(RNS) — Donald Trump thought he could wage a quick and successful war against Iran, but he was wrong. He had multiple goals, including regime change, destroying Iran’s military, making it impossible for Iran to develop nuclear weapons and stopping Iran’s support for militia forces in the Middle East.

We are more than a month into the war. Thousands of missiles, drones and bombs have been exchanged on both sides. The Persian Gulf states have been pulled into a war they did not want, and thousands of civilians have been killed or injured.

Although it has lost many of its top leaders, the Iranian regime is still in place and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard has the weapons to brutally suppress any uprising by its citizens. Many of Iran’s missiles and drones have been destroyed, but it still is hitting American and other targets in the Middle East. Nuclear sites have been bombed, but without an international agreement and inspections, Iran can rebuild. And Iran’s clients, Hezbollah and the Houthis, are attacking Israel.

In other words, the Iranian military has been degraded but every other goal of the war has failed.

Meanwhile, Iran has closed the Strait of Hormuz, cutting the world’s oil and liquid natural gas supplies by 20%. Oil and LNG prices have jumped, threatening the world economy and ruining the lives of millions of people. This has already forced Trump to lift sanctions on Russian and even Iranian oil and LNG.

At first, markets went up and down on every word that came out of the White House, but the credibility of the Trump administration has run out. Oil prices are over $100 a barrel. Gasoline prices in the U.S. have gone up a dollar a gallon. Global stock markets have lost an estimated $7 trillion to $11.5 trillion in market capitalization, with the S&P 500 dropping 7.4 percent from its February high.

If the war continues and oil prices hit $200 a barrel, we will go from the Trump slump to the Trump recession, affecting the lives of all but the richest elites.

The president continues to promise the war will be over in two weeks, but destruction and death continue throughout the Middle East, with Iran giving no indication it is ready to quit.

Is there a way out of this quicksand?

Trump is sending more troops to the area for a possible invasion, but every expert has said a military solution will be costly and not guaranteed. Our experience in Iraq and Afghanistan should show us that wars in the Middle East are not easy. Nor have we been very good at regime change. Despite everything he said in the past, Trump is now telling the nation, “Regime change was not our goal.” But he could change his mind again tomorrow.

Using the military to keep open the Strait of Hormuz would also be costly. Although the strait is 20 miles wide, the navigation channels are only a couple of miles wide. Tankers and their naval escorts would be sitting ducks for mines, drones and missiles. Even a small speedboat with a shoulder-launched missile would be a threat. 

Protecting tanker traffic would require not only naval and air power but also clearing missiles and drones from Iranian territory 50 to 100 miles inland along the Persian Gulf. It might require the installation of radar and air defense weapons on Iranian soil. Inevitably, American ships and personnel would become targets. And how long would they have to stay? And that is only for the Strait of Hormuz. It is likely the Houthis will also disrupt shipping in the Red Sea.

Finally recognizing how difficult it would be to protect shipping, Trump appears to have washed his hands of the strait, saying the countries in Europe and Asia that depend on oil from the Gulf “must take care of that passage.” In his address to the nation on Wednesday (April 1), he said, “They must grab it and cherish it.” Against all reality, he said, “It should be easy.” 

There was also talk of using American troops to retrieve Iranian enriched uranium. Trump now recognizes this would require occupying parts of Iran for months since the stockpiles were stored in deep, underground tunnels that were buried by U.S. and Israeli bombings. His solution now is to watch the sites and if Iran attempts to retrieve the enriched uranium, he will resume bombing. 

Trump will soon have 50,000 American troops in the area, but he may need twice this number if he decides to invade.

In his address, Trump said, “We are going to hit them extremely hard over the next two to three weeks. We’re going to bring them back to the Stone Ages, where they belong.” Such language and actions would push Iranian citizens into the arms of the regime because although they want the regime gone, they do not want their country destroyed.

He has also threatened to destroy Iran’s oil facilities to cut off its income, but Iran has promised to retaliate by doing the same to the oil and gas facilities in Gulf states. This would guarantee very high prices for the next five to 10 years that it would take to rebuild these facilities whenever the war ends. This would be disastrous for the world economy, while enriching Russian and American oil and gas producers.

As Pope Leo and other world leaders have said, the only way out of this mess is through diplomatic negotiations, but neither side trusts the other. Trump does not trust Iran, which he believes is secretly developing nuclear weapons. Iran does not trust Trump, who has attacked Iran twice while diplomatic negotiations were going on. Negotiations under these circumstances could take months.

Trump appears to want negotiations and a quick end to the war, although he is also preparing for an invasion of Iran. With his eye on the polls, the stock market, the price of oil, the price of gasoline and the November election, Trump is in a hurry to declare victory, but Iran literally has him over a barrel at the Strait of Hormuz.

Currently, the best Trump can hope for is reopening the Strait of Hormuz and a nuclear deal much like the one negotiated by the Obama administration, which he unilaterally rejected. The regime will stay in place, sanctions will be eased and Iran will rebuild its military. Iran is both weaker and stronger than before the war. Its military is weaker but the world now knows it can close the Strait of Hormuz whenever it feels threatened.

The war has also taught the Persian Gulf states that the United States cannot protect them from Iran. The American military is too slow to adapt to drone warfare and too attached to its expensive toys. The Gulf states will have to turn to Ukraine for the technology needed to deal with Iranian drones. While higher oil and LNG prices are currently helping Russia pay for its war, Ukraine may be helped in the long run by getting Gulf partners with deep pockets.

This war was unnecessary, stupid and immoral. It began without a plan and will end not with a bang, but a whimper.