President Donald Trump’s administration is currently divided on how to end its ongoing, unpopular war against Iran, according to a new report.
While Vice President JD Vance has been pushing Trump to bring the war to an end through a peace agreement with Iran, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been pushing for the war to continue through economic means instead of physical combat, reported Al Jazeera’s Stephen Quillen.
Marco Rubio Backs Economic War Against Iran to Bring Them to Heel
“The economic campaign is so devastating that right now there is no need for major combat operations,” Rubio told U.S. allies at the G7 forum in Paris on Tuesday. “We don’t need to conduct military strikes if we’re achieving the same objective through economic means and economic pressure. That’s not a stalemate.”
Rubio added that “the economic pressure on Iran is going to get even worse,” and told allies that the U.S. military would continue its presence near the Strait of Hormuz.
JD Vance Seeks Peace Agreement With Tehran to End Increasingly Unpopular Conflict
Vance, meanwhile, has repeatedly pushed for the conflict to come to a close and acknowledged the war as a significant factor in the Republican Party’s catastrophic defeat during the midterm elections this month.
“The real reason we lost is obvious to almost everyone,” wrote Vance in a post-mortem analysis of the Republican Party’s defeat last week, acknowledging that a lot of Trump 2024 voters were “angry” at the White House for dragging the country into another war and worsening the cost of living crisis.
“The reason we lost is the war. The president himself said so last night,” Vance continued. “If you’d like to argue it was worth it, that losing the Senate for the next 6 years was worth it, then do so. Argue it was a worthwhile cost to pay.
Agree or disagree, that’s at least honest. But everyone knows why we lost. And any honest conversation about where we go from here must start there.”
According to reports, Vance has been pushing the president to resolve the conflict peacefully through an agreement.
Qatar has also been attempting to broker an agreement between Washington and Tehran, which would see Iran reopen the Strait of Hormuz and agree to visits from United Nations (UN) nuclear weapons inspectors in return for the U.S. lifting its naval blockade of Iranian ports and releasing billions of dollars in frozen Iranian assets.
Trump Has Sidelined Vance, Pulling Him Off of Iran as the President Appears to Side With Rubio
As for which approach is proving to be more popular with the president himself, Trump made the answer abundantly clear on Thursday when he announced that Vance would be pulled out of Iran peace talks to focus on domestic issues in the U.S. instead.
“I have asked Vice President Vance to focus his complete and total attention on the Massive Corruption and Crime taking place in Democrat run Cities and States throughout the U.S.,” declared Trump in a Truth Social post. “The Blue States, such as Minnesota, California, Illinois, and many more, are all poorly run, corrupt disasters. Billions of dollars are being stolen every month. Our Budget could be quickly BALANCED with the correction of this large-scale criminal activity.”
Making his position on a peace agreement with Tehran clear, Trump concluded, “We don’t need a deal with Iran. Those days have long since passed. We’ve got their money, Hundreds of Billions of Dollars, and we’ve got their Strait! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”
Trump Says the U.S. Has Control of the Strait of Hormuz, But Hundreds of Vessels Remain Stuck
Despite Trump’s claims that the Strait of Hormuz is in the United States’ hands, hundreds of commercial vessels remain stuck in the strait as Iran continues to prevent many ships from transiting due to the ongoing war.
In an interview with Bloomberg this month, International Maritime Organization (IMO) Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez warned that the strait remained unsafe to transit.
“There is no confirmation that the strait has been cleared of mines, so it is very difficult for me to come here and say it is clear of any hazards on top of the attacks from drones and missiles that we are experiencing on merchant ships,” he said.
In October alone, at least 30 attacks were recorded on vessels in the Strait of Hormuz.
About the Author: Charlie Nash
Charlie Nash is a journalist and author whose work has appeared in The Spectator, Mediaite, New Statesman, and the American Conservative, among other major publications. His reporting has been featured by The Washington Post, Fox News, the Daily Beast, MS NOW, NewsNation, Hannity, and more. You can follow Charlie on X at @CharlieNash and on LinkedIn.
