Iran’s decision to attack ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz and the U.S. decision to retaliate and threaten to abandon diplomacy have pushed both sides close to the resumption of a war that neither wants. For the United States—which joined Israel in late February in a war to end Iran’s nuclear ambitions, among other goals—allowing Iran’s continued attacks on ships in the strait risked signaling that Tehran still holds the whip hand over one of the world’s most strategic waterways. But the re