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Iran War: Quick Early Updates

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[This post launched before complete because reasons. The final version should be up by 7:45 AM EST. However, please do comment since this post will be more information-snippet-y than usual]

The US-Israel war against Iran has been underway for only a bit more than 24 hours, yet in a continuing demonstration of Western ignorance and arrogance, many commenters seemed surprised that Iran, as it promised, not only launched fierce and geographically-wide-ranging retaliatory strikes but also quickly closed the Strait of Hormuz. The US and Israel assassinated the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and some senior IRGC officers. They also targeted but did not kill the democratically elected president, Masoud Pezeshkian.1

Readers and many experts pointed out during the time when it was not clear whether Khamenei has survived the strike on his residence, that martyring him be more likely to harm than help the US-Israel effort. Khamenei’s fatwa against nuclear weapons was the impediment to Iran building a bomb; his successor is likely to be more hard line and be unwilling to accept restrictions from outside. Khamenei had already ceded his role in military decision-making after the 12 Day War, so his death will not impact operations. His unjustified killing will further solidify support for the Iran government and increase sympathy for Iran across the region. It also puts countries with small populations of passport-holders and large Shia non-citizen populations, particularly Bahrain, at risk of revolution. Professor Sayed Marandi has been apt in calling them “family dictatorships”.

Aside from that, there is limited hard information on the war’s progress as of now. Israel is under military censorship, although my Thai helper told me he had just seen on the news visual evidence of a big missile blast in Israel. Iran has shut down its internet but images of damage in Tehran have been appearing. The mainstream media has pretty much no reporters on the ground and is thus obliged to treat official spin as accurate due to limited/lack of other source, plus in many cases, desire to preserve access.

So aside from the progress of the kinetic war, we also have the question of how long it will take before Western maximalist applications of porcine maquillage stop fooling the public. The baked-in jump in oil prices due to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz plus the existing overwhelming antipathy for this conflict in the US should make it hard to preserve happy fictions for too long. But Zionist billionaires will be doing their best to hide or blunt evidence of US-Israel failure.

One important item is the Washington Post revelation that not just Israel but also the Saudis pressed the US to launch this war. Larry Johnson, on Judge Napolitano, depicted the Saudis as being at war with Iran. That is formally not accurate; the Saudis have yet to declare war, but substantively, the Post account confirmed that Johnson called the substance right. From that report:

President Donald Trump launched Saturday’s wide-ranging attack on Iran after a weeks-long lobbying effort by an unusual pair of U.S. allies in the Middle East — Israel and Saudi Arabia — according to four people familiar with the matter, as Israeli and U.S. forces teamed to topple Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei after nearly four decades in power.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman made multiple private phone calls to Trump over the past month advocating a U.S. attack, despite his public support for a diplomatic solution, the four people said. …

As those talks proceeded, Riyadh issued a statement, following a phone call between the crown prince and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, that Muhammed [sic] would not allow Saudi airspace or territory to be used in an attack on Iran.

In his discussions with U.S. officials, however, the Saudi leader warned that Iran would come away stronger and more dangerous if the United States did not strike now, after amassing the largest military presence in the Middle East since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, said the people, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive situation.

Trump has bizarrely demanded that Iran hold its fire:

This is hopefully yet more Trump bluster, but the “hit them with a force never seen before” may point to a willingness to authorize an Israeli nuclear attack.

There has been a great deal of excellent commentary on YouTube, so readers are likely to have other talks they particularly like. Two I found noteworthy were Scott Ritter on Judge Napolitano and former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Chas Freeman on Glenn Diesen.

Ritter provides invaluable detail on the deficiencies of Tomahawk missies and the US process for targeting and the cascade that occurs if initial salvos do not meet their objectives. He also has a very moving discussion starting at 27:40, of the outrage of the US targeting two girls’ schools (Aljazeera says so far 146 have died) based on him having actually done the targeting for an Iraq strike gone away, when a bomb shelter that was full of women and children was mis-identified as housing combatants. 420 died horribly.

Freeman focused on the implications of the war for other states in the region and what little remains of US pretenses to democracy.

Glenn Diesen also just published another fine discussion, this with Professor Marandi. It does start off a bit slowly but includes biographical detail about Khamenei, such as that he was fluent enough in English to enjoy novels and Les Miserables was his favorite. The exchange gets interesting when Diesen posits that Iran has already gone way up the escalation ladder, particularly with its closure of the Strait of Hormuz, and has not much further to go. Marandi disabuses him of this idea, with only one of his rejoinders being that Iran can destroy oil production facilities all over the Middle East.

Now to the Twitterverse. On Iran targeting thus far:

And new strikes:

Iran has widened its targeting. Note the base in Cyprus is a UK, not US, operation:

On the continued US regime change scheming. Note that John Kirakou (who recall is an expert in the region and was the CIA’s head of counterinsurgency in Pakistan) has said that Reza Pahlavi, the son of the Shah that the West is trying to install, were to land in Iran, he would not survive the walk out of the airport. Nevertheless:

It also looks like Johnson’s call about the Saudis being at war with Iran is getting closer to being official:

Iran is not playing nice with its blockade of the Strait:

But aside from that foolish one that tried to test Iran, other tankers are sure to stay well away:

No way of knowing how complete this list is:

Forgive the awkwardness of this presentation. I will soon survey MSM live blogs and add any useful intel from them as well as other
Twitter goodies before 9:00 AM EST. So please give the post proper another gander then.

UPDATE 9:00 AM EST:

BBC has an official denial that Iran targeted Cyprus:

Starmer ‘confirmed clearly’ that Cyprus not a target, its president says

Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides says UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has called to confirm “clearly and unequivocally that Cyprus was not a target”.

This follows reports from UK defence sources that two Iranian missiles were fired towards Cyprus, where UK military bases are located.
A Cyprus government spokesperson later denied this, saying there is “no indication that there was a threat to the country”.

The next BBC item is not as consequential as it seems. Several independent media figures reported after the 12 Day and more so after the recent US regime change threat that Iran via protest escalation that the political and military leadership had all worked out who would step in if anyone were killed.

The Aljazeera has the death count from the Iran strike on Beit ⁠Shemesh as up to nine, t least 3 dead plus 58 injured in the UAE and 1 dead and at least 22 injured in Kuwait since attacks began. It also reports on fresh remarks by Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Araghchi that Iran is going to continue to fight hard.

The landing page at the Financial Times is delicious:

BWAHAHA. “Calm markets”?

And from its live blog:

Final quick sightings:

Not confirmed but huge if true:

Updates from now on will be in the comments proper.
_____

1 Hopeful disinformation by Google when I went to search on Pezeshkian’s name to verify my spelling?

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479 comments

  1. .Tom

    @FotrosResistancee reported, although idk how significant it is

    Prominent shia figure Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi has declared jihad against the US and Israel, after killing of Seyyed Khamenei.

    He says that avenging the blood of the martyred Leader is a religious duty for Muslims worldwide.

    The videos of crowds in various Iranian cities are impressive and I’m not sure what the glee evident in MSM reporting represents. BBC seems to think the purpose of the war is to kill him.

    1. NotTimothyGeithner

      BBC seems to think the purpose of the war is to kill him.

      Western foreign policy establishments and media suffer from a colonial mindset at their core. They don’t see Iranians as citizens of nation-states and especially as “global citizens.”

      If you eliminate the “one in ten thousand” leader who has “duped” the peasants, everything will fall apart as the peasants can bask in the light of their white saviors. It’s a spin on the “the boys will be home by Xmas,” but it’s just the colonial mindset. The msm stenographers are simply repeating what they’ve heard from “experts.”

      It’s why the Pentagon has to talk politicians down all these years, they actually have to consider things like a plane’s combat range and know where places actually are.

      1. .Tom

        Yesterday I was on the phone with a friend who was in the crowd when Pope JP2 visited Bellahouston park in Glasgow in 1982. That was when we were high schoolers in Scotland, although I didn’t get to know her until 1990. I remember the time she told me about what that day was like, everybody having the best time, happy and full of love, and a day off school.

        Do you think that if Jewish and Christian Zionists had arm-twisted the Israeli and US armed forces to assassinate Pope JP2 back then all those Catholics would have seen the error of their ways and converted?

  2. jjhanif

    What is telling are the Israeli flags and the US and UK Jewish press calling for regime change, cheering in the streets waving nationalist imperial flags. These are the same groups calling for the extermination of Palestine and claiming any criticism in antisemitic.
    When supporters of genocide are demanding anything you can guarantee it is a bad idea

    1. Carolinian

      I mentioned yesterday my neighborhood “flag poll” of those who had gotten out their American flags to hang next to their door.

      And by the end of the day only a handful had done so. So while they may be celebrating in Beverly Hills here’s suggesting that each authoritarian step on the part of the Trump regime is provoking ever greater anxiety among non coastals who are the real Americans, for all their faults. One increasingly suspects that elite America “hates us for our freedom” to not coin a phrase. And if the dog won’t eat the dog food then, if you are Kristi Noem, you shoot it.

      Meanwhile back in the heartland my neighborhood consists of young couples with children mixed with the remaining legacies. If the news about that destroyed girl’s school is allowed to get out it may have far more impact than the murder of an 87 year old man. Even Republicans love their kids and have reason to worry about what future they may face.

      1. mrsyk

        My neighbor decided to voice his opinion by firing off a clip with his ar-15 into the forest at what imaginary enemies I have no idea, this occurred yesterday afternoon, spooked the crap out of me.
        I live in SW Vermont.

      2. erstwhile

        Thanks for telling us who real americans are. Nothing authoritarian about that, no sir.

        1. Carolinian

          It’s not just about dual loyalty but about “real” according to the principles the country was supposedly devoted to including “no foreign entanglements” and that “the people” should be sovereign. Without a doubt post WW2 (or earlier) USA departed from these principles already but were not quite so hypocritical as to wave the flag for a foreign country that most definitely doesn’t believe that “all men were created equal.” Trump yesterday in his clownish USA hat is the vulgarian version of elite sociopathy.

      3. Yalt

        This neighborhood is largely PMC, but one of my neighbors is a small business owner who proudly displayed Trump banners from his trucks long after the election.

        For as long as I can remember, at least a decade, he’s flown an American flag from a pole next to his front door. It came down yesterday; the pole is now empty. (The banners are gone from his trucks, too, but i think that had already happened.)

      4. Steven A

        My home precinct went 2-1 for Trump in 2024. I have not noticed any flag displays around the neighborhood that were not there before attacks began. This contrasts with post-9/11 when neighbors were painting the Stars and Stripes on their garage doors.

    1. hk

      You mean when the Japanese responded rightfully to the unprovoked aggression on their peaceful warplanes minding their own business dropping ordinance on Pearl Harbor by warmongering Americans driven by irrational racism?

      2. FlyoverBoy

        Pardon my slowness here, but which side of the analogy are you saying applies to the Americans/!sraelis and which to the Iranians?

        1. hk

          The wild question by NBC interviewer of the Iranian foreign minister (and the ridiculous claims by Eurocrats about “Iranian aggression”) place this in context.

  4. NN Cassandra

    Re: Saudis secretly pushing for the war.

    I saw on twitter someone mentioning this leak may be disinfo from US/Israel to prevent Saudis from staying on the sidelines or even drift toward Iran. Tell Iran via press that Saudi Arabia is at war with them → Iran bombs SA hard → SA is kept inside US/Israel tent.

    2. hk

      If true, there goes good chunk of BRICS: India and Gulf Arabs joining “the other” side, then? It brings the fundamental internal contradiction of that grouping to bear–countries with fundamentally opposed political interests may not be able to cooperate for long on economic matters after all. That is a big Western victory, if things go in this direction.

      1. ambrit

        True, but if the House of Saud falls, then “The Ex-Kingdom” could become quite a radical “progressive” entity. The fall of Wahabism alone will be a major event worldwide. Saudi and Iranian oil combined? It boggles the mind.
        Stay safe.

      2. ChrisRUEcon

        > If true, there goes good chunk of BRICS: India and Gulf Arabs joining “the other” side, then?

        They were always on the other side.

      3. NoWAR

        countries with fundamentally opposed political interests

        Pardon me, but, the whole idea of a “new” world order is that such countries can live side by side together. I mean, seriously.

        1. hk

          Yes, but if that new order is a fair weather system that can’t survive turbulencem there’d be issues–the recent Foreign Affairs piece on multipolar delusion sort of gets at that (although that was mostly going off in another direction). Having said that, things are still unfolding.

      4. Tiresias

        This is a fundamental misunderstanding of what BRICS is. It is not an us vs them military alliance. It is like the ASEAN. Thailand and Cambodia are both members, but they just had a mini-war with each other and both are still in ASEAN. By the way, Saudi is not a member of BRICS. It applied, was admitted, but decided not to join.

        1. hk

          An international organization can foster closer cooperation and become influential or do little to encourage cooperation and become irrelevant. If the member countries are at war and no one does anything about mitigating it within the organization, then the organization is not very influetial–which incidentally is one of the reasons people are skeptical about ASEAN. The “working” counterpoint might be NATO at the height of Cold War, when Turkey and Greece were perpetually on verge of war (and actually shooting at each other sometimes), but other NATO members, mostly US, used a combination of pressure and side payments to keep the alliance going–but that took real effort, possible mostly because of the existence of a single hegemon.

          I think is a legitimate question to ask whether BRICS will be basically a social club of sorts or a real international organization that does something effectively. The latter is not very compatible with the current developments…for now, at least, I think.

    1. Carolinian

      The claims of no US casualties from all these strikes are not credible and you wonder if the Pentagon is going to imitate the Israelis and censor everything.

      1. Giovanni Barca

        Followed by a mysterious rash of “helicopter crashes” in the US near military installations? Your GI totally didn’t die in the Gulf, here’s a flag.

    2. lyman alpha blob

      Can’t remember exactly where I heard it, but one of the regular anti-globalist commentators mentioned yesterday that the US bases in the region had been largely evacuated ahead of the airstrikes. It was just an offhand mention and I haven’t heard it elsewhere yet.

