My weekly preamble is in spoiler tags below.
preamble
Aside from the virtually daily Iranian strikes on the Oman route, the main threat that the US is facing in this newest phase of the war is logistics. With Bahrain and the UAE unsafe, the closest safest port in the theater is Diego Garcia, which is over 2000 miles away. Either the aircraft carriers would have to go to Diego Garcia to restock, which would be even less planes and missiles available should hostilities restart suddenly, or goods have to be shuttled to the aircraft carriers from Diego Garcia. This latter option appears to be too much for the US to handle, with widespread reports of dwindling supplies and morale on the USS Abraham Lincoln (and, to a lesser extent, the USS George HW Bush). These reports have culminated in the USS George Washington being sent from the Pacific to replace the Lincoln, which was the sole aircraft carrier in that whole theater. There are six more carriers in maintenance, leaving two carriers left that could even hypothetically be called upon should the USS George HW Bush need replacement; both are currently undergoing training, and of these two, the USS Theodore Roosevelt might be available soon; perhaps even as soon as September. I’m unsure whether the Roosevelt will be sent to the Pacific to replace the Washington, or if it’ll be sent to the Middle East to replace the Bush. Nonetheless, that the situation has deteriorated to the point where we can speculate on how very limited naval vessels are going to be distributed is yet one more indication among many of the decline of US naval power. The symbolism was too much for me to ignore, hence the title: the last aircraft carrier in the Pacific being forced to leave, and not under military pressure in some hypothetical war against China, but to try and relieve logistical burdens elsewhere in a war of the US’s own making.
This joins Trump’s statements that the US will only be taking a very limited part in the South Korean military exercises. This is nominally because of the “great ties” the US shares with the DPRK, but this is an embarrassingly transparent face-saving statement. The DPRK is an increasingly major potential threat to South Korea, a major regional power and economy, but are also helping Russia with both manpower and materiel and getting military experience and data on their missiles’ effectiveness in return.
The US’s Under Secretary of War, Elbridge Colby, recently visited the Philippines. There, he gave a speech that promised to continue the construction of a defensive network that would deny China the possibility of militarily advancing through the Pacific by stationing US forces inside friendly countries. This is the NATO approach: our mere presence will deter the enemy because they would not want to start a direct war with us, and in exchange, you have to hand over billions upon billions of dollars. Colby gave the Philippines that most backhanded of compliments, the “model ally”, and stated that the US was “definitely not disengaging from Asia”. My “We aren’t pivoting away from Asia” shirt has people asking a lot of questions that are already answered by my shirt.
If you’re a US-friendly country in the Pacific and possess even the slightest sense of self-preservation, you are surely feeling nervous. The US is moving its aircraft carrier out of the theater. Overseas, you’ve seen how Iran - a very strong regional country, to be sure, but not as powerful as the industrial juggernaut and nuclear superpower that is China - has nonetheless crippled several undefendable US bases, has exhausted a very large amount of American air defense missiles, is holding the global economy hostage, and the US can seemingly do nothing to stop them. You have to be looking at your own US bases, likely expensive and unpopular, and all the money you’re handing over to the US, and glancing at how the Gulf states are bickering of being betrayed by their ally who promised them protection and immediately retreated. You have to be looking at your economy and its dependence on China. You have to be looking at Ukraine, and the unenviable state of destruction it has been driven to as a puppet of the US. You have to be looking at China itself, and how its military is rapidly developing in all fields, and how it’s even catching up on microchip development. In all, you have to be really hoping that China is serious that they only plan a peaceful reunification with Taiwan, and that the US will not do something incredibly, stupidly reckless in their decline.
Last week’s thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
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The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on the Zionists’ destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
So the much ballyhooed shortages of oil that have been alleged to be on the edge of happening for months now are still not occurring and the reason seems to be that Iran’s lockdown of Hormuz is much less effective than they’d like you to believe and that there is a constant supply of ships without transponders on transiting and bringing a lot of oil through. That plus possibly larger than disclosed reserves.
Covert mideast oil flows are keeping global prices in check - Fortune and Bloomberg
‘Dark’ oil trade still flowing despite Hormuz disruption – Bloomberg (RT link)
My thoughts and analysis
Personally I put this down as a massive L for Iran’s “economic nuke”. Because right now their only near term pressure point is the mid-term elections in the US and forcing high gas prices to scare Trump and Republicans into a deal for fear of losing congress or alternatively punishing the administration with a somewhat oppositional congress for the rest of his term. By failing to lock down the strait effectively, allowing this massive continuing oil flow it seems likely they’ve all but ensured prices will remain stable through election day meaning they’ve lost their window of opportunity to pressure Trump meanwhile US pressure will continue to slash at Iran’s economy and the quality of life for their people via strong sanctions, shipping interdiction and blockades, etc. This increases pain for Iran, pressure domestically to accept a lesser deal and sets the stage for better conditions for the next color revolution attempt so time is not necessarily a loyal ally of Iran but something that has to be managed given their own pain points and wants.
