But according to Professor Robert Pape, they can become an escalation trap.
Pape argues that Trump’s “maximum economic pressure” campaign may succeed tactically by inflicting enormous economic pain on Iran, while failing strategically to force Tehran to surrender.
Instead, it could harden the regime and make retaliation more likely.
The historical record is ugly.
Pape points to Japan in 1941, when American oil sanctions helped convince Japanese leaders that they were facing political and economic extinction. Their response was Pearl Harbor.
Iran could face a similar calculation: if sanctions are designed to eventually destroy the regime, Tehran has less reason to simply absorb the punishment and wait.
It has every reason to lash back.
And Iran has thousands of miles of land borders through which sanctioned goods can still move.
Closing those corridors would require military force, potentially dragging the U.S. deeper into the war just to make the sanctions work.
Pape's warning is brutally simple:
Sanctions may not be the off-ramp from war.
They may be the road to the next escalation.
@ProfessorPape