      I’m not sure why other nations in the crosshairs of rogue entities keep waiting for their enemies to attack first, Clearly by the UNs lack of action in the face of all the US/Zionist belligerence in the last several years, international law is just for suckers.

        1. NoWAR

          “international law is just for suckers”

          Another Israeli legacy.

          Oh they will remember the value of international law when they remember holocaust by heart, again, instead of using it as a tool to bash others.

  6. ocypode

    Fog of war is making assessments quite complicated, as is expected of this level of conflict. Hitherto it seems like everyone got a bloody nose, with the statelets in the Gulf having taken the hardest damage especially since they can’t really defend themselves or retaliate. I am impressed though by people declaring (on both sides!) that the war is over, Iran has been decisively defeated and therefore all is lost or successfully completed, depending on the sides taken. Iran is a big country with lots of weapons. It takes a bit more than a few assassinations to obtain a capitulation. In fact, whether this becomes a religious issue or not, it’s hard to see any negotiated end to this conflict, which means that something akin to surrender is more or less the only outcome for either side. The landscape is changing fast in West Asia.

    1. ChrisFromGA

      The people running our country are literal morons.

      They have no idea of history, never read books, and lack any sort of capacity to do critical thinking. To make matters worse, they’re war criminals the likes of which we haven’t seen since Pol Pot or Idi Amin.

      I never thought I’d see the day when I would miss Joe Biden and Antony Blinken, but that day has come.

        1. The Rev Kev

          I’m afraid that if Kamala was President, that she would be doing the exact same thing because of pressure from the Israelis and the Neocons. Presidents come and go but the Neocons make sure that the US always follows the same policy as always – their policy.

          1. chris

            Correct. No one has been allowed to run for the office of President in the last 20 years who would have opposed what happened yesterday. If rumors of Netanyahu acting to force Trump’s hand are correct, then Trump may have been the last chance these interests had to act out their Iran regime change fantasy. In which case, we will have successfully changed one regime that was trying to work with the West peacefully for another that will build nuclear weapons and use them.

            2. Giovanni Barca

              I don’t think that is quite the case. Both W and O were pushed to attack Iran and both successfully resisted, probably from listening to pentagoons they deemed credible who said Bad Idea. W had of course already double dipped in “the supreme war crime” of unptovoked invasion and both he and O were happy to be criminals against humanity but theu reisisted this step. I’m pining for a good Jeremiah Wright sermon myself right about now.

        2. Cat Buglar

          For whatever it is worth, Harris did make a statement opposing the war. One figures she is prepositioning herself for the future, likely because she remembers that Dem Iraq War supporters were not electable presidential candidates (although Biden notably had to dissemble on this point to get elected).

      2. lyman alpha blob

        Let’s not forget who teed this up for Trump, The same vicious Zionist warmongers have taken advantage of two extremely weak presidents in a row. It’s almost as if they prefer elderly and infirm presidents who can’t think straight.

        1. ChrisFromGA

          I think I am somewhat in disagreement. I have had it with excuses being made for Orange Julius. He may be deranged, weak, and easily manipulated, but he still has agency. He ran his campaign in 2024 under false pretenses. Nobody voted for this, except maybe the Ted Cruz/Lindsey Graham wing.

          Marjorie Taylor-Greene has been the most consistent voice condemning him. I hope that she gets some company; perhaps Boebert or Paulina Luna will start speaking up against this cynical sell-out of everything MAGA once stood for.

      3. tegnost

        yeah, no.
        The only difference is in degrees or methodology while both hands of the beast work tirelessly at “running the world” as per joey b.
        Kamala would have won had she even glanced at the left or said gaza would be dealt with. There are few or no positive actors in USA!USA! .gov.
        Remember, had had Harris won rather than musk it would have been marc cuban taking his axe to the sec. The dems have ham fistedly tried to disable social security (pun intended). Both sides are anti democratic and authoritarian and are also largely consistent on the worst issues.
        No way out of this telephone booth.
        We were screwed then, we’re screwed now.

  7. Ben Panga

    > There has been a great deal of excellent commentary on YouTube, so readers are likely to have other talks they particularly like

    I’ll repost something from the very end of yesterday’s blog comments

    Drop Site News, Scahill and Grim w/ Iranian-American analyst Hooman Majd and Ali Abunimah of Electronic Intifada

    The two guests were really good and offered perspectives I’d not seen elsewhere. Marandi is good but diversity of information is better.

    —-

    Also Amb. Chas Freeman and Michael Rossi on Neutrality Studies

    Freeman’s opening remarks are good and had a nugget I’m not sure of the source for. Paraphrasing “it’s now been confirmed that the decision and date for the war were decided when Bibi went to Mar a Lago in late December“.

    1. Pearl Rangefinder

      Not quite quoting exactly what Freeman said, but Branko Marcetic noted a line to that effect from Reuters reporting, which Reuters apparently edited out of their original report:

      This line where the Israeli official says the date had been decided weeks ago has been scrubbed from the report now. Would be good for @Reuters to clarify why: was it an error, for instance?

      And in a subsequent tweet, Marcetic cites reporting by Axios saying similar:

      The scrubbed Reuters line is now partly backed up by reporting in Axios, which says US/Israel agreed on the date of the attack a week earlier, and that the past week of diplomacy was indeed a sham to lower their defenses.

      Murdering the other side while pretending to negotiate definitely fits the “rules based order” MO at this point.

  8. Louis Fyne

    the “logical” response for Iran would be to continue the war at this pace or greater for the entire summer.

    the GCC and the American bottom 66% (>$4 gas) are not structured to handle with prolonged deprivation. Gulf states (services economy depression + no hydrocarbon exports)

    1. David

      Logical in what way? Sure America may struggle with high fuel prices. But there won’t be any bombs dropped on America. It will be Iranians being blown up. And their economy is not going to do to well woth the striats closed off either. And i doubt wither side has the capacity to keep up this rate if missile launches until June.

      1. Yves Smith Post author

        The US is already on the verge of civil war

        We’ll have a financial market crash, worse than 2008. We have high private debt levels to GDP, which is what causes meltdowns.

        Then, the European economy was OK but too many systemically important, highly leveraged financial institutions had massive exposure to US subprime, both directly and on a leveraged basis (leverage on leverage = death!) vis CDOs and credit default swaps. Now their economies are already green at the gills due to high energy costs and an increase would put them into a bad recession if not worse.

        China has even higher private debt to GDP than the US. Even if it merely zombifies harder (which it is already doing) due to drop in trade demand thanks to global recession, that means it won’t be able to do monster stimulus, as it did after 2008, blunting the impact for everyone.

        Trump’s economic team is full of morons so they would do exactly the wrong thing. The one thing I hate to credit the Bernanke/Geithner/Paulson team for is that once the crisis really got going, they did a very good job of executing on bad goals (patching up the financial system with no real reforms(.

        1. LawnDart

          The US is already on the verge of civil war

          I am sure that’s how the Epstein Class wants to frame it– keeping things divided between “left” and “right” takes the heat off the monsters who actually run things.

          Some quotes attributed to robber-baron Jay Gould, one of the railroad oligarchs of old, remain among my favorites:

          “It was the custom when men received nominations to come to me for contributions, and I made them and considered them good paying investments for the company. In a Republican district I was a strong Republican; in a Democratic district I was Democratic, and in doubtful districts I was doubtful. In politics I was an Erie Railroad man all the time.”

          And of course, this classic–

          “I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other half.”

          If sparks of Revolution are flying, you can bet your ass that the Epstein Class will try to stoke the flames of Civil War– a strategy that’s tried and true.

          1. Yves Smith Post author

            Yes, that take may sound dramatic but due to lack of clean geographic divides, this is playing out in an unconventional manner.

            ICE running around with masks and violating the 4th Amendment, locking people up, deporting them with no due process…this is brownshirting yet now treated as normal? Trump ADMITTING he has gone to war with no Congressional authorization? Rampant suppression of free speech and the right to assemble?

            1. albrt

              My wife reported she saw on the internet:

              “I’m just glad Congress isn’t alive to see what we’ve come to.”

            2. LawnDart

              These are actions coming from the top: aside from some harsh words, the only true opposition seems to be coming from below– DHS budget-impass not withstanding. But as far as that one goes, I think we can expect more of the same after the sausage-making is done and newly-reformed ICE is reintroduced to the public in gentler, focus-group approved packaging.

              I do certainly come across Trumpanzies who faithfully regurgatate whatever Dear Leader spits out (especially those who want to keep their jobs in ICE!), but every regime has had its loyalists or those who’ll kneel before the crown. Were it a democrat in charge, as we’ve recently seen, it’d hardly be different.

              That said, the dynamics today and the mood in the streets appear more to me like those of 1765 or the 1930s than 1861: revolt against distant rulers or leaders more so than North vs. South or brother vs. brother.

              Divide et impera should be more difficult to pull off when the many realize that they are being screwed by the few.

              1. Giovanni Barca

                I live in Trumpistan, amongst soybean farmers and tractor repairmen and drug dealing grannies who generally wave in one’s face their maga speech and their maga merch. I was at a community event last night and all of that was muted. No jingo boasting, no triumphalism. For what little it’s worth.

                1. LawnDart

                  Yes, very true…

                  The Killing Fields made quite an impression on me.

                  The convergence of several factors, trends, make plausable the possibility that a western-faced sequel may lie not outside the realm of imagination.

            3. Procopius

              … lack of clean geographic divides, …

              May I point out that Republican Rome had several Civil Wars without clean geographical divides. Not that I disagree with you, I don’t see a real Civil War yet.

            1. Old Jake

              After half that working class kills the other half, then who do they turn those guns on? Sounds like another half-cocked scheme to me.

    2. Kilgore Trout

      I think $6.00 gas is not out of the realm of possibility. Our patriotic oil cartel never wastes an opportunity to profit off war.

      1. Tom Stone

        Gas is already at $5 in Sonoma County, I will be surprised if it isn’t at least $7 by the end of March.

          1. ambrit

            Yesterday I asked the vaguely Middle Eastern man running our local low cost gas station, he’s evidently from Pakistan, what he expected the price at the pump to be next week. He replied that he was just waiting for the call from “the investors” any minute now. He had no idea as to the amount of the price rise to come.
            Stay safe, stay liquid.

            1. Yalt

              Still $2.23 here, as of an hour ago. I expected movement by now but it hasn’t happened yet.

          2. Old Jake

            For you and me, Tegnost, it’s now $4.19.9 for regular at Costco (topped yesterday afternoon). Next week? I’m happily retired, but all our specialists are a couple of hours driving.

        2. juno mas

          The national average price of gasoline is ~$3.

          California’s state taxes on gasoline are over a $1/gal. Add in local and road use tax and you get $5 at the pump.

          Close Hormuz and Cali business grinds to a halt.

          1. hear the wood

            Worked at gas station on the pa turnpike during the 73-74 embargo. I was a teenager and o boy did we make lots of money filling up the tanks of lincolns and caddies on the wrong day..the chicks and dope flowed over for a tank of gas…those were the days. Made enough cash to cover my first of college.

    1. ocypode

      It’s an open secret that “israel” usually hides or minimizes casualties as much as possible. Given that they have instantly admitted that 6 people died, it’s not unreasonable to expect that the real number is much higher.

    2. raspberry jam

      Apparently the Beit Shemesh deaths were in a public shelter. They knew as of last summer the public shelters could not withstand a direct ballistic strike (one of the residential blocks hit last summer with a high death count was for same reason)

  10. DJG, Reality Czar

    I have to repeat this Xitter by Tariq Ali here (from above):

    Have heard from an Iranian friend that her partner in Teheran has sent her a message. He is a leftist and is telling her that the US/Israelis are targeting a number of known leftists homes in Teheran and elsewhere in an attempt to make sure there’s no opposition to their favoured candidate once they destroy the regime. What this reveals is the degree of penetration by Mossad in Iran. What it also means is that this is not going to be an easy occupation for the US and its Israeli buddies.

    I put it here because my FcBk feed — and likely the social media that youse (to use the Chicago pronoun) indulge in — includes a good deal of vague stuff along the lines of “oh, well” / “regime change” / sudden Middle-East expert / don’t know much about geography. Some of this indifference comes about because the U.S. citizenry and U.S. culture now display a high tolerance for wars elsewhere — unless it inconveniences them. My feed also shows me the lack of political depth of liberals.

    As a leftist, I understand quite well why non-intervention matters. Russia after the November revolution. Chile and Greece, in the 1960s and 1970s, famously. Indonesia, the slaughter still a mystery. Vietnam. Brazil and those years and years under the generals. Argentina, ever a mess.

    Even the attempted coup by Borghese in Italy in 1970: “Un rapporto dei servizi segreti italiani, allegato ai lavori della commissione parlamentare d’inchiesta sulla P2, afferma che i golpisti erano in contatto con membri della NATO, tanto che quattro navi NATO erano in allerta a Malta.[80]” [lifted from Italian Wikipedia entry on the attempted coup].

    The US and Israel will be only too happy to slaughter more leftists. And U.S. liberals will be self-paralyzed and blab about the freedom to order more on Amazon.

    1. raspberry jam

      Thanks for this DJG, your comment par Italiano sent me to read up on Malta-NATO relations (I am currently based in Malta) because I thought it was non-NATO (it is) and officially neutral (it is) but apparently there is a long history of cooperation with NATO. Probably a legacy of the British presence and WW2 siege memories.

      1. mrsyk

        Wonder if Palantir is involved in this targeting of leftists.
        Wonder when the assassination by drone of the intellectual class begins here at home.

  11. Aumee

    Heartbreaking to hear that Saudi Arabia advocated this attack as well. Does anyone have any additional information or sources regarding this?

    2. jjc

      “Anonymous sources” have attributed many things to the Saudis over the past two-and-a-half years, utilizing for the most part publications like WaPo and Axios. The most common claim over this time period has been that the Saudis were on the cusp of “normalization” with Israel.

    3. Sugach

      https://www.youtube.com/@thecradlemedia

      Alastair Crooke is interviewed by Sharmine Narwani on The Cradle and she asks him what he believes re MBS urging Trump to attack or destroy Iran. Both Sharmine Narwani and Alastair Crooke do not think this happened. He explains why towards the end.

