President Trump told the New York Post on Tuesday that the Strait of Hormuz will "automatically open" once the Iran conflict concludes, a moment he suggested is not far off. The president framed the waterway's reopening not as something the United States needs to force, but as an inevitability once Iran's military capacity is fully dismantled.
The war, which began Feb. 28 with joint U.S.-Israel strikes on Iranian leadership and nuclear infrastructure, has entered what Trump described as its final phase. Iran has blocked oil tankers and other shipping vessels from passing through the strait since the conflict's opening days, choking a corridor that carries 20% of the world's oil supply.
Trump was blunt about the state of Iran's military.
"I think it'll automatically open, but my attitude is, I've obliterated the country."
There's a clarity to Trump's position that cuts through weeks of noise from foreign policy commentators wringing their hands over the strait. His argument is straightforward: a country with no offensive military capability left cannot hold the world's energy supply hostage. The chokepoint problem solves itself when the hand squeezing it loses its grip.
The president called on other nations that depend on the waterway to step up and help reopen it, making the point that the United States shouldn't bear every burden for a shipping lane that benefits the entire global economy.
"They have no strength left, and let the countries that are using the strait, let them go and open it … because I would imagine whoever's controlling the oil will be very happy to open the strait."
This is a reasonable demand. The Strait of Hormuz matters far more to Europe, East Asia, and the Gulf states than it does to the United States, which has dramatically expanded its own energy production. If those nations want their oil flowing, they can contribute to making it happen.
Trump reiterated that his primary objective in the conflict has never been control of the strait. It has always been ensuring Iran does not obtain a nuclear weapon. On that front, the president revealed that Iran's nuclear infrastructure was "actually bigger than we thought," a detail that vindicates the decision to act rather than pursue another round of diplomatic theater.
Consider the alternative. For years, the foreign policy establishment urged patience, negotiation, and carefully worded agreements that Iran routinely violated in spirit and often in letter. The Biden administration spent its tenure trying to resurrect a version of the Iran nuclear deal while Tehran accelerated enrichment. The infrastructure Trump is now describing, the one larger than intelligence assessments predicted, grew under that policy of restraint.
Trump said U.S. forces are actively taking away Iran's nuclear ability, the Washington Examiner reported. That's the mission. The strait is a secondary concern, and he's right to frame it that way.
Perhaps the most significant line from Trump's interview was his statement that U.S. forces "have secured a regime change" that is "much more reasonable than previous." The details remain thin, but the implication is substantial: the theocratic regime that spent four decades as the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism is no longer calling the shots.
Trump indicated the conflict's conclusion is near but not immediate.
"We won't have to be there much longer — but we have more work to do in terms of killing their offensive, whatever offensive capability they have left."
On the diplomatic front, Pakistan has positioned itself as a mediator between Iran and the United States. Trump declined to say whether he would dispatch a negotiating team to meet with Iranian diplomats there. That discretion matters. Telegraphing diplomatic moves in the middle of a military campaign serves no one except the other side.
While the United States and Israel prosecute this war, the United Kingdom and France have closed their respective airspaces to U.S. military forces en route to Israel. That decision deserves more attention than it has received.
These are NATO allies. They benefit enormously from the stability the United States provides in the Middle East. They are among the nations most affected by the Strait of Hormuz blockade. And their response to an American-led effort to neutralize the world's most dangerous nuclear aspirant is to shut their airspace.
This is the same Europe that lectures Washington about alliance solidarity, rules-based order, and collective security. Apparently, those principles apply only when the United States is asked to spend blood and treasure on Europe's behalf. When the mission shifts to a region where American leadership is doing the hard work others refused to do for decades, the doors close.
Trump's call for other nations to help reopen the strait lands differently when you consider which nations are actively obstructing the campaign. The free-riding isn't just passive anymore. It's turning hostile.
The Wall Street Journal previously reported that Trump had expressed willingness to end the war without reopening the waterway. Tuesday's comments suggest he sees the question as moot. Destroy Iran's ability to project force, and the strait opens on its own. The logic is hard to argue with.
A month into this conflict, the United States has struck Iranian nuclear infrastructure that turned out to be more extensive than anticipated, degraded Iran's military to a point where Trump describes it as having "no strength left," and facilitated a regime change. The Strait of Hormuz, which the foreign policy class treated as an unsolvable puzzle, may simply resolve itself once the regime that weaponized it no longer exists in any meaningful form.
That's what happens when you solve the actual problem instead of managing the symptoms.