This higher than expected supply would also explain the lack of panic. The banks and those others who matter have had this information for some time as have government officials. There was a window of panic before this system settled-in in defiance of Iran but now it’s up and working. Long-term it will still increase prices but not enough to make the US or zionist entity budge IMO. If anything they’ll move to diffuse this problem by having gulf vassals add additional pipeline capacity. Iran has been unwilling to escalate to total destructive bombing of oil extraction and refinery operations to shut down gulf operations that way probably due to a fear of retaliatory strikes, it being an escalation they want to keep in their pocket to tamp down the willingness of gulf states to attack them. So in that way Iran is being managed and its escalation kept in check by counter-escalatory threats.
Thus the problem is manageable for the west and more a burden on the average worker in the imperial core owing to higher prices than real economic pressure. Another telegraphed economic crash at this point wouldn’t hurt the bourgeoisie and would in fact help transfer more wealth upwards, make the working class even more desperate and amenable to discipline and help consolidate AI behind a few key strong players. It would annoy Trump personally but he’s term limited anyway and the fact is the resultant crimes of desperation would help push through a new 90s style police state expansion and really jump-start and bulldoze over opposition to things like Flock and other ALPRs private camera tracking and surveillance nets.
Iran is simply not achieving attrition of the global oil vessel fleet sufficient to scare the owners into not transiting under US military guidance and insurance. The economic risks of sitting on the oil and not transiting are seen as greater than that of risking transit. Iran simply isn’t sinking vessels and not in any large numbers so there’s a lack of deterrence and much celebrated drone strikes that put a hole here or there but don’t threaten the vessel or cargo are not enough to deter. This was always going to be a problem if this situation dragged on. For the short-term of a few weeks, a couple months the economics say that it would pay to wait and not risk it believing that resolution was right around the corner, however as the closure stretches on, losses pile up, US pressure piles up, a resolution becomes hard to see, this becomes the new normal and incentives are added the economics increasingly say it’s best to risk transit. And the longer this goes on the greater the incentive to risk ratio becomes in favor of defying Iran. That is short of reductions in the global or at least regionally held fleets of oil tankers that might threaten after-war capacity in a major way which might shift the calculus back.
Some of this shows the potential limits of Iran’s degraded sensing capabilities over the strait as well given how few of these vessels are being attacked and how a lack of a proper navy further complicates things. Chinese satellites are good and well but not enough on their own to sense and stop much of this traffic apparently. That or Iran is holding their hand back for some reason which makes neither tactical nor strategic sense.
As I’ve said before we seem to be at a stalemate. Iran is immovable as is the US and zionist entity. None can compromise to the degree the others desire so the situation continues while the US tries to route around the damage and Iran scratches its head trying to think of ways to pressure the US that won’t bring more massive attacks on it from gulf states by escalating against them too far and making them go for broke. Iran could break out of this doldrums by launching a massive new wave of attacks bringing pressure on the gulf vassals or the zionist entity directly, but will they? They’ve been building up their arsenal but they’ve also always shown themselves to be people after a deal not fighting a massive region-wide war. And the US could still play a card of a massive air/ground operation to seize nuclear materials and use a successful version of that to walk away after wiping their hands of the matter and declaring victory which could also disrupt this fragile state of in-action.
Also while one cannot rule out this being a psyop or misinfo at this point given the other indicators it would be rational to assume it is the case and they’re telling the truth.
This all feels like cope to me. Even with the numbers cited in the article that’s still half as much oil leaving as before the war. The SPR isn’t just emptying for funsies, there is real pressure causing that to happen. The paper market not catching up until it’s bad bad would not be surprising to me at all.
Agreed. We can watch the SPR dropping week over week I don’t think it’s a coincidence that they put this piece out the same week that it dropped below 300,000 barrels. Trying to manage the oil market collapsing is becoming a class-wide project
Crude oil prices are relatively low, but finished products (especially diesel) are behaving like oil was $150 and not $90. China cut demand for crude oil but now that finished products are shooting up in price, they might fully return to market because pushing up the price of crude oil is the lesser of two evils.
I was being a bit of a doomer about Iran accepting the MoU (knowing that the US won’t implement it), but it worked out well for Iran because they obviously also believed that the US won’t implement the MoU and they were able to prepare much better during the ceasefire. There is every reason to believe that the same thing is happening now. Also, there are signs that Iran is very slowly tightening up their control over the SoH. Cutting traffic now, with global reserves being much lower than at the start, would obviously create a lot more pressure.