      1. Yves Smith Post author

        So why no denial? Not buying it in the face of no denial of the story. Hope Chas Freeman, the former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia, weighs in.

  12. Tom Stone

    If there was any question about the Israeli’s having Kompromat on Trump, this War has answered it, there is no benefit to the USA by participating in it.
    And it will be amusing to see who Trump tries to blame for what is undeniably his decision, the whining will be epic.
    And so will the reaction to higher gas and food prices by an American public that is already stretched to the limit.

    1. John

      Kompromat on Trump – my first thought as well. I wonder if he has any regret about walking down that escalator

    1. NotThePilot

      AJ has good coverage as a data point, but keep in mind it is Qatari-owned and sectarian (more subtly in English). Which leads to funny reporting at times likes this where their reporting on Palestine collides head-on with their wish-casting for Iranian defeat.

      Another example of how AJ has to be read critically: according to them, the AD interception is at 100% in Qatar (lots of “explosions in the sky”) Unless you still believe in the perfection of US air defense in Ukraine & now the Mideast, you can infer the general direction of reality from there

  15. Ben Panga

    UK defence sec on Britain’s “defensive” involvement:

    Healey: UK forces intercepting Iranian drones (Times via archive)

    Healey noted that about 300 UK armed forces personnel had been “within several hundred yards” of drones and missiles that Iran fired at a US military base in Bahrain, while two ballistic missiles had been “fired in the direction of Cyprus” on Saturday.
    “It demonstrates how our bases, our personnel, military and civilians at the moment are at risk with a regime that is increasingly indiscriminate, widespread and uncontrolled in the attacks it’s mounting,” he said.

    Cowardly gits, still helping Israel as they did throughout the genocide. Every UK plane doing defensive stuff frees up a US/Zio plane for offense.

  16. Ignacio

    The apparent “show of force” looks poised to demonstrate show of weaknesses soon. Personal weakness by Trump is in my opinion obvious. Weaknesses of the empire and its missile-directed regime-change plus assassinations bullshit policies which will go nowhere.

    Everything looks as if thought backwards. Just because some say it, bombing must be the best regime change tool. The sad thing is that the supposed political alternative and supposed “progressive” punditry, even if tearing their hair out with the bombardments, they are showing exactly the same desire for regime change in Iran. I believe they might have found good justifications for those bombardments if these had been ordered by, let’s say, Kamala Harris. In this case it would have been a show of democratic resolve or something.

  17. Victor Sciamarelli

    If you’re interested in shipping in or near the Persian Gulf or why shipping will be restricted due to Israel and US missile strikes on Iran, even if Iran doesn’t formally close the Strait of Hormuz, and other factors, there is good information on “What’s Going on with Shipping? Is the Strait of Hormuz Open? | What Impact Will This Have on Shipping? | Hormuz Data | US Sealift”
    For example, “The US Navy declared a sweeping maritime warning zone across the Persian Gulf on Saturday [2/28]…forcing major oil companies to suspend shipments through the world’s most critical chokepoint.”
    Furthermore, the site produced an Iranian radio broadcast closing the Strait, as well as a US statement that, “All US flagged…vessels that are operating in these areas should maintain a standoff of 30 nautical miles from US military vessels to reduce the risk of being mistaken as a threat…” That alone will panic insurance companies.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wck_88OaQX8

    1. Revenant

      The real effect of closing the strait is two-fold: the supply is trapped but also the tankers. Replacing the supply from other providers requires more trips but there are no ships to reassign. If 20% of oil supply ==> 20% of tanker capacity, that is a big chunk of trapped capacity. Tanker rates should leap.

      1. Samuel Conner

        I think the trapped seaborne oil transport capacity must be significantly less than 20% — for it to be 20% would imply an average 5-day round trip for delivery and return for refill.

        The actual travel times are surely much larger, implying that the fraction of worldwide transport capacity that is trapped by the strait closure must be much less than 1/5

        1. Revenant

          I think similarly, hence my “if”. Should have been an iff, maybe (=”if and only if”).

          I just don’t know, though. A lot of Gulf traffic is long distance (China, Japan) but a lot is shorter (India, Southern Europe). And a lot of other traffic is also short haul (S America and Caribbean to N America, Russia and West Africa to Europe).

          If you close a route, a long one with a similar volume of trade will have more tankers tied up in it. But you are only closing one end so if the tankers are even distributed in space, most are set free to redeploy. But of course the tankers are distributed in time and gaining port entry and loading/unloading and repairs and revictualing etc may take more time than sailing the leg. So I just don’t know how to guesstimate what percentage went offline!

          Iran is letting Russian and Chinese tanker traffic through though. There’s some advantages to being a ghost, LOL!

        2. Revenant

          Well, well, well.

          I looked up an UNCTAD report and backed out a rough number of tankers (the global fleet is presented in dead weight tonnes but there are histograms of average tanker size by age and tanker fleet percentage composition by age and tankers under 20 are 86% of the fleet and 73k DWT. I ignored >20 because they are much smaller and only 14% of the fleet and because higher mean tanker DWT makes my estimate a lower bound).

          At 73k DWT, a global tanker fleet of 665,424k DWT means that there are c. 9,100 tankers in the world! Bottling up 150 of them is nothing!

          From Wikipedia, there are 4,000 tankers > 10k DWT so the average size is very much driven by the big tankers. 150 out of 4,000 would hurt a bit more but still only requires moving 4% of capacity from the RoW routes.

          However, there are only c. 400 ultra large crude carriers (>300k DWT) in the world. If the 150 were all these, that would hurt! 38% of global capacity!

          Maybe a shipping head could chip in here?

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_tanker
          https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/rmt2024ch2_en.pdf

    2. The Rev Kev

      I just heard that the UK insurance corporations have yanked the insurance for any tanker wanting to go throw the Hormuz Strait. Thus without firing a shot, the Iranians have gotten that Strait closed. Question is if Chinese tankers will be able to pass through since their insurance is done in Asia. But you never know if the US or Israelis will hit a Chinese tanker and pretend that it was the Iranians that did it just out of spite.

        1. David

          They may be allowed to. They may choose not to however. Too much chance at this time of misidentification. And if mines start being layed it becomes even riskier.

    3. Jeff W

      A new video on the What’s Going on With Shipping? channel:
      Ships Stranded at Hormuz: 1 March 2026 Update | Is the Strait Open or Closed?
      Here.
      From the video description: “This episode will look at the events of the last 24 hours regarding shipping and what impact this will have on the global tanker fleet and market.”

      1. Yves Smith Post author

        I listened with only one ear. I need to turn in and will generate a transcript to recheck.

        He has great detail but also seems unduly chill about what Iran can do. If I heard him right, he said something that amounts to, “The Stait has never been closed” and by implication, it won’t be.

        I recall in the runup to the crisis that mortgage industry models could not incorporate the idea that housing prices would fall on a nation-wide basis either.

        Iran has never been in a fight like this. Per his point, Iran may not have to close it formally because noise and threat display will jack up war insurance premiums so much (when as he explains there is also what amounts to a tanker shortage) so as to choke shipments so much that the effects are close to what a closure would achieve. But Iran just live-fire drilled a closure, FFS.

  18. Donald

    In the exchanges with Hezbollah and with Iran last year, the Lebanese and Iranian civilian population suffered vastly more damage and casualties than Israel did. This is why the U.S. and Israel perceive the Iranians and their Hezbollah allies as weak. The Houthis survived and the U.S. wasted a lot of money trying to destroy them but the Houthis were also not able to help Gaza with their attacks. So far we are seeing the same pattern. What Iran can do until or unless their launchers are destroyed is hurt the world economy but it takes no special competence to do that.

    This pattern started on Oct 7. Hamas killed hundreds of Israeli civilians and hundreds of Israeli military. As best I can tell, they inflicted more harm on Israel than everything done since and Israel responded with genocide.

    So there is a very good chance this is how things will go this time around. If Iran actually succeeds in hurting Israel to any significant degree, they will make Iran look like Gaza and they will use whatever means are necessary to do that. I think it is just as likely that Iranian missile launchers will be destroyed before Israeli and American defensive missiles run out.

    To be clear, I see all the actors here as cold- blooded murderers and war criminals. But the West has been better at it so far.

    1. Yves Smith Post author

      Israel does not begin to have the means to do what it did do Gaza to Iran. Many experts have pointed out that the weapons the US and Israel have to deploy versus Iran will be exhausted in 4 days of intense firing or maybe up to 10 if the pace is moderated. The level of attack is comparable to the 1998 Operation Desert Fox v. a MUCH smaller Iraq, whose long term effect on Iraq was close to nada. And Iraq lacked Iran’s vast underground bunkers.

      The US and Israel can’t have their fantasy absent a massive ground operation, which is na ga happen. The US army is way too small and it would take years to build it to the needed level.

      1. ocypode

        It should be said that it’s optimistic to think that even with time the US could build up such an army. They can’t make a decent new plane nowadays! This feels, whatever the outcome, the very last hurrah of imperial US ambitions. Considering a war against China, I don’t think the US has the capabilities to even reach Taiwan, much less to do war anymore.

        1. XXYY

          This feels, whatever the outcome, the very last hurrah of imperial US ambitions.

          I am thinking the same thing. I can’t remember the last time anti-war voices in the US were citing US weakness as a reason not to go to war. Yet sober voices inside and outside the US military have been arguing that the US is not capable of fighting a war of invasion. Same thing, only more so, with various European imperial powers. I’m not saying this is a bad thing, in fact I think it’s a good thing, but it does seem unique in Western history.

          Financialized leaders in the US and elsewhere have been so determined to dismantle their industrial bases and move them overseas, that they now lack even minimal levels of production. This is completely incompatible with being an imperial power, which historically needs to produce high levels of everything, including weapons and war materiel, quickly and reasonably well.

          It also seems like the propaganda systems in these countries can no longer convince the population either to pay for or to fight in wars that don’t affect them directly.

          Hopefully as the 80 and 90 year old neocons continue to die off, we will find better things to do with our children, time, and money than blow each other up.

          1. Michaelmas

            XXYY: the US is not capable of fighting a war of invasion. Same thing, only more so, with various European imperial powers. In fact I think it’s a good thing, but it does seem unique in Western history.

            Yes, but you’re drawing too simplistic a conclusion. It’s not only — and maybe not even primarily — due to neoliberal Western regimes offshoring manufacturing industry for greater corporate profit. (Though that’s part of it.)

            It’s the result of the global dissemination of all technologies, and particularly the democratization of missile technology and then drone technology that first became clearly evident circa 2005-2007 (e.g. the 2006 Hezbollah-Israel Lebanon war).

            In other words, in 2026 there is no modern equivalent of the situation that permitted 19th century European/Western colonial imperialism, e.g. —

            Whatever happens, we have got the Maxim gun
            And they have not

            –in the words of the poet Hillair-Belloc then. The industrialization of slaughter via the machine gun, that is, in the second half of the 19th century meant that whereas in 1850 most of interior Africa remained blank spaces on European maps, by 1910 all of Africa except Ethiopia had been turned into a colony of one or another European power. Besides Western machine guns, here was also cannon, gunpowder, aircraft, etc. in their various decades.

            In 2026, conversely, the West has no monopoly or even advantage in any military technological area.

              1. Michaelmas

                Juno Mas: ISR?

                Okay. Technically, you’re right as of 2026.

                But it’s not an overwhelming advantage as both China and Russia have enough up there in orbit to see what they want to see — especially China, as it’s made clear with its satellite photos of US force deployments pre-Iran — and to interfere with US satellites’ transmissions either from up there in orbit or as when Chinese gear closed Starlink down in Iran a few weeks ago.

                Then, too, the US advantage in ISR has to translate into force advantage on the ground. To what extent can it do that when Russian and Chinese missile, EW, and air defense technology is to a lesser or greater extent superior now in many ways?

                Nuclear subs might be another area where one could argue against the claim that the West no longer has any areas of military technological advantage over peer competitors. US naval subs are still better than the Russians’, and arguably the UK’s nuclear subs (!) are better than those of the US, based on some Russian analysis I’ve seen and their having the records for undersea cruising etc.

                But Russian nuclear subs are good enough. (And the Brits are irrelevant beyond fielding a questionable sea-based deterrent as they have only have ten nuclear subs and at best three-five are seaworthy at any time.)

      2. ilsm

        Ramping up assembly of depleted weapon stocks is still in the “find floor space” stage. The quest for supply chains dormant for decades is slow as is finding the engineering documents.

        Most of these needs are near useless like PAC 3 SME.

      3. David

        The question is how long does Iran have before it’s missile reserve becomes exhausted.

        And air warfare alone is rarely enough to devastate an opponent. Which is what Iran is currently relying on. The US and israel are in no position to inavade Iran to finish this. But equally Iran is in no position to do that either.

          1. David

            That doesn’t mean they have unlimited arms or resources. It also doesn’t chsnge that air power by itself has rarely been enough to win a war on it’s own.

            Russia has launched about 9000 missiles, 14000 drones and 33000 glide bombs in Ukraine and that has not been enough to win the war for them. Is Iran likely to be able to drop anywhere near that much ordinance?

            1. Yves Smith Post author

              1. Have you looked at a map? Ukraine is 30 times as large as Israel

              2. Russia has pointedly gone slowly because it likes attrition, so as to boiling frog NATO and the EU and also to get and keep Global South countries that don’t like the idea of Russia gobbling up Ukraine on side by showing Ukraine has been so intransigent as to leave no other option. So not at all comparable.

              3. Per #2, Russia has conveniently depleted the weapons stocks Israel can get from the US, MASSIVELY.

              4. Israel has a glass jaw. It has already lost lots of talented young people that are essential to the economy. Its population, unlike Iran’s, is not willing to tolerate hardship.

              All Iran has to do is take out Israel’s electrical grid or its desalination plants. I think the latter are pretty large complexes so it would take a bit of effort.

