, rescue, and environmental-protection services, rather than accepting a unilateral Iranian right to administer the strait and collect fees. Tehran, however, rejected a formula that would reduce its control and insisted upon a greater role in determining transit routes and conditions.

The problem is that when a fait accompli persists, it begins to become a political reality.

States protest at first.

Then they search for a settlement.

Then they accept a temporary exception.

Eventually, the exception becomes the new rule.

The aggressor does not prevail because it convinced the world that it was right, but because the world grew tired of resisting what was wrong.

Who Emboldened the Aggressor?

A popular saying asks:

“Pharaoh was asked: Who made you a tyrant?”

He replied:

“I found no one to stop me.”

The value of the saying lies not in its irony, but in its psychological interpretation of aggression.

An aggressor does not always begin with confidence in its own strength.

It tests.

It advances one step, then watches the response.

If the objection comes in the form of a statement, it advances another step.

If the punishment is limited, it raises the threshold of its test.

If it discovers that its opponents fear the cost of responding more than it fears the cost of aggression, hesitation becomes incapacity in its mind, and perceived incapacity becomes an acquired right.

An armed group begins by attacking a ship.

Then it determines which vessels may pass.

Then it declares a blockade against a state.

Then it considers imposing fees on global trade.

Its power has not multiplied so rapidly.

What has multiplied is its awareness of the limits of others’ responses.

Is the United States Incapable?

Militarily, no.

The United States can strike command centres, missile and drone facilities, naval capabilities, and coastal surveillance sites inside Iran. It has carried out successive waves of strikes against dozens of sites, vessels, and military installations.

But possessing military power is one thing. Converting it into a political outcome is another.

Military hardware, however powerful, cannot achieve its purpose unless guided by courageous and wise decisions that recognise genuine interests and clearly define what the war is intended to accomplish and how it should end.

Without that clarity, the battle may drag on and its losses may multiply without bringing the desired outcome any closer.

A boat can be destroyed within minutes, but preventing Iran from building another cannot be accomplished with a single strike.

A missile launcher can be bombed, but ending the regime that decides to launch the missiles raises greater questions:

Who would govern Iran afterward? Would the state remain intact or disintegrate?

Who would control its nuclear facilities and missiles?

Would the groups affiliated with the regime cease their operations, or become unrestrained forces?

Would the fall of the regime bring stability to Iran, or produce chaos extending beyond its borders and across the region?

These questions do not prove that Washington is incapable, but they may explain why it uses force incrementally.

Yet an inability to understand the post-regime phase, or to identify the instruments needed to preserve the state and establish stability, would simply mean that the war is not yet being guided by a clear plan serving the interests of the Iranian people and the region.

Instead, it would be guided by military objectives that know what they want to destroy, without a complete political vision of what they intend to build afterward.

The United States appears to want to weaken Iran sufficiently to deter it and force it into negotiations, without bringing down the regime, for fear of losing the ability to manage what follows.

But this policy carries a clear danger.

If incremental pressure fails to produce retreat, it gives the adversary time to adapt and turns the strikes into part of the daily landscape rather than a shock capable of changing its calculations.

American power then becomes immense in motion, but limited in decisiveness.

This raises the question: Do the United States and its allies possess a strategy different from what is visible on the battlefield, or is continuing pressure without a decisive outcome the strategy itself?

Sanctions After Strikes

The United States has imposed new sanctions on companies and tankers linked to Iran’s attempt to generate revenue from passage through Hormuz. It has targeted entities that it says use insurance, maritime services, and digital assets to collect money from vessels.

This means Washington is fighting the Iranian project militarily and economically at the same time.

But the sanctions raise a painful question:

If Iran is imposing a fait accompli on an international waterway, is it sufficient to punish the companies collecting the money, or must the underlying capability that allows Iran to impose the fees be eliminated?

Punishment exhausts the aggressor.

Deterrence prevents it from repeating the act.

The difference is that punishment follows aggression, while deterrence makes the aggressor recalculate before it begins.

The Region Is Capable

The states of the region do not lack modern aircraft, air-defence systems, intelligence capabilities, trained forces, or financial resources.

Saudi Arabia, in particular, possesses the political, economic, and military weight required to protect its territory and interests and respond to sources of threat.

