The pendulum is swinging in a very wide range between a ground operation and the end of the war in Iran. This was told to the Bulgarian National Radio by diplomat and former Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Lyubomir Kyuchukov, director of the Institute of Economics and International Relations:
"It jumps very sharply and very often from one extreme to the other. It is enough to recall Trump's statements, which fluctuate from "We have achieved all the goals and have already destroyed everything that needed to be destroyed" to "We can hit Kharkov Island just for fun". ... The choice now is between a ground operation by the US and Trump declaring victory to end the hostilities."
According to him, the negotiations have been discredited and are not seen as a credible tool for stopping the war because they were conducted, especially in their final stages, as a tool for preparing the war itself by the US.
"When we talk about stopping the war, we have to take into account two factors. The first is whether and when the US, including Israel, will declare that they have achieved their goals and that victory has been achieved in the war. The second is whether and for how long Iran will be able to inflict damage on both the US and the Gulf states, turning the war into a very expensive exercise for Washington," Kyuchukov pointed out.
According to him, the Strait of Hormuz has turned out to be Iran's main military resource to resist attacks from the US and Israel:
"What Iran managed to achieve was to transfer the consequences of the war from its territory to the entire region and the entire world - through the crisis after the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. And thus the war is no longer fought only with weapons - it has become a matter of economics, energy and from there a political issue. It is no coincidence that Tehran is launching these attacks on the Gulf countries so that they suffer the consequences of the war and try to find ways to end it.
The diplomat pointed out that internationally, the concepts of "international law", "democracy" and "national sovereignty" have disappeared from our vocabulary.
"The division between the two sides of the Atlantic from tactical is beginning to acquire the characteristics of conceptual, from the point of view of the goals that the US and European countries set for themselves within NATO. Trump is trying to outsource the war and its consequences, demanding that NATO and non-NATO countries take on the responsibility of ensuring free navigation through the Strait of Hormuz, also taking on the consequences of the energy crisis," commented Lyubomir Kyuchukov.