              1. Polar Socialist

                As a tangent to this, if one combines Trita Parsi’s explanation and a few other comments from around, it really seems that during the current phase of the conflict Iran is targeting US assets in the Gulf region to force US to withdraw from Iran’s proximity. Ans simultaneously it’s also targeting all the Arab and other assets that last summer formed Israel’s air-defense buffer zone.

                Once Iran has properly degraded this buffer (and US forces a re-living the Houthi experience), Israel will stand alone receiving the full wrath of Iran’s two missile forces. Israel won’t have the stamina for that phase.

                Also, to add to your first point, Israel has no strategic depth at all, while Ukraine’s reach from the front line to the Ramstein Air Base – which is for now “out of reach” for Russian missiles. Iran can reach everywhere in Israel, and once the harbors (3!) and airfields (15) are destroyed, no supplies can reach Israel.

        2. John k

          Israel is very small but target rich. Take out desal plants, refineries, elect gen, f35’s on tarmac (visible to sat), ports, and many (half?) would have to leave. And imo the half that leave are the most productive, have best prospects in us/eu.

          1. XXYY

            I think Russia is writing a new book on how to conduct a war against an industrialized enemy, and it will be studied for generations. Tanks, artillery, battalions of men marching forward, indiscriminate gravity bombing from high flying aircraft, even battlefields themselves seem like they are no longer elements in an effective war.

            It now seems possible to surgically dismantle an opponent’s society from a long distance off and with relatively minimal destruction and casualties, the goal being to create an unlivable country where the enemy population can easily flee. Not every country is vulnerable to this type of attack, but it seems like many are, and Israel particularly so.

          2. Revenant

            There was a post last night with video that Iran has taken out the Sorek desalination plant, Israel’s largest.

        4. juno mas

          While interceptor missiles cost a couple million each a fighter jet is orders of magnitude more costly to replace. Shoot down a couple and the US will rethink its plan.

          2. Skip Intro

            Speaking of cost, spending millions firing AA missiles from jets at $10k shahed drones, as we see now in Ukraine and in the Gulf, is successful attrition even if the jets take out every drone they fire at. Now the drone hits can do more damage than the cost of the defense, but forcing that cost on an opponent is a successful strategy of attrition.

        5. redleg

          Total destruction isn’t necessary to effectively destroy something. Damage requires time and resources to clear and repair/replace. If key components are hit, such as high-end electrical, water treatment plants, etc., return to baseline life is impossible in the short term and the cost will impact the affected area’s economy for a generation or more.

        6. OnceWere

          Don’t focus only on the missiles and forget the humble Shahed. The Israelis have claimed that the Iranians have a stockpile of 80,000. It’s fair to say that their one-on-one success rate against any kind of functional air defence is tiny but what would happen if it were not a matter of a couple of hundred launches a day for a week or two but rather 500 launches a day for the next six months or thereabouts. Israel and the US might expend every air defence missile in the Western world and then fly the wings off every aircraft they own going for gun kills and still not be able to fully counter a threat of that magnitude.

      4. WJ

        If I am not mistaken—and forgive me if I am—the estimation of 4-10 days worth of US attacking munitions assumes stand-off firing. If the US and Israel are able to establish clear air superiority over Iran itself with fixed wing aircraft—a big IF to be sure—then their capacity to inflict serious damage against Iranian state infrastructure increases by a huge margin.

        The question I do not have the answer to is whether it is more likely that the US and Israel will be able to establish this air control before they run short on their own anti-air defenses. If both events happen roughly simultaneously, then I think we are simply in a contest to see who can withstand punishment longest.

        1. Yves Smith Post author

          1. Both the Israel and Iran have crap air defenses. Larry Wikerson said if you had asked him before the 12 Day War who had the best air defense in the world, he would have said Israel. He was shocked at how badly it performed. Iran’s is admittedly comparatively more crap due to having such a big country to defend

          BUT

          2. Iran’s missiles are massively bunkered

          3. Iran even has its missile factories bunkered underground

          4. Per Prof. Marandi, Iran is again deploying its old slow stuff first to deplete Israel/US air defenses first. A reader yesterday linked to the vid of the successful Iran hit on gas storage at the 5th Fleet base. He was shocked not just at how slow the drone was but that there was also no sign of any attempt to intercept it.

          5. Iranians are Shia and culturally can take great pain, as in human and material losses. Israel cannot.

          1. Arkady Bogdanov

            I’ll add that no matter the physical size of the nations involved, it is simply impossible for a nation of 7 million people (Pop must be far less by now) to attrit a nation of 90 million people. The US is not going to be much of a factor due to the length of the supply chain, and US population’s unwillingness to participate in this war (which is becoming more unpopular literally by the minute at this point).

          3. XXYY

            My understanding from casual reading is that Iran is heavily armored up with Russian S300 and S400 systems, as well as whatever else they are using. The Russian systems have the reputation of being the best in the world and very formidable, and also interwork with new Chinese “3D” air defense systems supposedly capable of easily seeing stealth targets.

            The problem is, every air defense system has a great reputation until it’s actually tried in a real war. So I’m certain everyone will be watching closely since this is one of the first times the Russian/Chinese systems have been used against a first world opponent AFAIK.

            1. ChatET

              Nothing beats real world R&D. Russia and China are learning how to beat the US tech through observing their own equipment in use against it. Besides Russia and China strategically cannot let the US gain control of Iran. It will only make their existence more difficult as the US gains more control over world energy markets. Venezuela is one thing, Iran is their back yard.

            2. Polar Socialist

              Ukrainians have used US intelligence and NATO weapons to attack Russian targets for at least three years now. HARMS, HIMARS, SCALP, Storm Shadow… you name it.

              The main problem for Iran’s air defenses is what makes it’s so hard to conquer – it’s surrounded by huge mountain ranges. Radars are kind of line-of-sight devices (with the exception of beyond the horizon radars that bounce from atmosphere) so that and a very long western border means that even with advanced systems it’s practically impossible to cover all approaches.

              The mountains create plenty of radar shadows, no matter how many radars you have and how you position them. Even if you notice an incoming missile, it’s very hard to track it long enough with the fire control radar to achieve a hit.

              Iran has lately developed a small, very mobile air-defense system, basically a SUV with an opto-electrical targeting system (backed by radar) and four ready-to-launch Sidewinder derived IR-seeker missiles which appears to be optimized for independent operation in mountain areas against relatively low flying threats.

      5. Donald

        I think conventional weapons deliberately aimed at civilian targets could kill many thousands— they could also aim it at power plants. I agree they can’t literally flatten all of Iran as they did Gaza, unless nukes are used. I will come back to that.

        My point is that thus far, whatever the “ Axis of Resistance” has done to Israel, Israel ( with US help) has done on a far greater scale to civilians in return. And if Iran really can hit desalinization plants and whatever else it would take to hurt Israel really badly, well, that is why they have nukes. I do see people here and elsewhere claiming that Iran ( and before that Hezbollah) had a missile arsenal capable of destroying civilian infrastructure on a scale that would practically make Israel uninhabitable or at least turn it into a disaster zone. Suppose that is true in both cases. Hezbollah backed down so Lebanon wasn’t destroyed. If Iran has the ability to destroy Israeli infrastructure, they are going to have to decide if they want to see Iran destroyed. Because Israel at some point would see this hypothetical massive Iranian bombardment aimed at wrecking their society as an existential threat and that is what nukes are supposed to deter. They could start with a few “ tactical strikes”.

        The Iranians (whoever is in charge ) would have to be crazy not to think about this.

        1. Yves Smith Post author

          Israel killed thousand of defenseless women and children and people it kept in an open air prison for decades.

          It has STILL been unable to fully subdue Hamas.

          It had to pre-emptively attack Lebanon to weaken Hezbollah and impede its ability to help Iran (although the Twitterverse argues Iran has not leaned on them because it does not need to, better to wait until Israel more bloodied). It and the US have been unable to subdue the Houthis.

          Israel like the US is a bunch of cowards. Happy to beat up on weaker parties. This is the first time they have been up against a real power.

          1. JohnnyGL

            Hezbollah has no air defense and probably didn’t anticipate the the US would send an endless stream of 2,000lb bombs for the IAF to use with no logistical or political restraints from the west at all. It was pretty clear that Israel wasn’t keen on a ground operation and was just going to drop bombs on civilians, round the clock. Hezbollah got some early wins on the ground and made the IDF bleed, but the IDF just stopped advancing and let the air campaign do the work.

            If Iran can damage the airfields, run down the air defenses, and otherwise hamper the IAF’s ability to operate, Hezbollah might make a move. They need a ground fight, though. They won’t ask Lebanese civilians to suffer unless they think they can make some tangible gains to show for it.

            Would they be so bold as to go for the Golan Heights? Could they hold it? The fall of Syria really weakened Hezbollah’s strategic situation, but probably too risky to make a move.

          2. Michaelmas

            Yves S: Israel like the US is a bunch of cowards. Happy to beat up on weaker parties.

            A bunch of cowards with nukes, nevertheless.

            David is right to raise the possibility with ‘Israel at some point would see this hypothetical massive Iranian bombardment aimed at wrecking their society as an existential threat and that is what nukes are supposed to deter. They could start with a few “ tactical strikes”.

    2. eg

      Iran is 4500 times the size of Gaza in geography, with 45 times its population. It is also over 2000 kilometres further away from Israel.

      Your grasp of logistics is, to put it charitably, poor.

    3. Christopher Mann

      “Oct 7. Hamas killed hundreds of Israeli military who then killed hundreds of their own civilians.”

      I fixed that sentence for you, Donald.

  19. John

    On HuffPost this morning it’s suggested that our current horror is fueling the perception that the USA has gone rogue.
    Wtf?
    In my lifetime (b.’51), how many leaders of other countries have we corrupted/deposed/assasinated (Mosaddegh, Diem, Gaddafi, Allende . . .), how many countries have we destroyed (Vietnam, Chile, Libya, Iraq, Nicaragua . . . ), how much poison has our capitalist way of life spread around the planet? The idea that trump is somehow an anomaly is laughable.
    To my mind, Trump has done us all an enormous favor – he’s revealed to the whole world what we’ve been for decades – a crime syndicate, dressed up in patriotic rags, willing to rape, murder, and torture our way around the planet in pursuit of a sadistic dream of power and domination. And now it’s beginning to look like it’s all going to end in a mushroom cloud.
    Did it really take this long for people to figure out that we’ve “gone rogue “?

    2. XXYY

      Every generation of young Americans needs to learn this lesson over again.

      I learned it in the mid ’70s, for example. Luckily, the lesson stays with you.

      1. JohnW

        Luckily, the lesson stays with you.
        Indeed. But I gotta say, the Epstein revelations have surprised me. The stories have out there for years, but to have the corruption and depravity revealed for all to see has been startling. Who knows what will come of it, but it really feels like the ground has shifted

    1. Louis Fyne

      easy PR kill. Zionists are irrationally fanatical, and DC is so retarded that they literally have no idea that killing Ahmadinejad is akin to drone striking 1999 Jimmy Carter. All DC sees is: we taught those ditry sand worms a lesson

    2. Yves Smith Post author

      Remember that to justify Israeli hostility to Iran, Israel successfully got the Western media to widely publicize their translation of a remark by him as “Israel should be wiped off the map.”

      What he had actually said was in conditional tense and was much more accurately translated as “It would be better if Israel had never existed.”

      1. Retaj

        I remember that per John Oliver, a common idiom in Iran is to declare death to something. Like death to potatoes meaning down with potatoes.

        From Iranian protests, the official translation of the phrase is down with America. Translating it as to death to America is a similar escalatory choice.

        1. Louis Fyne

          yes, absolutely. I recall a Rick Steves lecture re his 2007ish? visit to Iran.

          His driver flippantly, constantly said to “death to traffic”; and that, after talking about it with the driver, was when Steves realized the nuances that were lost in translation between colloquial English and Farsi

    3. Jeremy Grimm

      Sorry, I am ignorant of who is Ahmadinejad. Why does killing Ahmadinejad baffle you?

      2. hk

        A rather controversial figure, even by Iranian standard. A rather “Trumpy” populist–loudmouth, crass lingo, down to earth, nationalistic, kinda anticlerical (actually, very anticlerical, just not the way Westerners think “anticlerical” in Iran should mean), very anti-Israel and anti-Western. Personally, I always thought Ahmedinejad captured (and still captures) the real dissident sentiments in Iran very well (with the caveat that my understanding of Iranian politics and society is quite meager.) and he could still be a contender if the current regime fails to sustain itself. This seems interesting in context of how someone from the Western intel types seem to be taking out Iranian opposition figures who are also not pro Western.

        1. rowlf

          I was impressed decades ago when Ahmadinejad came to New York City and offered to debate anyone. The news media treated him like a mind virus vector.

        2. ChatET

          He was part of the group that swarmed the US embassy in Tehran back in the 70’s. Killing Ahmedinejad was an act of retribution. Its a constant theme with these war freaks.

  21. Revenant

    The report of an attack on Cyprus is very interesting. I posited Iran might do this a week or two ago. The Mount Troodos radar and signals station is a very obvious, high value target in the Levant.

    I have also seen a single report that Iran has attacked the Oman, which would be more shocking because the Omanis have more-or-less cordial neutral relations with all sides (because they are seen as apostates by both Sunni and Shia, LOL). I speculated that Iran might attack the MI6 listening post at Se’eb. It is a unique, very high value Five Eyes target in the Gulf. Will watch to see if this is confirmed but subsequent posts all emphasised that Iran has *not* attacked the Oman.

    Here in London, there were Iranian monarchists with flags on the tube, heading off to demonstrate somewhere.

    My hedge fund brother-in-law says that they are unconcerned for Mr Market on Monday morning. Biggest factor to address is any rise in oil prices will feed through to US inflation (because low gas taxes in US make gas price more geared to crude price) and the 2yr rate will rise in reaction anticipating inflation / Fed raises.

    1. Yves Smith Post author

      I just posted an update above from the BBC denying that report. But I think Cyprus is bound to be on the menu at some point.