The Kingdom has already acted against Houthi sites used to threaten navigation and is seeking to establish an international coalition to protect the Red Sea.

Why, then, does the response appear smaller than the provocation?

Because a state does not make the decision to go to war in the same way as an armed group.

A state must consider the security of its cities.

Its economy.

Its airports.

Its ports.

Its refineries.

Its electricity and desalination plants.

Its existing and future investments.

Its international relations.

And the lives of millions of civilians.

An armed group, by contrast, hides among mountains, caves, and neighbourhoods. It may launch missiles from beside civilian facilities, then exploit the casualties resulting from the response to portray itself as the victim and strip its opponent of legitimacy.

This is one form of asymmetric warfare: the weaker party compensates for its military inferiority through concealment, dispersal within civilian areas, and surprise attacks, before using its opponent’s response and the resulting casualties in a media and political battle.

Conventional military superiority is therefore insufficient. Confronting such a group requires precise intelligence, limited and specialised operations, separating combatants from civilians, cutting off sources of financing and weapons, documenting violations, and building a political and service-based alternative that denies the group the ability to shelter within society or exploit its suffering.

In this context, some methods used by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps—particularly after the erosion of its conventional capabilities—overlap with methods previously employed by al-Qaeda and ISIS. These include operating through dispersed cells and networks, hiding within civilian environments, relying on proxies, maintaining ambiguity over responsibility for attacks, striking soft targets, and turning fear and disruption into instruments for compensating for the imbalance of power.

The distinction, however, is fundamental.

Al-Qaeda and ISIS are transnational organisations operating outside the state. The Revolutionary Guard, by contrast, is an official state institution that possesses the resources and institutions of the state and uses militias as extensions of its influence.

It does not replicate the two organisations ideologically. Rather, it employs some of their methods within a state strategy that combines a conventional military, proxy warfare, and political deniability.

In some respects, that makes it more complex.

It can behave as a state when it needs legitimacy and negotiations, and as an armed network when it seeks to attack, deny responsibility, and evade accountability.

accountability.

A responsible state fears disorder because it has a homeland, a society, and achievements to protect. A militia invests in disorder because it cannot flourish without it.

Herein lies another harsh paradox:

The success of the region’s states increases their power, but also raises the cost of war for them.

An institutional military is therefore not merely confronting weapons. It is confronting an adversary that conceals itself, pursues attrition, and attempts to convert the military’s mistakes into political and media gains.

The most important rule remains:

Defeating a militia does not mean destroying the place in which it hides. It means separating it from the environment it exploits and denying its sponsoring state the ability to combine the privileges of statehood with the methods of armed organisations.

The Revolutionary Guard is an official military institution within the Iranian state, but it does not always behave according to the rules of a conventional military. It combines direct military action, proxy warfare, covert operations, denial, and attacks on navigation and civilian facilities.

Conventional military policy uses force to achieve a declared military objective, under a clear command structure, accountability, and rules of engagement.

Terrorism, by contrast, uses fear and attacks on civilians and non-military interests to coerce states and societies.

The Iranian regime has authorised this dual role. It has made the Revolutionary Guard an army inside the state and an armed network beyond it, granting it money, weapons, and political cover.

The weakness of states in which it has implanted proxies, the international community’s hesitation to hold Tehran accountable, and the treatment of each militia as though it were separate from Iran have also enabled the expansion of its influence.

The world did not explicitly grant it legitimacy, but it gave it ample room to operate when it separated the crimes of the proxies from the responsibility of the party that created, armed, and directed them.

The more precise question, therefore, is not whether the Revolutionary Guard is an army or a gang.

It is:

How can an institution enjoy the status of an army, then resort to the methods of gangs and terrorist organisations whenever necessary?

The Revolutionary Guard uses the methods of gangs and terrorist organisations because it wants the power of a state when it attacks—and the immunity of a gang when it is held accountable.

When the Umbrella Becomes a Ceiling

For decades, the structure of regional security has depended upon partnership with the United States.

This partnership has provided deterrence, weapons, intelligence sharing, and protection for maritime corridors. But it has also created a high degree of interdependence between local decisions and American calculations.

Weapons systems are interconnected.

Defence systems are integrated.

Intelligence is distributed among allies.

Major operations require political and military coordination.