Some LNG derived products are also higher priced or not available like 0W-20 and lower weight engine oils. Manufacturers reformulated the products to reduce LNG scarcity exposure
Clearly there’s a lot of oil getting out of the gulf. No one here should be that surprised - look at how creative commodity markets have been at working around US/western sanctions of Russian oil. Commodities find a way, so to speak.
That said, I don’t think this is as huge a loss for Iran as you are portraying. Ultimately they want oil to flow through the strait, while taking a cut for themselves. Cutting off the strait entirely is contrary to this goal. Their primary goal (imo) is to get the US military out of the gulf and pushed away as much as the Iranian missile range will allow. Debasification is separate from oil flows. Frankly, the less oil that goes through hormuz, the less important it is to US interests and the less incentive there is to have bases in the region.
Finally, most of the analysis I saw in March was saying that July-Aug would be the start of the real pinch. We are on the front end of that, especially after allowing for the short time when strait transits bounced back, the uncertainty associated with reserves, creative workarounds, and uncertainty associated with any individual analyst. If we go another 6 months of oil below $100 I’ll agree that this strategy is more of a failure, but in the meantime I think inconclusive. Geopolitical change always takes time.
It doesn’t matter that much as I said with regards to higher prices eventually as I outlined in my post about why a crash is fine for the bourgeoisie. As long as it happens after the midterms there’s no pressure on this admin or the US in general to really change strategies even temporarily.
There’s no serious evidence the US reserves will run out by August or even September and no pro-Iranian propagandists on twitter don’t count. Demand decline after summer is a real thing even under normal circumstances and with some flow coming through (maybe up to half pre-war even) that stems the use of the reserves and preserves them for longer. I just don’t think it will hit before the mid-terms as it would be a disaster not just for the Republicans but for support for the zionist entity which would hit the Democrats hard.
The moment of maximum pressure would be $8/gal gas for the US heading into the midterms, that would be a disaster for the US and the zionist entity and support for it. After the midterms they can just coast and fuck the workers with high gas prices while proclaiming it’s Iran or environmental regulations (expect them to strip the hell out of those) that are causing these higher prices.
So I’m not sure what the point is. The US didn’t crack over the OPEC embargo which was much worse back in the 70s over support of the zionist entity, they didn’t crush all those campus protestors and create a renewed anti-zionist movement within even the right with their heavy-handed support of the entity to drop it now. Sure US loses some bases, mildly inconvenient and a definite Iranian win and demonstration of missile and drone power but strategically I don’t see them being pushed out of the region entirely, nor congress bending the knee and repealing sanctions, nor the zionist entity rolling back its occupation of Lebanon by a single mile in response to this. So at best Iran gets some money while the US gets to hold its head high without a brutal and crushing visible loss and that flow of money could be challenged at any time if the US enforces sanctions on transfers of funds to Iran by gulf states.
The thing about control of the strait vs just bombing Saudi refineries into dust is that there’s a good case to be made under international law that Iran has a right to charge these fees and to control that waterway. There’s no case to be made under international law that they can just bomb the Saudis or anyone else for not letting them get a cut of their oil by routing it away from Iran’s territory to avoid paying them. China and Russia would recognize and stand behind ratified Iranian control of the strait and fees for transit, they wouldn’t stand behind them bombing extraction and refineries throughout the region because they’re avoiding their tolls.
The news that Iran is preparing for a new wave of attacks unless the US actually implements the MoU is great news. Because if they fail to do that then this is a slow slide into irrelevancy while the US strings them along forever. We’ll see how long those attacks last and whether they’re performative or not or lead to more stringing along when they come I suppose but it’s something positive at least and anything that hits the US and its dogs is good.
There’s many other considerations such as a desire to spur creation of alternative capacity by raising oil prices enough to get other projects elsewhere in the world under way, places much more safely under US empire control so this continuing with higher prices may not even bother some of these planners so much as suit them for their longer term designs. They do keep talking of short-term pain for long-term gain. The US may not be able to rebuild a WW2 size arms industry no matter how much money they throw at it but fossil fuels exploration, exploitation, etc is very much actively opening and tapping new sources and if they can convince those companies that the new reality is limited, unstable transit, fees to Iran, etc through Hormuz they may be able to get them to invest the thinking may go and that’s not unreasonable.
posting style reminds me of xhs
vague article followed by more and more claims
readers note: iran is considered by commentators like mearsheimer to hold “all the cards”
The Biden playing 4D chess claim while in actually just having dementia and cancer is still iconic.
