The US is now bombing bridges in Iran, specifically those close to the strait of Hormuz. This is an attempt to wreck Iran’s logistics around the strait in order to impair its ability to manage passage. The US wants to control the strait itself, and may be preparing for some kind of ground invasion in the area. This would, of course, be an absolute disaster. The US is also bombing ships docked at Kharg Island, presumably to destroy Iran’s capacity for floating storage of oil. In return, Iran is bombing American assets in Qatar and Bahrain, and exhausting the remaining supply of US interceptors in the process. Iran has demonstrated the capacity for precision strikes, including having managed to take out a mobile HIMARS system.
Both Iran and Iraqi militias are trolling Trump after the Israelis warned him about assassination attempts. An Israeli warning suggests that Israel is planning to take him out themselves as a false flag to blame on Iran. Alternatively, his health is very poor, so they could be simply waiting for a natural end which they could pretend was an assassination. Trump has become absolutely paranoid as a result. For some reason, Iran is playing along with this by providing information on his location to would-be assassins. The Iraqi militia has also put a $10million bounty on his head. Considering that the US and Israel have made a habit of political assassinations, it’s not suprising that their enemies would try to return the favour.
Public anger in Iran is off the charts. Red flags calling for revenge were everywhere at Ayatollah Khamenei’s recent funeral. President Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Araghchi were both booed by their own people at that event for having negotiated the MOU with the Americans when it was obvious the US never had any intention of meeting its terms. Western countries have a long history of using negotiations as cover for buying time, for surprise attacks, or for political assassination, including of the negotiators on the other side. For this reason, they are widely seen as agreement incapable, especially since Trump changes his rhetoric and his mind constantly. Iran has now said there will be no more negotiations. The reformist/Atlanticist faction in Iran has lost credibility, and the hardliners have gained it. The new Supreme Leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, did not agree with the MOU and has been proven right. He’s likely more hardline than his father, especially after an American airstrike killed his parents, his wife, and his small daughter, as well as wounding the man himself. He may reverse his father’s religious fatwa against the development of nuclear weapons.
Trump’s regime never had anything resembling strategy, and barely has comprehensible tactics. Their negotiating team is a couple of biased zionist grifters with no experience and no understanding of diplomacy, combined with a Vice President who’s being hung out to dry by his own side so Trump can destroy his chances of reaching the presidency. Trump is setting JD Vance and Marco Rubio against each other in order to ruin both of them politically. He wants a dynasty, so anyone not named Trump must be undermined. The odds of achieving a dynasty are low due to the extent to which the Trump name has come to be so widely hated, both at home and abroad. It will be much more hated once the inevitable oil shock hits. So far the manipulative narrative that the US is somehow winning, backed up by market manipulation, has kept prices relatively low, and that has meant little to no demand destruction. This means the limit will be reached sooner than would otherwise have been the case. It means there will be a sudden price shock once reaching tank bottom becomes undeniable. Then the demand destruction will happen all at once, with howls of protest from an unsuspecting public, likely in the run up to the midterm elections.
Tonight Trump made a speech about non-existent election fraud from 2020, while presenting documentation that undermined his own case. He’s trying to distract from his disastrous wars. He still cannot accept that he lost the 2020 election, as he obviously did. However, his speech was intended to undermine confidence in the upcoming midterm elections more than to relitigate 2020. He claims fraud and rigging every time he loses anything, and he wants to sow as much doubt as possible about the election he knows he’ll lose if the techbros don’t rig it for him. His polling is the worst in presidential history, so a victory would not be accepted as legitimate by the public, but a loss would not be accepted by Trump. This could easily lead to violence within the US, as the country is already primed for civil unrest, if not for civil war.