This structure gives states additional strength, but it may also slow their independent decision-making at critical moments.

Here emerges a possibility worthy of consideration:

Has the security umbrella, at certain moments, changed from protection into a ceiling?

Have the region’s states become capable of responding militarily, yet obliged to wait for agreement on the timing, scope, and conclusion of that response?

This does not mean that the United States prevents its allies from defending themselves. Nor is there publicly available information proving the existence of an American decision to restrain them.

But a difference in objectives is sufficient to produce constraints.

The state under attack wants to end the threat.

Washington may want to manage it.

A neighbouring state seeks a decisive outcome that will protect its infrastructure for decades.

An international power may prefer incremental pressure that keeps the door to negotiation open.

When objectives diverge, joint power becomes slow, however immense it may be.

Does Washington Want a Decisive Outcome?

There are several possible explanations, none of which can be confirmed from outside the rooms in which decisions are made.

The first is that Washington fears the day after the regime’s fall may be more dangerous than the regime itself.

The second is that it seeks to exhaust the Revolutionary Guard and gradually reduce its capabilities, while avoiding an occupation or a prolonged ground war.

The third is that it is using military pressure to force Tehran to accept a settlement concerning the nuclear and maritime files.

The fourth is that it wants to transfer a larger share of the cost of protecting the waterways to the countries that depend upon them commercially, rather than leaving the United States as their sole guardian.

The fifth—and most sensitive—is that some international powers neither want the region to collapse nor want it to become entirely independent of the Western security umbrella.

Persistent danger sells weapons.

It increases the need for military bases.

It turns alliances into permanent necessities.

And it gives the protecting power influence over decisions of war and peace.

This is not an established fact, but it is a political possibility that should not be excluded merely because it is painful.

Cooperation between states is natural and necessary when governed by mutual interests and respect. It multiplies strength and supports stability.

But when cooperation becomes exploitation or dependency, it destroys trust and turns an alliance into a temporary burden awaiting grave consequences.

Why Do States Not Act Alone?

Because a unilateral response could leave the targeted state bearing the entire cost of protecting an international interest.

Freedom of navigation through Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb is not the concern of Saudi Arabia or the Gulf states alone.

Energy consumed in Asia passes through these waterways.

Goods destined for Europe pass through them.

The ships belong to international companies.

The cargoes affect food prices and industrial costs around the world.

Why, then, should one country alone bear the blood of its soldiers, the cost of its operations, and the risks of retaliation, while the benefits reach everyone?

The formation of an international coalition would therefore be an attempt to correct a longstanding imbalance:

The world wants the passage to remain open, but it would prefer someone else to pay the cost of opening it.

While states negotiate over the distribution of responsibility, the aggressor moves quickly because it does not need an international coalition to launch a missile.

This is one of the weaknesses of broad alliances. Everyone wants freedom of navigation, but some states prefer to benefit from protection without bearing its cost. Others regard the survival of the familiar Iranian regime as less dangerous than the uncertainty that could follow it.

This explains China’s position. It does not necessarily reflect weakness in strategic thinking so much as a preference for stability that protects its trade, even if the source of the crisis remains unresolved.

The solution is a binding coalition, not merely a symbolic expression of solidarity: joint command, a declared division of costs and responsibilities, unified rules of response, and a direct link between benefiting from the waterway and participating in its protection.

Those who benefit from the security of the route must share its cost.

Rules Restrain Those Who Respect Them

There is a structural injustice within asymmetric warfare.

The state is bound by international law.

By rules of engagement.

By the obligation to protect civilians.

By the requirement to present evidence.

And by the need to calculate political reactions.

The militia operates outside most of these constraints, then uses the state’s adherence to them against it.

The greater the state’s ethical standards, the greater the constraints upon its response.

The lower the group’s level of accountability, the wider the space available for its aggression.

This does not mean that states should abandon the law. Descending to the level of a militia would constitute another defeat.

But a law that neither protects those who respect it nor punishes those who violate it ceases to be a foundation of justice and becomes an operational advantage for the aggressor.

More Dangerous Than the Fees

The danger does not lie in the amount a ship may be required to pay.

It lies in the entity to which the payment is made.

Payment, even under coercion, grants the collecting authority three benefits:

Money.

