ItвЂ™s willing to push back against the US by engaging in aggressive or assertive behavior that could risk triggering the conflict with the United States.вЂќ

вЂњReally since 2005, Iran has shown a number of times that it is willing to push back against international pressure or foreign pressure. вЂњThis is more or less consistent with IranвЂ™s behavior over the last 15 years,вЂќ Ostovar said.

These tactics are all part of IranвЂ™s playbook. вЂњIf Iran is not willing to take sanctions and suffer, and if itвЂ™s not willing to compromise and capitulate, then it needs to do something to change the situation,вЂќ Afshon Ostovar, an Iran expert at the Naval Postgraduate School, told me in June. But thereвЂ™s a reason Iran is choosing to act like this. If all of this sounds aggressive, itвЂ™s because it is. Iran did fess up to shooting down a US military drone, though, a move that almost led Trump to bomb Iran. The Trump administration also said Iran was responsible for using limpet mines on at least one vessel (Iran also denies this). The diplomats didnвЂ™t specifically name Iran as the culprit, but the US had already blamed Tehran for the sabotage, a charge Iran denies.ДЄnd last month, two oil tankers traveling in the Gulf of Oman - just east of the Strait of Hormuz - caught fire and sustained significant damage, leading the US Navy and other nearby ships to respond immediately. UN ambassadors from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Norway said two weeks ago that the damages came after a country used divers to place mines on the large ships. (The fourth was owned by a Norwegian company.) Two of them belonged to Saudi Arabia and one belonged to the United Arab Emirates, both staunch enemies of Iran and friends to the US. In May, four oil tankers were damaged near the Strait of Hormuz. With MondayвЂ™s announcement, Iran has executed option one, and option two is seemingly underway as well. Likely because the sanctions have put a major dent in IranвЂ™s economy, Tehran has chosen to employ the risky, two-pronged strategy. Disrupting the worldвЂ™s flow of oil would garner the fury of the United States and other nations dependent on energy traveling through the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial maritime passage aggressively patrolled by Iran through which a third of the worldвЂ™s liquefied natural gas and almost 20 percent of the worldвЂ™s oil production flows. Its two best options are to cease compliance with the terms of the nuclear agreement and to threaten to disrupt the global energy trade.Д«oth of those moves are extremely dicey, especially the second one. Iran may be a relatively powerful country in the Middle East, but its options for pushing back against the US and its European allies are few. Why IranвЂ™s strategy to end US-led sanctions could fail Zarif told IRNA that вЂњif Europeans do what they have to do, our measures are reversible,вЂќ referring to TehranвЂ™s efforts to get European nations to trade with Iran despite US sanctions imposed after Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal last year.Д«ut if that doesnвЂ™t happen - and itвЂ™s unlikely, since the US would penalize European countries for doing so - then Iran may soon be on the path to having a much more dangerous nuclear program than in recent years. There may be a way out of this mess, though. But Tehran said it could to start enrichment closer to weapons-grade level on July 7 if Europe doesnвЂ™t offer financial relief, which would significantly escalate the months-long standoff between the US and Iran by potentially putting the latter closer to getting a nuclear weapon (though Iran has never officially said it wants one). The enrichment level of the uranium Iran has now - 3.67 percent - isnвЂ™t high enough to make a nuclear bomb. Fredrik Dahl, the chief spokesperson for the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United NationsвЂ™ nuclear watchdog, confirmed IranвЂ™s claim to me and added that IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano told the groupвЂ™s board of governors about the development. IranвЂ™s state-run IRNA news agency quoted Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Monday saying that his country had surpassed the ceiling.

While it took a little longer than that, Iran has finally done what it said itвЂ™d do.

The following month, a top Iranian nuclear official said RouhaniвЂ™s wasnвЂ™t an empty threat and that Tehran would blow past the limit within 10 days. In May, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said his country would stockpile more low-enriched uranium than the 660 pounds the nuclear accord allows. Iran has officially broken part of its commitment to the 2015 nuclear deal - following through on its months-long threat and further raising tensions with the United States.

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