      1. Revenant

        Weirder and weirder, the UK defence secretary is still briefing that Iran fired two missiles towards Cyprus “but didn’t mean to attack British bases” LOL and the Cypriiot government outright denies any attack!

        Imaginary war….

        1. ambrit

          Those missiles could have been sent to intercept Bibi’s flight to ‘safety?’ Or perhaps it was Iran sending the message to the Israeli Prime Minister that he was not safe on Cyprus after all. I was wondering why Netanyahu passed Cyprus by and went further into Europe.

      2. Cat Burglar

        A possible reason for firing missiles at Cyprus: it ties up aircraft into doing missile defense of Cyprus instead of doing missile defense for Israel.

        1. Revenant

          Latest news on Cyprus – a missile strike on the British base at Akrotiri has been announced on twitter, no UK confirmation.

  22. Frank

    About bombing the residence of the Ayatollah; could be a good thing… how many people everywhere, local, state or country might be energized to participate in government under open minded and thoughtful leaders.

    And, knowing that perfidy and duplicity is endemic in all cultures I just wonder if reassurance of safety could have influenced one to remain in a location that can probably be pinpointed using google earth.

    1. Kilgore Trout

      Marandi, in his interview with Diesen, says the Ayatollah chose to stay in his compound out of respect and solidarity with ordinary Iranians. Marandi offers a few tidbits about him–spoke 4 languages, read and enjoyed Western literature–Les Miserables being his favorite. Take all with a grain of salt, I’m thinking the contrast with Bush2/Cheney taking to their bunkers after 9/11, presents a stark difference: profile in courage vs one of cowardice.

      1. Ben Panga

        He knew he would die. He chose to be an inspiring example.

        Scott Ritter is making some good points while having a pretty full on melt-down on Danny Haiphong (he’s called the audience “stupid” at least 20 times and I’m only a few minutes in):

        If Khameni ran/hid, he can be ridiculed by propaganda. Killing him (like Obi Wan Kenobi) makes him infinitely stronger. It makes the regime look strong. It inspires resistance and resilience in the Iranian people and Shia in other countries.

        Compare that to the optics of Saddam in a hole.

        1. abierno

          Current optics: Compare – Khameni placidly attending to his duties in his compound, anticipating death (since his successor had already been named), to Netanyahu stuffed into the Wing of Zion on the first day of hostilities, making for Akrotiri, and then changed course to Berlin for assured safety. Or to Trump et al partying the night away at Mar A Lago. The comparisons are stark even before one gets the Epstein class. Adding in the global South, Chinese and Russian reports are regularly and continuously showing graphic images of the US/IS missile to an elementary girls school and to a shelter for women and children, in total hundreds of “protected” persons murdered. Mirror to Gaza. The reputational damage to US is irreparable, at a time when the US has never been weaker – in armament, political and military leadership.

        2. Old Jake

          Indeed, Obi Wan came to my mind immediately. Joseph Campbell’s writing on myth, mythology, archetypal heroes etc also. I think he knew his time was growing short – he even mentioned disabilities – and his belief system motivated him to prefer to end this way. He will now be a motivating figure for a long time and for all Shia.

        3. Alice X

          I understand the Shia to revere the martyrs. He did not run and he did not hide. He is a martyr.

          His strength in his martyrdom is many times his strength in life.

          Now a Fatwa.

          He proclaimed a Fatwa against producing nuclear weapons. That is a moral position that the world should emulate.

          Now, without him, that Fatwa may expire and Iran may indeed produce a nuclear weapon, which, following the North Korean model, would be a pragmatic response.

          Our leaders lack so much understanding.

        4. JCC

          I got the impression he was primarily calling the people that dragged us into this war stupid.

          Overall the first 20 minutes or so was a good lesson on how the Shia Religion functions as well as the Iranian Constitution functions (unlike how the US Constitution functions)

          Finally, as a former member of the US Army, my first thought at today’s news of 3 service members killed and 5 wounded followed by Trump’s speech; how many service people today realized that when they swore the Oath to uphold and protect the Constitution of the United States that there was a hidden sentence/addendum that stated they were also willing to give their lives in the defense of Israel, even should Israel initiate an illegal war of aggression?

      2. Kouros

        My issue with him staying in his compound is twofold:
        1. Why there wasn’t some major bunker underneath?
        2. Why did Israelis knew the timing of the meeting the ayatolah was having with military officials?

        He wanted to be martyred. That is fine, but one has to seize the adversary. With the psychopats that Iran is against, living, surviving is what will drive them mad.

        1. abierno

          Khameni is far more powerful as a martyr. Already speculation is in the air as to whether the powerful Grand Ayatolla Al Sistani will issue a fatwa declaring jihad against the West which would have the potential to exponentially raise the stakes against IS/US as well as destabilize West Asian Sunni satrapies with considerable Shia population. Use of nuclear weapons against Iran could be expected to guarantee such as move.

        2. Sibiriak

          He wanted to be martyred.

          That’s right, alongside his son-in-law, daughter and granddaughter.

          1. OnceWere

            That could just have been bad luck. It’s not hard to imagine that family members might want to visit for a short period in order to say a final goodbye or alternatively to try and convince him to retreat to a bunker. It’s not as if all six of his children together with their own families were gathered together at the same time and place waiting for martyrdom.

  23. ISL

    The US has about three days now of interceptors and 5-8 days of missiles. Unless Iranian Air defenses are down and there are regional bases within short range functional, Trump will soon declare he won and retreat, but missiles will keep on falling on US bases, Israeli bases, Qatar (no European gas), etc.

    This opens an opportunity for Russia and China to push the US (and Europe) out of West Asia. I think Stansilav Krapivnik noted in a talk yesterday, in the fog of war, who would know if Russian torpedoes eliminate many US ships? Certainly, Russia has 100,000+ reasons to see lots of dead American soldiers. It’s not as if the US could rebuild for decades (or never without rare earths).

    Stanislav says Russia is seeing the news of the girls’ school murders (his term) on primetime. He also notes the S400 are remaining silent until the US only has B2s left.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsD0NHR05t0

    2. Lefty Godot

      The seeming passivity of Russia and China with a golden opportunity to cripple the US military in the region is quite frustrating. But then Iran has said several times, “We’re not asking for help, we can handle this.” I just hope they can keep the pressure on and not listen to the siren call of a Trump ceasefire talk that will just set them up to be bombed again in short order. It has to be clear to the world now that “not agreement capable” is a true description of the US and that the US government only uses diplomacy as a cover for back-stabbing treachery. Iran has to suffer whatever is being thrown at them for at least three weeks, then I would say the attackers will be running off with their tails between their legs (including half the Israeli population heading back to Europe). But can Iran last that long?

  24. Acacia

    Quite a few unconfirmed reports on X that Iran fired 4 ballistic missiles at the U.S. aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln. IRGC claims they scored a hit.

    Major escalation, if true.

    1. Yves Smith Post author

      Yes, just put in the main post. Apparently an IRGC announcement.

      If true, this was foreshadowed in the 2002 Millennium war games, which was intended to simulate an invasion of Iran.

      Updates from me going forward will be in comments.

    2. Revenant

      Apparently the French naval base in AbunDhabi has been attacked. Who knew they had one there?! Not their historical territory….

      1. The Rev Kev

        I was surprised to learn that the French had a base there too. Just what is it there for? And for the Iranians to attack it, what part has it been plying in the attacks on Iran? Macron has some ‘splainin’ to do.

    3. The Rev Kev

      You can bet that the Russians and more likely the Chinese were feeding real time targeting info to the Iranians. If this news is true, the the US Navy will have to pull their ships out of the region before they lose any. You wonder if the Russians and the Chinese have satellite images of that carrier with smoke coming out of it and if they will publish them. Also-

      ‘The French naval base in Abu Dhabi is burning after being struck by missiles and drones, smoke bellowing from the compound’

      https://nitter.poast.org/iwasnevrhere_/status/2028110004725702837#m

    5. J.B

      I think it would be in the interst of Iran to hit the carrier but not necessarily sink it. They just need to remove it from the war. I bet they are calculating in a way to minimize American military personal casualties, atleast for now. They likely understand how ballistic the American population will get with thousands of dead in a single day and how easy it will become to manufacture consent to allow Israel to use some sort of nuclear weapon.

      1. .Tom

        There are a lot of different ways we can speculate about Iranian thinking and calculations. What you say is a possibility. It’s also possible they would want to and attempted to sink Abe, I can think of reasons.

        Otoh, it’s very, very difficult to sink a carrier.

          1. Jason Boxman

            This came up a few days ago; a carrier is still a hard target to hit if maneuvering, and hypersonic missiles aren’t great at terminal guidance at moving targets. They’re for annihilating stationary targets.

            1. .Tom

              Indeed. Thanks to PlutoniumKun and Millennium 7 * HistoryTech I know more than I did. Hypersonics are hard to shoot down but they are 1) lat-long targeted so little use against moving targets, and 2) cannot carry much explosive so are usually kinetic like a big bullet and no blast zone so you have to be very precise and the target must be vulnerable to that kind of hit, e.g. small.

              1. Polar Socialist

                Regarding:

                1) Russian anti-ballistic missile systems S-500 and A-235 can hit satellites travelling 7.8 km/s and hypersonic glide vehicles during re-entry. One would think those count as moving targets for hypersonic interceptors.

                2) Both Zircon and Kinzhal missiles have a HE payload about the same size as Tomahawk cruise missile. Why would speed limit the payload size? Most hypersonic gliding vehicles have multiple playloads of similar size.

                1. .Tom

                  > Why would speed limit the payload size?

                  The amount of energy need to achieve and maintain M5+ speed means the fraction of vehicle launch weight used by the motor is high. So explained Millennium 7 * and, iirc, PK — I’m not the expert. I suppose if the hypersonic flight phase is very short then maybe it’s different. Parameter trade offs and definitions, as usual.

                  1. Polar Socialist

                    I gather you mean the fuel takes bigger fraction than in super- or subsonic missiles? Fuel, not the engine, is the energy. Even if this is true, you just have a slightly bigger vehicle to carry a big payload, eh?

                    From my the previous example: Kinzhal has 2.7 times the launch weight of a Tomahawk, but only 1.5 times the HE payload. In the end it still carries more payload than a Tomahawk.

                  2. John k

                    Energy can be reduced if missile accelerates or maintained speed ex-atmosphere, return is gravity assisted.

                    1. Revenant

                      Also, HE payload is not so important as kinetic energy of the impact, e.g. mv^2. Think Oreshnik. Maybe a multiple warhead fall of hazlenuts could take out a target an area and thus take out an aircraft carrier.

                      Russia really needs a good public demo or what Oreshnik can do….

      2. redleg

        Operationally, is better to wound a military target than kill it. If it’s killed, it’s gone. If it’s wounded/damaged, the rule is it takes 2 of something to recover 1 from the battlefield and move it to safety. For a carrier task group, a significant hit to the CV removes the entire task group from the battlefield.

        Something to consider: I can think of 3 historical examples since 1914 where a single relatively minor hit to a capital ship resulted in the sinking of that ship due to poorly trained crews (HMS Audacious, HMS Ark Royal, IJN Taiho). The US Navy is historically excellent at damage control, but is essentially untested since… maybe the USS Cole? Is the training and staffing of the fleet currently adequate for damage control on every ship? I guess the world might find out.

        1. hk

          I was shocked when they decided to scrap USS Bonhomme Richard (too much damage to repair) instead of repairing it, given that it was already in port when it caught fire. If a carrier (BHR was an amph landing ship, so kinda carrier like) catches fire under combat conditions, I shudder to think what might happen.

    6. dandyandy

      … and this very moment, BBC Washington spokesperson on 3pm (U.K.) news read out American version that Lincoln had not been hit and no missiles got anywhere near…

      1. Yves Smith Post author

        Now that I look more carefully at the Twitter……

        1. IRGC did not say they hit, just that they fired 4 ballistic missiles at it

        2. Before the denial came out, some Twitterati argued that the point was to get the carrier strike group to deplete defensive missiles faster

        3. If Iran got at all close, you can be pretty sure they could hit is with a hypersonic missile. But I doubt the US has worked that out.

        1. rowlf

          I kept thinking this morning that hitting the aircraft carrier would enrage American animal spirits, while having the warheads strike parallel to the path the ship was sailing could be a warning for whoever has two or more brain-cells in the carrier group.

          I think the Iranian moderation and pace is going to drive the West bonkers. Having Israel going several days with constant sirens has to be grinding.

          1. ISL

            In what way does what the American public thinks impact the war? 70% opposed (pre-war, pre-casualty) because Epstein has the controlling vote.

            This will be decided by economics and military hardware, and the US loss of strategic (industrial) depth. If you are out of missiles and air defense, with aging technology (or dysfunctional new technology), no rare earths… who cares what the Americans think? No one. Especially the US elite.

            Perhaps at the midterms (IF there are midterms), when the electorate will have the choice of a new John McCain (D) or John McCain (R).

            Meanwhile, I note slow Shahed drones hitting the major Bahrain radar and naval base. AAD should have protected against those slow drones. The US could not even muster enough patriots to protect its billion-dollar and key target, radar. As fired Gen Caine said – the larder is getting bare.

            Sorry to monotribe, but there is little serious evidence that the US is a democracy, and massive evidence that it is an oligarchy. Moreover, we see it rapidly descending into a post-constitutional system.

            1. rowlf

              What Americans think can still be a pressure point for use by the Iranians. Use all available resources.

              Agree on oligarchy over democracy, but why not try to use all channels to influence your attacker? Maybe the Chinese will come forward with satellite images of damages inflicted by Iran to undermine Western reporting and propaganda.

      2. Skip Intro

        That brag that the Lincoln was missed seems to vindicate the entire move by Iran. While nothing makes me think Iran bulls-eyed the carrier like an official denial, the US just admitted that the carriers were in range of attack. I thought it was an extravagance to waste ballistic missiles on a carrier, even if they have cluster warheads, but the narrative value may be significant.

    1. ambrit

      This makes me wonder if the House of Saud is safe now. Iran could hit them personally to disrupt the region. America would be doubly vexed if it has to watch it’s back in the Imperial bases in Arabia.
      Stay safe.

