What if Trump actually wanted this outcome in Hormuz all along?

By Brett Arends

Cambridge University professor Helen Thompson says the consistent 'thread' through the second Trump administration has been resetting the energy part of the world geopolitically

Ships languishing in the Persian Gulf recently following attacks in the Strait of Hormuz.

Since the start of the Iran war, the conventional wisdom has been that the whole thing is a hot mess. The argument is that President Trump either blundered into a strategic situation he didn't understand, or was suckered into it by Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with disastrous consequences.

These range from the humanitarian - starting with the killing of around 165 Iranian schoolgirls, apparently by a U.S. missile - to the economic and even geopolitical. Oil (CL00) (BRN00) is up to $100 a barrel, gasoline is nearly $4.20 a gallon nationally, and - irony of ironies - the enemy regime in Tehran has been left with control of the Strait of Hormuz and about 20% of the world's oil supply.

The Iranians are now reportedly charging a toll of $1 a barrel - payable apparently through nontraceable cryptocurrency (BTCUSD), or in Chinese yuan (USDCNY). President Trump, who has repeatedly called the regime evil and worse, was left surprised that it acted in such a "dishonorable" manner with regard to the cease-fire.

But what if the conventional wisdom is wrong?

That's the hypothesis of one of the world's shrewdest and most respected analysts of geopolitics and energy, Cambridge University political economy professor Helen Thompson. In a couple of recent broadcasts, she has argued that this entire outcome - including the apparent closure of the Strait of Hormuz - may not be a bug of the war at all, but a deliberate feature.

Professor Thompson argues that driving up the worldwide price of oil and keeping it there may be a core war goal of the Trump administration. That hurts China, which depends on imported energy, and helps America, which is a net energy producer. And if that's the case, then Iranian control over the xtrait would, ironically, be a desirable outcome.

"The Trump administration thinks through the lens of resource competition," Thompson explained.

"You have to consider the possibility ... that actually part of what's going on isn't just about Iran, it's about the Trump administration trying to hurt China," she told the conservative-leaning website UnHerd.

The Iran war may be "part of an attempt by the Trump administration to reset the energy part of the world geopolitically," she told Bloomberg Podcasts.

That, says Thompson, is the consistent "thread" through the second Trump administration's foreign policy - including the intervention in oil-rich Venezuela and its attempts to destabilize resource-rich Greenland. It is also, she points out, part of the geopolitical blueprint that the administration laid out last fall.

America, Thompson points out, may be a "beneficiary" of the war economically because it will be able to sell more liquefied natural gas at elevated prices, especially to the Europeans.

She adds that right now, competitive thinking between the U.S. and China focuses on artificial intelligence, which uses a staggering amount of energy. Driving up China's energy costs hurts its AI ambitions.

Thompson also points out that it wasn't just the Iranians who "closed" the Strait of Hormuz. Western shipping insurers became worried about the risks, especially after the Iranians attacked some ships. And after initially floating the notion of stepping in and providing insurance to ships through the U.S. government, the Trump administration soon walked away from the idea. That would be consistent with the theory that the administration does not want fuel to flow freely through the strait, because it wants oil and gas to remain expensive.

Expensive fuel produces its own political calculus here at home. High gasoline and diesel prices are expected to cost the Republicans heavily in the midterm elections, especially if they persist. That, at least, is a problem Chinese dictator Xi doesn't have to deal with. But the situation may be more complex. Polling at Rasmussen shows no overall decline in President Trump's approval ratings since the start of the war.

And the parts of America that actually benefit from expensive oil - such as the energy companies and the oil-producing regions of the South, West and Midwest - are typically MAGA country. Oil prices at today's levels are actually high enough to provoke another drilling boom, according to data from the Dallas Fed.

Does this sound fanciful? As always, do the math. According to the Dow Jones Markets Data team, since the start of this war on Feb. 28, the U.S. publicly traded energy industry - meaning all the energy companies traded on U.S. exchanges - has gained $93 billion in market value. Those companies' 2026 revenue estimates have risen more than $200 billion, from $1.9 trillion to $2.1 trillion. (Yes, really.) Their estimated total net income for 2026 has risen by 22%, or $33 billion, to $183 billion.

This doesn't leave the rest of the world with many good options. Either the Iranian regime has an accidental stranglehold over the Strait of Hormuz, or it achieved this with the deliberate connivance of the Trump administration.

To understand what the Iranians are likely to do with this newfound power, try to imagine what an amoral but rational actor would do in their shoes. They'd probably charge a toll on oil and gas that was low enough that nobody minded paying it. So charging $1 on a $98 barrel is bupkis to oil producers and consumers, while it adds up to real money over time for the Iranians.

What you would not do is kill the goose laying the golden egg, meaning you would not want to make your control over the Strait of Hormuz so costly or irksome to others that they are moved to take action - either by actually removing you from power, or by quickly building new pipelines in the desert to circumvent the strait. So an amoral but rational actor would avoid charging too much, and would avoid shutting down the strait altogether.

Meanwhile, the situation means there is an ominous chance that oil will not return to prewar levels, or anything like it, anytime soon. The oil-futures market thinks oil will fall from $98 a barrel today to $80 by September and $75 by Christmas - but that may be a pipe dream. As usual, ordinary investors leave an energy fund out of their portfolios at their own risk.

-Brett Arends

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04-11-26 0830ET