By keeping Iranian supplies off the market, oil producers with access to the shipping lanes and secure pipelines can benefit from high prices. The Ayatollah’s loss is their gain.

As has been pointed out before, oil is a fungible commodity with very little slack between supply and demand. If you attack Iranian oil infrastructure without cause, besides incurring the wrath of the world community, you raise prices dramatically for everybody. If you seize tankers on the high seas bound for China, you’ve just picked a fight with them as surely as the oil embargo against Japan led to Pearl Harbor. There better be a damn good reason to get into another war, like an Iranian chemical attack on Tel Aviv. Sending Condi Rice to the UN to wave around some pictures of WMDs ain’t going to work this time, on the principle of Fool Me Once, Shame On You, Fool Me Twice, Shame On Me.