WASHINGTON, July 7 — The Strait of Hormuz is once again a flashpoint, and for anyone trying to make sense of the latest tensions between Iran and the United States, the backstory reads like a playbook that keeps getting passed down. Think of it like a recurring software bug in a critical system — the underlying code hasn’t changed, just the trigger that sets it off. The practical upshot for ordinary people is this: a narrow waterway that carries a huge chunk of the world’s oil supply is unstable again.
The current attacks represent a breakdown of a fragile calm that had been painstakingly assembled. To understand what’s happening now, it helps to look at the long arc of conflict here.
Tensions in the Strait date back to the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, a period known as the Tanker War. Iran attacked oil tankers, and the U.S. Navy intervened to protect shipping. In 1988, the USS Vincennes mistakenly shot down Iran Air Flight 655, killing 290 civilians.
That tragedy still casts a long shadow.
A fragile deal falls apart
The 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, temporarily reduced tensions. In plain terms, it was a deal that limited Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. But the U.S. withdrew from the agreement in 2018 under President Donald Trump.
Iran responded by resuming uranium enrichment and attacks on shipping. The practical upshot of that withdrawal was a return to the kind of brinkmanship that had defined the region before.
In 2019 and 2020, a series of incidents ratcheted up the pressure. Iran attacked Saudi oil facilities at Abqaiq and Khurais in September 2019. In July of that year, Iran seized the British-flagged tanker Stena Impero.
Then in January 2020, the U.S. killed IRGC Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani. In 2023, a U.S.-mediated deal with Iran saw the release of five American detainees and the unfreezing of $6 billion in Iranian assets in South Korea.
That deal brought a measure of calm. But the current attacks represent a breakdown of that fragile calm.
What to watch next
The key question now is whether the current escalation remains contained or spirals into something broader. The Strait of Hormuz is a chokepoint, and any disruption there has immediate effects on global energy prices. For now, the pattern is familiar.
Iran has a history of using shipping as leverage, and the U.S. has a history of responding with naval force. The practical upshot for the rest of us is uncertainty — and a reminder that old conflicts, like old code, tend to resurface when you least expect them.
