A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
President Trump is dialing back an ultimatum for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz by today. He's now instructing the U.S. military to hold off on Iran's energy infrastructure for five days. Both sides, the president says, are now in talks to wind down the war. But Iran says there's been no dialogue with the U.S. NPR international affairs correspondent Jackie Northam reports on how the war is reshaping long-standing alliances.
JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: President Trump gave no clear, consistent reason why the U.S. went to war with Iran. But the Gulf States had a good idea of what it would mean if fighting broke out.
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SUZANNE MALONEY: The targeting of the Gulf States by Iran was an entirely predictable outcome to this war.
NORTHAM: Suzanne Maloney is director of Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution. She says over the past few years, relations between Iran and the Gulf States had warmed. The United Arab Emirates in Saudi Arabia and others wanted stability as they tried to shift their economies from oil to become attractive destinations for finance and tourism and tech industries. Maloney says all that evaporated when the war started and Iran began pounding the Gulf States with drones and missiles.
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MALONEY: I think that the, you know, sort of constructive relationships that had been developed - especially between the Saudis and the Iranians over the course of the past couple of years - are going to change radically in the aftermath of this conflict.
NORTHAM: But relations between the U.S. and the Gulf States are also affected by the war. Maloney says there's frustration amongst Gulf leaders that they weren't consulted about the targets or anything else about a war that's damaging their future. Maloney says that's created a loss of confidence in the U.S. - a strategic ally of the Gulf States.
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MALONEY: And they were already hedging their bets. These are countries that have relationships with Russia, that have relationships and investments with and in China.
NORTHAM: Georgina Wright, the European specialist at the German Marshall Fund, says there's concern across Europe about rising oil prices and the potential for a wave of mass migration. Wright says the Iran war comes on top of recent disputes with the U.S. over tariffs in Greenland.
GEORGINA WRIGHT: This war has certainly exacerbated the tensions in the Transatlantic Alliance and has really compelled Europeans to think even more about, OK, how do we stand up on our two feet with the United States that may be distracted elsewhere in the world?
NORTHAM: Wright says there's also concern in European capitals that the U.S. will shift its focus and weaponry from Ukraine to the Middle East. But she says Ukraine is providing help with the war in Iran, sending in systems that it's developed to counter Russia's drones.
WRIGHT: We're seeing a Ukraine that is much more confident, actually, and President Zelenskyy has said that he has sent experts to the region on how you basically fare in this new AI-type defense warfare. So it's as much as expertise as weaponry and really sort of sharing lessons learnt over the past four years.
NORTHAM: It's unclear whether President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's contribution to the Iran war effort will boost Ukraine's leverage with Trump in negotiations to end the war with Russia. Right now, Russia is in a suddenly much stronger position, raking in at least $100 million a day in sales of crude because the Strait of Hormuz is effectively closed, according to Columbia's Center on Global Energy Policy.
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DANIEL YERGIN: Vladimir Putin has won the lottery.
NORTHAM: Daniel Yergin is vice chairman of S&P Global. He says the high price of oil and the temporary lifting of U.S. sanctions is helping Russia replenish the revenues needed to fund the war in Ukraine.
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YERGIN: Russia's gotten out of the penalty box. People need Russian oil to make up for the oil that they're not getting through the Strait of Hormuz, and that certainly burnishes and strengthens his relationship with countries around the world.
NORTHAM: Especially China and India, who relied heavily on crude and liquefied natural gas from the Gulf States - crucial energy which is now trapped on tankers idled in the Strait of Hormuz.
Jackie Northam, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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