There is really no pressure for them to change strategies outside of the public uncertainty both at home and abroad. We do not live in a world driven by materialism, we live in a world of idealism that only responds to materialist concerns when the crisis occurs We are not at the point of materialist crisis, and it is uncertain if it will reach a point of materialist crisis where the elite have to act before the proletariat do. And the proletariate are at a historic point of disorganization, so I expect extremely little from them. However, that doesn’t mean that these entities will not act irrationally out of purely ideological motivations.
Due to this, I doubt that will be the case that they will not change strategies, as they already have had to change strategies, publicly and repeatedly, and it is clear that nobody, even those supposedly in charge, really knows what the endgame looks like here.
What matters more than anything is that Iran has been able to make the U.S. look extremely incompetent on the world stage, and has not allowed them secure any of their actual stated objectives, outside of ‘kill alot of people’. This denial alone has been enough to scare the piss out of the elites, and sometimes that is enough to be thankful for. It certainly punctures the myth of American omnipotence and invincibility.
If they decide, irrationally, that they must demonstrate complete dominance and pursue further military action, such as invasion, it will likely only serve to place more egg on their face.
“All things are chaos under heaven. The situation is excellent.”
It should’ve been July, something is off.
It’s always depended on what reserves are actually at and how both producers and consumers (on the industrial side) reacted. We are solidly in the range of uncertainty. Gas is still +40-50% compared to the beginning of the year.
I think it’s reasonable to think it’s possible, and that some people are running the blockade. I’m not sure I would concede that it’s rational to assume western sources are just telling the truth.
I call bullshit and it is in fact China balancing the markets.
China released a ton of oil from their reserves. Guess China isn’t doing nothing.
That only begs the question of why China is assisting the US in doing its imperialism and avoiding the consequences of its actions. Especially since at this point there’s no reason not to let the whole thing rip as it’s clear Trump isn’t going to bend the knee or make peace. So this is tantamount to saying China is in the US corner against Iran which I have trouble accepting given the implications. I could see China tapping its own reserves early on as a favor to curry some favor with the US with an eye to the US realizing its mistake in attacking Iran and pulling back while minimizing consequences for Trump to make that appealing but continuing to do so in the face of the perfidy and other actions of the US would be foolish.
China’s just adhering to total consistency as a non-interfering country. They’re operating to stabilise things, not just for themselves but for everyone else. They’re demonstrating with total consistency that they can be viewed as a reliable trading partner and participant in international markets, not use it as a weapon.
It’s annoying for internationalists but it’s in-line with their non-interference and sovereignty policy, which they view as more important right now.
Do we trust these sources
They could be paying the iranians under the table; Trump would then refuse to scuttle the ships because otherwise, our groceries are going to jump by 400%
Maybe but this can only go on for so long before it leaks or some other problem comes up if true. That and Trump’s threats to bomb Oman over striking a deal on transit fees with Iran makes it feel like the US doesn’t really care or at least refuses to let this ever be above-board if it’s the case things are being done under the table by the gulf states.
Iran is also allowing oil tankers to transit the strait through their designated routes. The strait isn’t closed moreso than it is open to anyone who accepts Iranian sovereignty.
The oil supply is still fucked up from various missile campaigns, and Ansarallah is bludgeoning the Saudi entity with a much more effective blockade in the red sea, but Iran has quietly loosened the noose in pursuit of a rules based order that favours their regional ambitions. Not a surprise, nor a necessarily bad thing; patience is needed.
I haven’t seen them as deal-seeking, they have left room for the US to de-escalate but they have been clear about their red lines and have continually attacked US proxies in the region and continue to strike vessels attempting to transit. The US’ ability to carry out strikes on Iran has been severely degraded, if nothing else changes this is a win for Iran right now, the west might be sneaking tankers but there’s no way it’s close to pre-war levels. Strategic reserves of oil in the US continue to go down. I don’t believe the US is immovable in the region, they can’t continue this posture indefinitely and their bases are still vulnerable to missiles, what I see from Iran is a long-term strategy that is advantageous over the west. They recently had some promotions and role changes within their security council and haven’t had much time to show what their continuing strategy might be as well.
This doesn’t make sense to me. As we’ve seen capitalism jumps at any chance to raise prices and any tiny change is enough to fuck with it. Iran has declared that there will no longer be free passage. That alone should be enough to fuck with prices to a bad point given how razor thin the markets have been on collapse. You factor in the AI bubble and other things it seems like a recipe for a disaster. Even with a few ships going through.
(doesn’t know shit about anything) and the Japanese bond market!
oh I don’t know anything either. I’m just putting down my thought process, which could be very flawed.
They jump to raise consumer prices to scam consumers. But the very economic structure of wider society is also a scam, and that’s what is under threat if they hike prices too much.