      1. erstwhile

        There a lot of Shia in the kingdom, and they’ll be outraged if the sauds were in anyway complicit in the Ayatollah’s murder. The saud’s house is built on sand, after all.

          1. ambrit

            Which brings us to the observation that all the surveillance in the world avails you naught if the State which that surveillance system serves falls. As Stalin is supposed to have said; “Quantity has a quality all its own.”

    2. Jason Boxman

      The Saudis must be high as f**k if they want to get into a hot war with a country that can completely relieve them of their oil infrastructure.

    3. danpaco

      The Saudi chirping sounds rather choreographed. The Saudis would be insane to join this coalition against Iran at this moment but I’m sure they would happily join in if it seemed that the Iranians were about to lose.

  26. The Rev Kev

    Alex Christoforou’s latest video is up and he starts it with a zinger at the beginning. The Iranian Foreign Minister is being interviewed by NBC and one of the talking heads asks him how attacking US military bases abroad can be justified. Seriously. She actually asked him that. He had to inform this innocent from the woods that it was because those bases were attacking Iran-

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YLX2RKcgBQ

    The main stream media at their finest.

    1. Ben Panga

      That clip will live on for a long time. I’ve already seen it in 3 different YT shows. So perfectly captures the orientalism and stupidity.

      1. JonnyJames

        Are these sycophant-stenographers (so called journalists) really that ignorant? Or do they just get paid a lot to read the questions off a teleprompter?

        1. earthling

          The mainstream television media replaced experienced, thoughtful, worldly-wise journalists with ‘spokesmodels’ a long time ago.

    2. John Wright

      None of the short clips identify the reporter.

      From some searching, it appears this is Laura Jarrett, daughter of Obama advisor Valerie Jarrett.

      Went to Amherst College and got a Law degree from Harvard.

      Nepo babies are bringing down the USA.

      1. Jason Boxman

        Oh, this is the moron reporter that can’t imagine why Iran is attacking the US?

        LOL.

        Too busy gratifying themselves to care about anything else, or learn or understand anything in the world.

    3. Donald

      I am showing my age but American news broadcasters always remind me of Ted Baxter on the old Mary Tyler Moore show.

  27. Wukchumni

    It all boils down to high tech warewithal in this newfangled robotic* war of attrition, or some are calling it: ‘drone that-been there’, or does it go a wee bit further as the Zionists are on the run, having run short on sundries of battle by as early as Sunday?

    Bibi: ‘Execute General Order 24’

    * When you pin medals on a drone that done good, does it salute you back?

        1. Wukchumni

          Donald Quixote-of Cashtillian descent, is lucky to have Sancho Pamza as his legal squire.

          Their adventures together begin with Quixote’s verbal attack on some windmills which he believes to be ferocious giants that blight scenery.

          1. ambrit

            Yes, that scene where Don Q tries to joust with an offshore electricity windmill is comedic genius. That and his “Ladylove” being a nubile nymph luring him onto Epstein Island completes the Komedy Kompromat.

  28. Ben Panga

    Plenty of video/photo at Middle East Spectator Telegram (one of the sources recommended in the indi.ca piece in yesterday’s links)

    Viewable via a browser w/out Telegram account

    https://t.me/s/Middle_East_Spectator

    Last two posts

    • Iran struck the French Naval Base in Abu Dhabi, located at Zayed Port

    • An Iranian Shahed-136 drone targeted an Emirati oil rig in the Persian Gulf

  29. Acacia

    Re: the tanker SKYLIGHT that Iran hit off the coast of Oman: lotta smoke. Looks bad.

    https://x.com/TankerTrackers/status/2028059839708930378

    SKYLIGHT (9330020) wasn’t passing through the Strait of Hormuz. She’s been anchored in the Musandam governorate of Oman (north of UAE at 26.288021, 56.266388) since 2026-02-22. This small 11K DWT tanker, mostly used for fueling other tankers, has been blacklisted by the US since 2025-12-18. Iran specifically hit one of their own. Tehran’s tanker theatrics on full display.

    However, Hapag-Lloyd, the world’s 5th largest container carrier, is not taking any chances:

    Due to the deteriorating security situation in the Middle East region following the escalating military conflict, we have decided – in close coordination with our security partners – to pause future Trans-Suez sailings through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait for the time being.

    Note: Trans-Suez and not just about oil.

    Hard to imagine that markets won’t react to this when trading opens on Monday.

      1. Revenant

        LOL!

        Hedge fund werewolf, sorry, brother in law, says oil is in oversupply, it’s not going to budge materially but any rises will be worst in the USA because low gas taxs = high cost-push pass through and the rise in inflation will result in higher 2yr funding costs and potentially Fed rate stance changes and hurt financial returns generally.

        We’ll see.

  30. Yves Smith Post author

    The substance of this video is consistent with the headline. IMHO important or at least indicative, since India is not a party to this fray:

    Iran SMASHES American Patriot Defences; U.S. Bases Suffer Shock Attacks, Gulf Allies Under Fire Times Of India, YouTube

    ZOMG, Luttwak is considered to be a top expert albeit of the very hawkish sort. I can’t even…..

    But a bit less ludicrously:

    1. ISL

      Epic Patriot fail in the Times video. The US-Gulfie deal was: Support the US and the US provides air defense protection. If they survive the war, it seems unlikely that they will re-enlist.

      In contrast, Russian air defense works (91 US drones to assassinate Putin, all stopped).

    1. lyman alpha blob

      Thanks JM. Another one on that account mentioning that the brave Netanyahu has fled to Berlin. Hard to believe German actions these days. Based on the company they keep, it sure does seem that Germans love genociders.

  33. TomDority

    The Trump Admin seems only to act when Don has some money to divert his way. Trump only acts in his best interest. What promises of money, fame and security have been made to Trump -(trademark) ? some haven? some untouchable non-extraditable place or position unaccountable? perhaps a new riviera?
    Just looking at that angle and speculation.

    1. FlyoverBoy

      IMO, you’re overlooking that Don responds not only to the carrot but also to the stick. We haven’t heard all the incriminating evidence yet, but !srael has all of it.

    2. Ben Panga

      I don’t think Trump survives this. He looks very sick. He knows a lot and he has a big mouth so it might be good for some people if he dies in his sleep or, better yet, gets whacked by a trans wokeist Muslim.

      1. albrt

        Seems unlikely that Russia is the only country with access to frog dart poison. Trump’s cabinet is mostly made up of the kind of people who I would expect to have some on hand.

      2. raspberry jam

        Apparently Vance is in the White House while Trump manages the war from the winter palace at mar-a-lago. My first thought was not continuity of government!

        1. Ben Panga

          White House account tweeted out photos of both scenes:

          https://nypost.com/2026/02/28/us-news/photos-capture-tense-moments-trump-vance-orchestrate-strikes-on-iran/

          Winter Palace: Secretary of State Marco Rubio, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Dan Caine, joined the president in monitoring the mission.

          White House: Vance was joined by US Secretary of Energy Chris Wright, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

          1. raspberry jam

            Vance looks more like an executive than trump in his stupid hat and the ridiculous curtained off area. Interesting choice of Gabbard and Bessent too.

            If this is going as pear as appears I can see Vance and the thielites making their move soon. It would be a way to shut off support to Israel or just pull the materiel out of theater without explicitly claiming national fault. Pin it all on demented Trump and exploitative Netanyahu and walk away. Behind the scenes begin retooling the military contracting along palantir lines based on poor performance these first days.

  34. hemeantwell

    Fatwa watch: In Najaf Ayatollah Sistani has offered condolences over Khameini’s assassination and urged unity against the aggressors. That appears to stop short of a fatwa calling for jihad. Is the protocol to wait until the three day mourning period is over?

      1. hemeantwell

        Yes, I recall that from earlier assassinations, e.g. Nasrallah’s. But I’ve seen references to a 3 day period being applicable here. Waiting 40 days to mobilize would not be wise right now.

        In Islam, the 3-day mourning period (Hidaad) is the standard, recommended time for family and friends to grieve, receive condolences, and offer prayers for the deceased. It emphasizes patience and acceptance of Allah’s will, discouraging loud wailing or excessive emotional displays

    2. The Rev Kev

      Putin also offered condolences on behalf of Russia which made me wonder how many other countries have done the same.

    1. Yves Smith Post author

      Sorry, should have said that. Just because a UK base does not mean others not using it. I had though that the Brits had let Israel use it, including in connection with going after the flotilla with aid that got a bit of somewhere (unlike the relief ship that the Greeks would not let get out of port).

    2. Richard

      The photo is genuine but from Feb 2025 according to Google Earth. However the hangars do look to have been built to house U2 sized aircraft. Maybe someone knows where to source more recent Chinese open source imagary?

    1. hemeantwell

      The Zionist reading of political dynamics and possibilities in Iran is a wellspring of astonishment for me. It’s like they want to go back to the Carter presidency which, under Brzezinski’s pushing, myopically held on to the idea of restoring the Shah. This, iirc, led to bringing the Shah to the US for cancer treatment which was then used by Khomeini to justify occupying the US embassy. The ensuing mobilization around national unity justified further crackdowns on secular political groups by Khomeini. Now it appears that those groups, which are the ones that might have a chance of eventually reassembling political parties with some appeal to Iranians, are being directly attacked by the US. Under the Shah, there was Savak to carry out repression, which led to the mosques serving as opposition rallying points. etc etc.

    2. Yves Smith Post author

      Ynet is MSM in Israel.

      And this is an admission against interest. So I think this has to be seen as having decent odds of being accurate.

      2. erstwhile

        If you knew susie like I know susie, then you wouldn’t want to know susie, susie wiles that is.

  37. Rui

    The West really is a death cult, it’s depressing to be a part of it. The last 2 decades of colonialism ‘apologism’ have been shown to be a complete fraud.

  38. SDB1

    Re: Yves on Trump’s willingness to authorise an Israeli nuclear attack. Yes. Or even a US nuclear attack. Looks like only Iranian war off-ramp for Trump given conventional missile stocks eg Tomahawks due to run out in weeks (Scott Ritter says 5 weeks, Larry Johnson says 8 weeks) and are in any case needed before then for “offshore balancing” (Mearsheimer) of China in South-East Asia. Tactical nuke dropped by B-2 on Zagros Mountains should destroy identified underground Iranian missile factories. Trump probably not afraid to cross nuclear threshold. He enjoys taboo-busting. Might even want to use up stock of BS61-11s before they age out. More here:
    https://www.twz.com/air/hints-at-more-b61-nuclear-bomb-variants-in-the-u-s-militarys-future

    2. ISL

      You should watch one of Ted Postol’s videos with Nima. Nukes are not very effective against hardened military assets, less so against ones buried in mountains (and radiation takes a while to kill, plus tank armor is decent at stopping radiation). If I recall correctly, a tank only ~1km from a H2 bomb survives.

      This was all gamed out for a feared Soviet invasion of Europe.

      That is why Oreshniks scare the bejeezus out of NATO. A nuke energy decreases cubically, Oreshnik doesn’t.

    3. Martin Oline

      What Is good for the goose is good for the gander. Trump is not the only one who can use negotiations as a smoke screen. If Iran re-enters talks it will likely be to buy time, not to find a solution to the conflict.
      I have learned much from listening to Theodore Postol whenever he appears on YouTube. I think he said Iran is only one enrichment step away from having bomb grade material. That would take only a few weeks at the most. If the fatwa against nuclear weapons is lifted the IRGC is already busy working on it. Mr. Postol will be appearing on Dialogue Works at 4 PM EST today and I will be interested if he has any guess as to a timeline for the appearance of, as Kouros puts it, an Iranian ‘big one.’
      Link to the show is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iH6nN0EUGvM

      1. Martin Oline

        Ted talks about air defense for most of the hour and addresses the possibility of a nuclear Iran at the end, saying he does not know what they will decide to do. I highly recommend taking the time to watch it.

  39. maurice

    We should be all very, very grateful to Yves Smith for all the work she’s doing to keep us up to date.

    Thanks Yves!

    2. ocypode

      Nowhere more reliable to get news, as well as having an insightful commentariat. It can’t be an easy job!

    3. Bruce F

      I’ll add my thanks as well. I’ve found this site, and her work specifically, to be invaluable.

      Thank you Yves!

      1. Yves Smith Post author

        You are all so kind!

        But this also shows the pawer of the commentariat. Many people here provided important info and also debated the merits of rumors/preliminary info on Twitter. So we are all trying to navigate an informational hall of mirrors.

    5. John k

      Yes, fab effort. Can’t take my eyes off this blog. So far as I can see, most accurate and timely source.
      Hope she’s getting enough sleep.

    6. JM

      Same here. I’m consistently impressed with how well Yves and everyone here handles things, even in crazy situations like what’s happening now. NC continues to be an indispensable resource.

      1. anahuna

        None better.

        Great thanks to Yves and All who keep the comments coming and prune them appropriately.

    8. Ben Panga

      NC continues to be my oasis of sanity.

      Peace and love to everyone, and special thanks to Yves 🙏🏼

    9. Pilot Paul

      Yes! Thank you Yves. You have been a long time source of uncommon insight and information. I doubt you truly understand how much you are appreciated.

    10. Keith Newman

      Agreed. Yves’ work is stellar. NC is an oasis in the desert.
      Thank you so much Yves (and the rest of the NC crew).

    11. hk

      I also echo the sentiment. This seems to be the only place to talk to sane (but not too sane) people about things like this.

    15. Rick

      Yes indeed, I have been following this site for 18 years. Hope everyone remembers this come fund raising time! (And no, I do not have any connection to the site other than a reader and supporter)

    16. jobs

      Yes, thank you, Yves and co. for doing such a marvelous job helping us keep our sanity in these crazy times!

    17. The Rev Kev

      Same here. All the main stream media is total rubbish and NC stands out as a place for discussion, analysis and the addition of new information. Many thanks to Yves for all her hard work.

  40. Trees&Trunks

    Betrayal helped the US kill the Iranian leader.

