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Iran is seeking to raise the economic and security costs of confrontation with the U.S. by threatening trade routes, shipping lanes and energy infrastructure across the Middle East, Gulf officials and analysts reportedly told Reuters.
Rather than pursuing a decisive military victory, Tehran is using calibrated escalation to widen the conflict while avoiding a full-scale war, according to the report.
Iran’s objective is to convince Washington and its allies that containing the crisis will cost more than accepting Tehran’s demands for a greater role in governing the Strait of Hormuz.
By placing several maritime chokepoints and energy assets at risk, Iran believes it can strengthen its position in future negotiations.
Michael Knights of the Washington Institute told Reuters that Iran had sought to keep expanding its options by introducing new locations, weapons and targets.
He said Iran’s main advantage was not its ability to directly harm the U.S. or Israel, but its capacity to damage regional countries and the global economy.
Iran has demonstrated its ability to disrupt traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, which carried about one-fifth of global oil consumption before the war.
Tehran has also signaled that other maritime chokepoints could be targeted.
Threats against the Red Sea and Saudi energy infrastructure suggest a broader effort to increase the cost of protecting global trade and test Washington’s tolerance for continued disruption.
A Gulf source told Reuters that commanders in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards believed they could gain additional concessions by increasing pressure.
According to the source, Iranian officials see an opportunity in what they regard as U.S. President Donald Trump’s reluctance to become deeply involved in another Middle East conflict before November’s midterm elections.
Iran believes that widening the war and increasing pressure could eventually force Trump to make concessions, the source said.
The source added that while Trump believed heavy strikes could push Iran toward negotiations, Tehran was unlikely to yield.
Trump said talks with Iran would take place Monday after previously announcing that he had canceled an imminent attack in hopes of reaching an agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran, however, said it was not currently engaged in talks with the U.S.
A senior Iranian source told Reuters that Tehran’s leadership had concluded that previous attempts at flexibility had brought greater pressure from Washington.
That assessment strengthened Iran’s view that it must first establish leverage before meaningful negotiations can begin.
The source said Tehran believed Trump viewed concessions as weakness and responded only to pressure.
Michael Singh, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute, said Iran believed it still held the initiative because the Trump administration appeared uncertain about how far it was prepared to go militarily.
Singh said Tehran was seeking sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz and selective control over the waterway.
Alan Eyre, a former U.S. diplomat and Iran specialist, said Tehran’s deterrence strategy was intended to force Washington to end its blockade and halt military attacks.
Iran does not want the U.S. to control the pace of events, Eyre said.
The future governance of the Strait of Hormuz remains at the center of the confrontation.
Oman has presented Iran with a Gulf-backed proposal for managing the waterway that includes voluntary user fees, according to regional sources cited by Reuters.
Iran is seeking administrative authority over the strait and the ability to charge vessels for services.
Washington has rejected any fees and insists that Hormuz remain an international waterway outside Iranian control.
The dispute reflects Tehran’s effort to secure a greater role in the strait before agreeing to reduce pressure on maritime traffic.
Iran’s widening threats have increasingly pushed regional and Western countries to focus on defending trade routes and energy infrastructure rather than increasing pressure on Tehran.
Gulf sources described an emerging Saudi-led maritime coalition as a defensive framework centered on escorting commercial vessels, sharing intelligence and protecting shipping lanes rather than directly confronting Iran.
Knights compared the coalition to the European Union’s Aspides mission in the Red Sea, which was created to protect merchant shipping rather than change the military balance.
For Iran, that shift represents a degree of success.
Although Tehran cannot match U.S. military power directly, it can impose costs by forcing governments and naval forces to remain defensive. Each additional threat in strategic locations like the Strait of Hormuz or the Bab al-Mandeb—which connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden—increases the resources required to keep energy supplies and global trade moving.
Iranian leaders appear to believe they can withstand economic pressure longer than a U.S.-led coalition can tolerate repeated disruption to global commerce and energy markets.
The strategy also has a diplomatic purpose.
By showing that it can expand the crisis, Tehran hopes to influence the conditions of any eventual negotiations.
Ray Takeyh of the Council on Foreign Relations, a former Iran adviser at the U.S. State Department, told Reuters that Iran would seek to define the terms if negotiations took place.
He said both Tehran and Washington were responding to escalation with further escalation.
Neither side, however, appeared willing to retreat.
As the U.S. and Iran continue testing each other’s resolve, the strategy of increasing pressure to gain negotiating leverage risks developing into a broader conflict that neither side can fully control.
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