Trump’s gambit to move ships through the Strait of Hormuz tests the fragile ceasefire

By Kevin Liptak, Adam Cancryn, Zachary Cohen, CNN

(CNN) — President Donald Trump’s initiative to guide ships through the Strait of Hormuz was a high-stakes, high-risk attempt to jolt loose a resolution to the standoff that had come to define his war against Iran.

But the gambit has put the US’ fragile ceasefire with Iran under strain, as US and Iranian forces traded fire in the contested waterway. Now, no one is entirely sure whether the tenuous peace can hold long enough for halting negotiations to yield some resolution.

“It is very bad and messy at the moment,” a regional source told CNN.

With little sign Tehran would blink in its efforts to block traffic through the waterway, Trump had grown frustrated at the deadlock in the strait. High gas prices and a looming visit to China both created pressure to find a way to get vessels moving.

So from his golf course in Florida on Sunday, Trump announced a plan for the US to help guide certain ships through the strait, dubbed “Project Freedom.” The risks soon became apparent. Booms reverberated in Dubai as Iranian missiles were intercepted for the first time since a truce went into effect nearly a month ago. The US military destroyed six Iranian small boats, US Central Command said. (A report by an Iranian state media outlet disputed that the boats had been sunk.)

The open-ended ceasefire appeared to be stretching to its limit, without clear evidence a negotiated settlement may be near. Speaking to CNN on Sunday, Trump’s foreign envoy Steve Witkoff would only say of talks with Iran: “We’re in conversation.”

Some of Trump’s allies have encouraged him to resume the bombing campaign inside Iran, arguing the US has already weakened the regime and insisting the time was ripe to further degrade its military capabilities.

“I hope this conflict can end diplomatically, but it is now time to regain freedom of navigation and forcefully respond to Iran if they insist on terrorizing the world,” GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham wrote on X this weekend.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who Israeli sources say is planning a trip to Washington to visit Trump in the near future, convened security meetings Monday. Officials signaled in Israeli media afterward that the country was prepared to resume a bombing campaign.

Despite the hostilities, it was not clear whether Trump had the appetite to resume full-scale bombing inside Iran. He shrugged off a damaged South Korean ship as from an “unrelated Nation” and claimed otherwise there had been “no damage going through the Strait.” He similarly told ABC News of Iran’s drone and missile attacks, “One got through. Not huge damage.”

But he also warned in a phone interview with Fox News that Iran would be “blown off the face of the Earth” if it targets US ships.

“I wouldn’t go into details of whether the ceasefire is over or not,” Adm. Bradley Cooper, head of US Central Command, told reporters Monday. “I think the key thing is, for us, is we’re merely there as a defensive force and to give a very thick layer of defense to commercial shipping to allow them to proceed out of the (Persian Gulf).”

Trump’s highly anticipated visit to Beijing next week could also complicate his decision to resume the war with Iran. He initially delayed the trip from April while the conflict raged. China has called for reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, where much of the energy products it relies upon pass through.

Arriving in Beijing with the conflict at best unresolved — or at worst raging yet again — could place Trump in a weakened position in his talks with Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

Speaking to Fox News on Monday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent — who has been leading preliminary discussions with the Chinese ahead of Trump’s visit — said the country could do more to convince Iran to allow ships to pass through the strait.

“Let’s see if China – let’s see them step up with some diplomacy and get the Iranians to open the strait,” he said.

The origins of “Project Freedom” lie in meetings the president has held over the last several days exploring options for reopening the strait, through which 20% of the world’s oil passes. Iran has resisted US demands to allow ships to pass through.

Trump received a 45-minute briefing from Cooper and Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, last Thursday to discuss updated military plans for Iran, including on reopening the strait, a source familiar with the matter said.

During an earlier meeting with energy executives at the White House last week, participants conveyed varying levels of urgency to Trump and his aides over the status of the strait, a person familiar with the exchange said, with some warning Trump and top officials of the continued consequences of the waterway’s closure on rising oil prices.

Others opted to deliver a more optimistic view focused more on praising Trump’s move to blockade the strait and ramp up economic pressure on Iran.

The president’s latest bid to change the dynamics in the strait came as oil and gas prices have continued to march upward, with energy experts warning that the US is likely only weeks away from averaging $5 per gallon for gasoline nationwide.

Trump officials have regularly pressed energy industry representatives over whether companies can ramp up domestic production to help alleviate the strain, two people familiar with the matter said. But the industry has so far declined to make any major commitments, wary of the time it would take to substantially boost output and the lack of a guarantee for exactly how long prices will remain elevated.

“The longer this goes on, the higher prices are going to get. There’s nothing that can replace Hormuz output,” said Gregory Brew, a senior analyst on Iran and the energy sector at political risk firm Eurasia Group, who added that based on the amount of oil already lost to the market, “$5 gas is basically baked in.”

US gas prices have skyrocketed from an average of $2.98 a gallon before the war started to $4.46 a gallon on Monday, according to AAA.

Despite those rising prices, Trump has so far declined to try to reopen the strait by force — opting instead to take a more nuanced approach focused on negotiating the exit of certain ships that have been stuck at sea for months in the Persian Gulf.

Yet while the US’ blockade does appear to be damaging Iran’s economy, Brew said, there’s little evidence so far that it’s done much to change the Iranian regime’s calculus. Iran has continued to load some oil onto tankers, meaning it’s not under imminent threat of having to shut down its production.

And while Iranian negotiators have maintained a running dialogue with the US over the parameters of a deal, they’ve yet to signal any willingness to make the significant concessions Trump has demanded.

“The administration on the one hand is digging in its heels in negotiations, waiting to see if the blockade forces the Iranians to make more concessions,” Brew said. “But at the same time, I have to imagine the president is getting impatient.”

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