Both Iran and US think they’re winning the war. Both can’t be right | CNN Politics

The Iran ceasefire and peace talks this week are hanging by a thread as tensions boil over the strategic waterway that epitomizes Tehran’s new leverage and a conflict that critics warn has escaped President Donald Trump’s control. On Friday, Trump said Iran had “agreed to everything,” prompting a stock market rally on hopes the war could soon end. But by Sunday, this looked like another case of overhyping diplomacy, and the president was again threatening to destroy Iran’s bridges and power plants, and Tehran had shut the Strait of Hormuz back down. A mutual lack of trust and fears of a full return to war were on display after the US Navy fired on and seized an Iranian-flagged freighter that tried to bust its blockade of Tehran’s fleet. The whiplash is typical of Trump’s war leadership, which veers between triumphant predictions of imminent peace and alarming threats of violence. His opponents see chaos and the absence of a plan, while the president’s aides insist he’s masterfully wielding leverage in a way that will force Iran to cave. But Trump’s fog of war faces its next date with reality as an expected second set of US-Iran talks loom in Pakistan ahead of th