Practical recognition of its authority.

And the ability to decide who may pass and who may not.

If an armed group succeeds in imposing fees at Bab el-Mandeb, it will no longer be merely a group attacking navigation. It will begin behaving as an unlawful maritime authority.

If Iran succeeds in establishing a unilateral right to administer Hormuz, it will not merely have survived the war. It will emerge with a gain it did not possess before it.

That would be an extraordinarily dangerous outcome:

A war that began to punish Iran could end by granting it greater authority over the strait.

The Mosaic

When the pieces are assembled, a picture emerges that differs from the fragmented daily analysis:

Iran cannot defeat the United States militarily, but it can increase the cost of America’s continued involvement in the war.

The Houthis cannot confront Saudi Arabia as a state, but they can threaten its vessels and exhaust the security of the Red Sea.

The region’s states can destroy many of their adversaries’ capabilities, but they cannot guarantee that destruction alone will produce lasting stability.

The United States can bomb Iran, but it has not yet demonstrated an ability to convert bombing into a clear political conclusion.

The world condemns threats to navigation, but does not display the same enthusiasm for sharing the cost of protecting it.

The problem, therefore, is not that the stronger party has become weak.

It is that the weaker party has learned how to use the stronger party’s constraints against it.

The Real Question

The question is not:

Why do the region’s states not respond?

They do respond.

They defend themselves.

They intercept missiles.

They strike sources of threat.

They build alliances.

The more precise question is:

Why has the response not yet reached a level that convinces Iran and the Houthis that continued aggression will cost more than retreat?

Who established the boundary between an authorised response and a prohibited decisive outcome?

And is the postponement of such an outcome part of a deliberate strategy, the result of conflicting interests, or fear of the day after?

BETH Analysis

The region does not suffer from an absence of power.

It suffers from a gap between power and decision.

The aggressor possesses limited capabilities but enjoys freedom of movement.

The state is powerful, but it is surrounded by responsibilities, alliances, laws, and calculations about the future.

The weaker party may therefore appear more daring, while the stronger party appears more hesitant.

But this situation cannot continue indefinitely, because deterrence is not measured by the number of strikes. It is measured by what changes in the adversary’s behaviour afterward.

If Iran continues to dictate transit routes, and the Houthis continue moving from attacking ships to considering fees on them, the number of strikes alone will not constitute evidence of success.

Success means that ships return to sea without seeking permission from a militia, without paying an aggressor, and without waiting for a military escort merely to exercise a right guaranteed by law.

Pharaoh was asked:

“Who made you a tyrant?”

He replied:

“I found no one to stop me.”

But a response does not always take the form of a larger missile.

It also takes the form of clear will, an alliance that understands its objective, a law with the power to enforce itself, and a declared limit to patience that the aggressor knows will change the rules of confrontation if crossed.

An adversary that does not know where its opponent’s patience ends will continue testing it.

A state that does not draw a clear limit to its patience may turn that patience from wisdom that protects it into space within which its enemy can operate.

The states of the region are capable.

But the question that will determine their future is not how many weapons they possess.

It is:

Who holds the decision to use force, and when does the response move from managing aggression to ending it?

The Principle of Change

God Almighty says:

“Indeed, Allah does not change the condition of a people until they change what is within themselves.”

Human beings are compelled in matters beyond their control, but they possess choice and responsibility in matters they have the power to change.

The same applies to states.

They do not choose their geography or every circumstance surrounding them, but they choose how to manage their power, build their relationships, confront their dangers, and protect their people.

An aggressor may be granted respite, but respite is neither approval nor victory. God Almighty says:

“We only give them respite so that they may increase in sin.”

Power is also neither an eternal right nor a guarantee of survival. God Almighty says:

“If you turn away, He will replace you with another people; then they will not be like you.”

History contains states and empires that rose to dominance, then disappeared when they mismanaged their power, exhausted their societies, exceeded the limits of their capabilities, and failed to adapt to a changing world.

They did not always fall because they were the weaker powers.

They fell because they failed to change themselves before the balance of power changed around them.

States are not protected by the power they possess alone, but by their ability to review themselves, reform their decisions, and recognise what they are capable of changing.

Those unable to lead change by their own will may eventually confront that change in the form of a disappearance they are powerless to prevent.