    The main question is: how was it even possible that one of Iran’s most highly protected facilities was hit? First and foremost, the scale of the attack.
    [—-]
    It’s clear that Iran’s air defense systems were overwhelmed and partially suppressed in the first minutes. The aggressor made extensive use of sophisticated electronic warfare systems and a significant number of decoys.

    However, all these grandiose efforts would not have achieved their goal if, at the moment of the strike, the Rahbar had been located not in the above-ground conference room, but in an underground bunker.

    This blunder on the part of the Supreme Leader himself and his security team suggests one thing: they weren’t expecting the attack. Indeed, Trump himself initiated the negotiations, which not only continued but became distinctly constructive, with both sides’ positions realistic—and it seemed a “deal” was on the verge of being struck.

    [—-]

    This is precisely what made it possible to carry out a precise “decapitation” strike. Such work was undoubtedly carried out, but artificial intelligence still could not have pinpointed the location and time of the meeting with 100% accuracy. In other words, the assassination of the Iranian leader was the result of an act of treason.

    Someone with knowledge of the event reported it to the enemy. The circle of people who possessed this information was very small.

    These are the meeting participants themselves, the ayatollah’s personal security detail, and protocol officers. This means the traitor should be sought among those who knew about the meeting but did not participate—and therefore survived. Reports have already surfaced online of a certain meeting participant leaving just minutes before the attack. Whether this is true or not, Iranian intelligence services will confirm soon.

    https://m-vz-ru.translate.goog/world/2026/3/1/1398552.html?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=de&_x_tr_pto=wapp

    1. Carolinian

      According to a report I saw yesterday Netanyahu said he had seen video of the ayatollah’s body being brought out and how could that be true unless he had someone on the inside (or was lying as usual)?

      On the other hand many are saying both the attack and the day of it were decided weeks ago and not opportunistically.

      1. MH

        Both things could be true. The time of attack already decided with actual movement in negotiations being used as a smokescreen for that pre-determined attack in hopes that Iran might let their guard down.

    2. Kouros

      Yes, this was eating at me since the moment I read about K’s killing. I am glad that somebody else in this fog of war is thinking straight.

    3. ISL

      Actually, if you listen to Ritter on Nima, the Supreme Leader, who was old and ill, hoped he would pass as a martyr, not die in his bed. He made a conscious and open decision to stay at home, not a secret. The new Ayatollah, Scott reports, is supportive of Iran getting a nuclear deterrence (as does the Iranian public).

      You would think a Christian society would understand the danger in making a martyr of a religious leader (the equivalent of the pope).

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOwpAySRwG4

  41. Trees&Trunks

    What was the US mistake in killing Khamenei?

    The fact is, everything was already prepared for Khamenei’s departure. Rahbar was 86 years old, gravely ill, and could have left at any moment, even without American strikes. Therefore, a behind-the-scenes struggle for succession status had long been underway in Iran, and since the death of the previous favorite (President Ibrahim Raisi, whose helicopter crashed in May 2024), a new one has likely emerged. Or there could have been agreements within the elite—primarily the leadership of the Guard Corps—not to tear the country apart in the event of a power struggle.

    Betting that the same IRGC generals will rush to surrender to the United States (as the Venezuelan generals did) is unlikely to work. The Iranians have nowhere to flee from their own country.

    “The problem with this regime is that it’s one of the loneliest in the world. Iranian officials have no good escape plan. There are very few places in the world where they could go into exile,”

    now, after Khamenei’s assassination, Iran has three goals. First, to maximize the cost of the war for the Arabs. To this end, Iranian missiles are currently flying at Arab cities (officially targeting American targets), and the Strait of Hormuz, through which the Arabs export their oil, is being closed.

    Secondly, to demonstrate the will to resist and the futility of any anti-government protests – which is why hundreds of thousands and millions of people, enraged by the murder of their supreme leader, will now take to the streets of the country

    Finally, thirdly, to withstand weeks or a month of American-Israeli bombing, regularly firing missiles and drones at US military bases and ships, as well as Israeli cities.

    And if the Iranians succeed in all of the above, then the assassination of Ali Khamenei will not bring the Americans any closer to implementing their strategy of regime change in Iran.

    https://m-vz-ru.translate.goog/world/2026/3/1/1398486.html?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=de&_x_tr_pto=wapp

    1. hk

      It occurs to me, in a way, that US and Gulf States did Iran a favor by making the missile targetting simpler.

    1. Retaj

      This link is in Spanish, and it seems to be translated from a post on islander reports per its source link.

      Also, it claims that China halted rare earth exports to the US at the start of the war. I cannot find confirmation of this.

  46. Clwydshire

    Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani has issued a statement of condolence (see: https://en.shafaqna.com/442815/grand-ayatollah-sistanis-message-of-condolence-following-martyrdom-of-ayatollah-khamenei/ following the martyrdom of Ayatollah Khamenei. It is notable that he does NOT declare jihad against the US and its partners. He is known to be far more concerned with the survival and inner health of Shia Islam than with worldly events, even terrible events. But from discussions of his influence by Alastair Crooke and others, were he to declare jihad, or declare the US or Israel to be “enemies of Islam,” as he might do after a nuclear attack on Iran, then, due to his immense influence, the effects could be electric. Regional war could become civil war in those states that cooperate with the US (most have Shia minorities), and the timeline of conflict would likely be indefinitely extended. And that’s undoubtedly an inadequate description of the possible fallout.

  47. JonnyJames

    I thank you as well Yves for this great effort to aggregate a huge amount of information and try to clear the “fog of war”. As usual, the commentariat are in great form. It is always reassuring to see informed, intellectually honest folks out there, amid a sea of garbage information and outright war propaganda.

    Reports are floating around that the US regime offered a ceasefire which Iran refused.

    I just saw this, maybe it was already posted, but just in case. I was a bit surprised that concerns about “magazine depth” are already coming out in the press.

    https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/us-races-to-accomplish-iran-mission-before-munitions-run-out/ar-AA1XiJVm?ocid=hpmsn&cvid=69a4642014de4a588dd90cc116fa098e&ei=70

  48. lyman alpha blob

    It is pretty amazing, or not, that in all of the corporate media descriptions of this Zionist-initiated illegal conflict, not one of them bothers to mention that the Islamic Iranian “regime” that they can’t help but describe in a very negative light, would not have been there in the first place if the US hadn’t overthrown the secular democratic Iranian government and installed a monarchy of its choosing.

    I am ashamed to be a citizen of this evil nation.

    1. Cat Burglar

      People in the States can’t be reminded enough of the coup against Iran. The powers are working hard to keep it invisible.

      On the March 24 an NPR Morning Edition story featured a halting and tentative Franco Ordonez being interviewed on the history of conflicts between Iran and the US, which began with the 1979 revolution — with no mention of the 1953 coup! I wonder which editor told Ordonez not to bring it up? Unbelievable journalistic malpractice.

  49. Sub-Boreal

    Former dweller in the northern peat bog (i.e. swamp wannabe) of the Canadian national security establishment calls out Carney:

    “Our PM, Mark Carney, on the other hand, from the distance of his trip to India, has come out in full support of the US action. He has simply echoed the Trump administration’s speaking points.

    That is a terrible mistake. The Carney government’s first major error in the realm of foreign policy. It would have been better to take a leaf from the Chretien government’s response to the US intention to go to war against Iraq in 2003. No thanks.

    It seems we still struggle to unhook ourselves from thought and policy dependency on the United States, despite a brave speech in Davos.”

    Elswhere, former Liberal foreign minister Lloyd Axworthy cuts Carney no slack (paywalled; excerpt follows):

    “We have been here before, and once knew better. In 2003, Canada refused to join the American invasion of Iraq because there was no Security Council resolution, and the case for war rested on preventing a hypothetical future WMD threat.

    Today, by endorsing preventive strikes on Iran during ongoing diplomacy and after Washington itself shredded the previous agreement, we are embracing the very doctrine we used to reject.

    The contrast with our language on Ukraine is stark. For four years, Canadian officials have rightly called Russia’s invasion an “unprovoked,” “unjustifiable,” “illegal” violation of the UN Charter and of Ukrainian sovereignty.

    Yet when the United States and Israel launch large-scale strikes without UN authorization, Ottawa drops the legal vocabulary entirely. No talk of aggression, no warning about Charter erosion, no insistence on emergency debate in New York.

    The double standard is obvious: when Russia uses force without lawful grounds, it is condemned as an outlaw; when the U.S. does something legally analogous, we kowtow in an effort to curry favour.”

      3. Sub-Boreal

        I’m waiting to see how the Carney apologist-bots will rationalize this.

        To save them time, I compiled a phrase book with 100 numbered options to choose from. For example, this particular capitulation could be handled with something like a 1-3-17-8-75:

        1. “So good to listen to an adult in the room.”
        3. “We have to deal with the world as it is.”
        17. “There’s more at play than we know.”
        8. “Carney is forced to play 3D chess”
        75. “He’s just addressing the reality of the world in a uniquely honest manner.”

  50. Yves Smith Post author

    Dunno if the rest of you who are on Twitter are seeing this, but since I started on this post (some before but most right before 7 AM EST) there has been a BIG BIG uptick in Iran-skeptic/hostile tweets, so much so that it does not feel organic. Or maybe Elon greatly tweaking the algos.

    1. Ben Panga

      > Elon greatly tweaking the algos.

      Bibi or DJT picked up the phone?

      > it does not feel organic

      All Hasbara units activated!

    2. raspberry jam

      Don’t forget that Sunday is the start of the work week in Israel. I suggest this is paid/official hasbara operations not just algo tweaking

    3. ChrisRUEcon

      > Or maybe Elon greatly tweaking the algos

      Exactly this.

      I keep my main feed as “Following” and not “For You”. That way, I can decide where to follow the rabbit hole as opposed to letting the algo tell me …

    4. dandyandy

      Talking about Elon, has anyone else seen his mega-cringe tweet earlier today? “Another one bites the dust”? Puke material.

    1. Antagonist

      In the video, Ritter states that things can go south pretty quickly for Trump, especially if the Democrats win a majority in the House and the Senate. He than references impeachment and an orange jumpsuit for Trump. I laughed. An orange jumpsuit would match him perfectly. Does he often wear a red tie to match his bizarre orange complexion?

      As for the Democrats saving the day, I am skeptical. Aren’t the Democrats and the Republicans pretty much the same? Are the Democrats magically going to develop a spine and do something about various Trump transgressions? Just like the other Republican war criminals, eh? Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, etc. I would rather wait for Batman to save me than American politicians.

      In all seriousness, it would take massive protests across the US about the foolishness of this Iranian War. Maybe a general strike. And a rent strike. Let’s get to it.

  52. Yves Smith Post author

    More updates:

    Not confirmed:

    Also important: Gulf Airlines Extend Flight Cancellations as Iran Targets Hubs Bloomberg

  53. Ben Panga

    https://www.theatlantic.com/national-security/2026/03/trump-iran-attack-negotiations/686201/

    https://archive.ph/MDKUy

    Trump tells The Atlantic that Iranian leaders want to resume negotiations.

    “They want to talk, and I have agreed to talk, so I will be talking to them. They should have done it sooner. They should have given what was very practical and easy to do sooner. They waited too long,” Trump told me in a phone call from his Mar-a-Lago club shortly before 9:30 a.m.
    Asked whether his conversation with the Iranians would happen today or tomorrow, Trump responded, “I can’t tell you that.” He noted that some of the Iranians involved in negotiations in recent weeks were no longer alive. “Most of those people are gone. Some of the people we were dealing with are gone, because that was a big—that was a big hit,” he told me. “They should have done it sooner, Michael. They could have made a deal. They should’ve done it sooner. They played too cute.”

    I asked Trump whether he was willing to prolong the U.S. bombing campaign against Iran to support a popular uprising if one unfolds. “Will they continue to get support if it takes some time to overthrow the regime?” I asked. Trump was noncommittal. “I have to look at the situation at the time it happens, Michael. You can’t give an answer to that question,” he said.

    But the president also expressed confidence that a successful uprising was coming, noting the signs of celebration in the streets of Iran and supportive gatherings of expatriate Iranians in New York and Los Angeles. “That is going to happen. You are seeing that, and I think it’s gonna happen. A lot of people are extremely happy over there and in Los Angeles and in many other places,”

    Trump told me he was pleased with Iranian people’s reaction so far. “Knowing it’s very dangerous, knowing I’ve told everybody to stay in place—I think it’s a very dangerous place right now,” he told me. “The people over there are shouting in the streets with happiness, but at the same time, there are a lot of bombs coming down.”

    Trump told me he expects the attack on Iran will not disrupt Republican efforts before this fall’s midterm elections to convince voters that his administration is focused on delivering economic benefits for the country. “We have the greatest economy we’ve ever had,” he told me. “The word isn’t out because people like you don’t write about it properly. But the economy is ready to go through the roof. And it already is in many cases.”

      1. Ben Panga

        Gotta think he won’t enjoy the conversation too much. I can’t think last week’s “better than JCPOA” deal will still be available and that the Iranians will ask for at minimum sanctions relief.

        You can smell the weakness coming off him…

        And unless Bibi is also crying uncle, the Kompromat theory precludes any deal still.

    2. Tom Stone

      That statement by Trump is almost unbelievable, but I don’t doubt it is true.
      Holy Shit!

    3. Jason Boxman

      I caught a hint of that last night; Trump wants an off ramp now. Good luck with that. The situation has taken on a life of its own now. There are many actors involved in this. Even a unilateral Trump ceasefire isn’t going to stop Iranian missiles from flying free. And Trump isn’t agreement capable. And Israel assassinates leaders engaged in negotiations. Why would Iran not end this in whatever way they see fit, to their ends, certainly not Trump’s. I guess Trump’s about to get a lesson in the limits of US power.

      And per NY Times

      During an interview with ABC News, Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, vowed that Iran would continue its fight against the United States and Israel, saying that Iran’s military forces were “capable enough to defend” his country.

      When asked whether he believed a diplomatic solution was still possible, Araghchi suggested that he was doubtful, saying that the talks between American and Iranian delegates over limits to Iran’s nuclear program had become “a very bitter experience” for Iran. He said Iran was attacked both on Saturday and last June amid diplomatic talks with the United States that Iran believed were making progress. He said that Israel and some of President Trump’s advisers “decided to spoil” diplomatic talks and “dragged” Trump into a war even though a negotiated peace appeared possible after talks in Geneva on Thursday.

      and a life-long dream comes true

      In a video statement shot on the roof of the Israeli military headquarters in Tel Aviv, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu demonstrated confidence in his ability to step out in the open air, and elation at the Trump administration’s military cooperation. “We bring to this campaign the help of the United States,” he said, alongside his defense minister and Mossad chief. “This combination of force allows us to carry out what I’ve yearned to be carrying out for 40 years — pounding the Iranian regime.”

      What kind of negotiations are those gonna be, then? And Trump is Netanyahu’s dog on this.

      1. Irrational

        One of the Telegram channels normally focused on Ukraine (Ukraine Watch) is showing a screenshot from Truthsocial (?) where Trump claims the US has sunk 9 Iranian ships and destroyed the Iranian naval headquarters. Big if true.

        1. Jason Boxman

          Iran can still keep the straight closed; and it can only be possibly re-opened by a high risk operation by the United States, during which you’d expect American ships would be hit; and it seems like the likelihood of success would nonetheless be very low. The Houthi’s did more with less.

          No one can force insurers to insure ships transiting the straight. No one can force the ships to move. The US certainly isn’t going to seize and crew these ships, and we lack the merchant marine anyway.

          On this I think Iran has checkmate.

          This might reshape energy markets for the next generations.

        2. Yves Smith Post author

          This is the same Trump that obliterated Iran’s nuclear sites.

          I have yet to see any reports of that having happened in the meat world. All I see is amplification of the Truth Social claim.

          He also says Iran is begging to negotiate, which is false.

          You would expect his peeps to be all over the TV if things were going well. Instead:

          Not verified, but a claim that Iran damaged the runway of the Abraham Lincoln:

          1. Irrational

            Oh, absolutely re. the sunk ships. And I have not seen it reported anywhere else in the meantime.

        3. OnceWere

          Large surface ships are sitting ducks against this intensity of air attack. It would be entirely unsurprising, for example, if all of Iran’s frigates are sunk without firing a shot. The Iranian navy, if it can achieve anything, will achieve it with their submarines, small fast-attack boats and naval drones. I did see a report that all of the Iranian subs successfully left port but I can’t remember where.

      4. Samuel Conner

        > an off ramp now.

        I imagine that the Iranians may take an approach similar to that of Russian Federation, indicating a willingness to engage in peace negotiations aimed at resolving the root causes of the conflict. Cessation of hostilities would be conditional on reaching an agreement accepted by both sides.

        The insistence on resolving “root causes” may cause indigestion on the part of the Western negotiators.

        1. Tom Stone

          If Iran includes a demand that Bibi be turned over to the ICJ for prosecution it would be amusing.

    4. ChrisFromGA

      Whadda maroon. A few limousine liberal diaspora, celebrating in their Louboutins and Teslas in the streets of LA, does not make for an uprising. How many are willing to go over to Iran and risk their necks to support “the revolution”?

      [crickets]

      At this point, I can’t even argue that he’s gotten mesmerized by the Grahams and Ted Cruzes of the GOP. He owns this. He’s really that stupid. We’re just marking time now, waiting for the act in the play where hubris is punished by the gods. May it come swiftly and without mercy.

    5. Hepativore

      How can Trump expect to try and negotiate now when this whole thing started right in the middle of when negotiations were supposed to be taking place?

      At this point, the US has demonstrated to both Iran and the world at large that any “deal” that it makes it will renege on instantly the moment it becomes beneficial for it to do so. There is also the fact that the US is merely a client state of Israel and will instantly do its bidding regardless of how shortsighted or damaging it is to the US’ own interests.

      I know that the brunch-table liberals are now trying to claim that this would not have happened under a Harris administration, but Harris and the DNC are just as much Israeli stooges and neoliberal (neocon) ideologues as Trump and the Republicans are. Now, all roads lead to Israel in the White House.

      The only difference is that Harris would have probably put on a whole front complete with maudlin dialog about how she just had to preemptively bomb Iran and her hands were tied because those Iranian no-goodniks were “something-something human rights” and probably more Russia-baiting.

    6. hk

      Reza Pahlavi is neither Iranian nor a leader, in case people didn’t tell Don Zhuo already….

    7. Revenant

      He blew up Iran to win the votes of Orange County plastic surgeons he already had? LOL!

    8. THarry

      “The economy is ready to go through the roof”. Yes Donald, that’s what happens to the economy when you blow it up, it goes through the roof.

  54. Tom Stone

    The coverage of World events by NC is unparalleled in my experience, It has been my first stop for news for nearly two decades.
    Calculated Risk had a superb commentariat when Tanta was moderator, I never expected to see better yet NC is better and due to Yves superb management it is not a one Woman show.
    That humility, or lack of ego, is extraordinary.

    Thank you, Yves.

      1. ChrisFromGA

        The Zionist state impeaches itself with their past lies. They have zero credibility.

  56. Boomheist

    I am wondering if what we are seeing here is a total paradigm shift away from the now nearly centuries old convention that leaders are sacrosanct and all negotiations are conducted by underlings to a system of “Kill the Head!!!!” and that Trump is essentially completely changing the entire diplomatic order away from discussion and meetings and mouthing underlings to simply cutting off the head of whatever real or perceived monster – grab the Venezuelan president, now wipe out the Iranian leadership. If you have the biggest, more forward-projecting military in the world, which we do, use it to kill anyone who disagrees with you, then dare them to kill you back. Trump has killed the leaders in the middle of negotiations, and everyone knows now he might just paste Tehran with a nuke if he doesn’t get his way. Imagine what other leaders are thinking, for example Putin and Xi and Kim and a host of others. So here we are, with a world filled with commentators and officials entirely wedded to the “old” rules-based system of diplomacy and negotiation sitting there now aghast and flat-footed watching what is happening. If I were the Iranians, I’d be doing everything I could to publicly and visibly kill Barron Trump or any family member, asap, to send him the message back, we can get you, too, because right now this seems entirely one-way, the big US hedgemon waving a big stick and nobody able to respond.

    I also think there is another factor in play, here. In 2003 when GWB was desperate to bomb Iraq this was a time just after 911 so the GWOT was fresh in everyone’s mind; this was shortly after the S oviet Union fell (proving we are better and more noble) and shortly after our pasting of Iraq with GHWB, so we in the US wer eon the rising side of empire, world control. Now, 23 years on, the Middle east continues in chaos, terrorism continues, and we have an entire generation among us with no memory of those years when it seemed the entire world was going to join our city on the hill. So I think a majority of Americans are perfectly fine with going in to Iran and taking the leadership out, leveling them, just get it done and finished for god’s sake. The new Trump doctrine then is if you mess with me I am going to kill you, and your family, and everyone close to you.

    Ironic, eh? You have to go back to tribal hill forts and clans and warfare then when in battle the point was to kill the King, now fast forward centuries and you have these huge systems, complex systems, of control and military and trade, but also drones and spyware and cameras and an ability to track and kill anyone, And, either seeing this or stumbling into it, Trump has developed a doctrine that is personal, immediate, and ruthless. Kill the King.

    It might just work.

    1. Silo Man

      Your description reminds me of the old school mafia gang wars in New York and Chicago back in the day. Maybe revisiting how that all went down would be informative….so far, the other “families” have not responded in kind.

    2. hk

      Let’s recall Trump himself has ben in the other end if this for years: his oppnns, both Dems and Reps, still live under the delusion that the widespread discontent is not real and all will back to “normal” if he is taken out. The notion is both very widespread and rather old.

      1. Philosaruptor

        I think I agree as far as it goes; the chaotic personalized aggression and open-to-the-air obsessiveness specifically towards other leaders from an apex country’s leader seems unique to me too, and feels like a throwback to a different stage in civilizational development.

        But having recently read both The Doomsday Machine (Ellsberg) and The Samson Option (Hersh), it’s pretty clear that nuclear threats and decapitation strikes have been core to the power projection horizon of the American President since… well, since at least Hiroshima. It isn’t new that we (as Ellsberg sort of put it) put a nuclear gun to the head of the leader of other countries and said Do as we say or else. Ellsberg describes, in my view, a mafia gang with a truly massive military infrastructure. And The Samson Option describes the same mafia-like impunity, only from a different gang’s perspective, wherein getting the same threat tools as the American gang is a great strategy.

  58. XXYY

    Forgive the awkwardness of this presentation.

    You and NC certainly have nothing to apologize for, Yves. Not only are your current posts in very good form under horrific circumstances, but you are providing one of the only good, well curated outlets during this war.

    You guys are serving your readership incredibly well.

      1. Rolf

        This exchange:

        Sharmine Narwani: Within the last few hours there’s breaking news that the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier has been attacked by four ballistic missiles. How did the Americans not consider all these developments? Because Iran is clearly as you said in the driving seat right now.

        Alastair Crooke: You’re asking a question that you know goes into deep psychology because you know how is it that some people just cannot hear even when it’s said explicitly … I mean there is a real problem the westerners have, I feel, of you know this mechanical way of thinking … they just don’t listen to what people are saying … Iran has been very clear about saying these things. They’ve said it quite loudly what is going to happen.

  60. Jason Boxman

    My gravest concern in all this is that Israel is sufficiently bruised that the release of nuclear weapons is authorized; if this appears existential to Israel, it becomes perhaps an imperative.

    I hope not.

    But meanwhile, this is an existential threat to Iran’s regime; they can’t fumble the ball on this.

    Maybe Trump finds a way to climb down, and without US interceptor and logistical support, Israel has to stand down. Short of that, I dunno. This is bleak.

    1. hk

      If Israel does release the nukes, it will truly be, most likely, the end of the Jewish people (it will definitely be the end of any dream of an Israel in the Middle East). What makes me worry is that this will suit the likes of Huckabee and Graham perfectly fine–indeed, they very much want to see the end of Israel, and are doubtlessly pushing very hard for it to happen.

        1. hk

          We wouldn’t know until we are all dead, would we? These guys seem so sure of themselves that they’ll push forward until everyone is dead, I worry.

  61. mrsyk

    From the bottom of my coffee cup, “what was the point of targeting the schoolgirls?”
    I’d like to know whose idea that was.

    1. JM

      I’m assuming it was Israeli targeting, since it fits their MO of petty cruelty. Same with the women’s athletics group that was reported killed and recent reports of Ghandi Hospital being struck.

      The cruelty is the point.

      1. mrsyk

        I can buy that. But, after watching Ritter talking about targeting specific frequencies, my black heart keeps whispering “Iranian false flag”. There is a degree of civil unrest there, many of who might be gathering around the flag now.
        Please talk me down.

        1. JM

          I’m not there so I can’t say with authority, but the main reason I don’t believe that is it doesn’t seem necessary for the Iranian government to create additional tragedies to unite the people.

          The Israeli approach is well know by now, they can be relied upon to do something short sighted or pointless. Even if they didn’t go for civilians right away – which I didn’t expect them to do day 1 – everyone expected they’d go for Khamenei.

          They, and US leadership, don’t consider the culture of Iran and how martyrdom could unite them. Which seems to be the case. So, it’s just a huge risk to do something that is essentially guaranteed to happen anyway.

          1. mrsyk

            Thanks. Agree to below about Ritter.
            I also am inclined to agree that this cruelty falls squarely in Bibi’s wheelhouse. Do you suppose Trump knew? Im recalling a tweet about Trump being pissed about Bibi jumping the gun on the attack. I am leaning into a theory that Bibi’s strategy here is to lock in Trump’s allegiance as an international criminal co-conspirator.
            Im looking for something to hold on to here because I’m having a hard time thinking that it’s cruelty served neat.

            1. JM

              I saw a comment somewhere, middle east spectator’s telegram or thomas keith on nitter, that the school was near a military installation. So theres always a chance it was a technical error – just a tragic miss.

              But they’d never admit a mistake, so we may never know.

              I’m sure they’d love to lock the US in, but given our duplicitousness IDK if that’s possible.

              I think Trump is reprehensible, but has strong enough self-preservation instincts that he wouldn’t go for a planned attack on school kids. I hope I’m not wrong on that…

        2. JM

          I should also say Scott Ritter’s reflection on that tragic targeting error is a reflection on him as a person, having decency and humanity in his heart. I’m not so sure that was ever the case for Israeli military, even less so after the past few years.

          And if anyone hasn’t seen it, go back and watch his talk with Judge Napolitano from yesterday, mentioned above too.

        3. OnceWere

          I’ve seen many hasbarists (those who aren’t saying that it was a misfire of an Iranian-launched missile) claim that the school was located in an IRGC compound with the implication thus that this was an IRGC-linked school. If that’s the case, who could honestly doubt that the Israelis would do it : they’re IRGC-linked little girls.

      2. JohnnyGL

        Yeah, this sort of massacre is normal for them. Just like dropping residential towers in Beirut. It’s just how they approach war. Terror is at the core of who they are.

    2. Es s Ce Tera

      Were the Israelis delivering a message, twice, that they would target Iranian children?

  62. Wukchumni

    UFC 666 (Ultimate Fundamental Championship)

    End-time evangs versus ‘every Amalek must die!’ end-time Zionists

    2 aged claims go into the Octagon, I can’t see why both belief systems don’t come out relatively intact

    PPV (HD) 30 Shekels

    1. JohnnyGL

      No one is landing a knock-out. This one is going to have to go to decision, except there’s no ref and no judges. Both camps will claim victory. Both fighters will be a loud, proud, bloody mess by the end.

      So much winning…

      1. Yves Smith Post author

        Go to the set of tweets I just posted at the end. Click on the first from Trita Parsi. It is the US and Israel that are seeking a knockout. Iran has a different strategy.

        1. ChrisFromGA

          Muhammad Ali rope-a-dope?

          Trump is certainly playing the role of the dope quite well.

        2. JohnnyGL

          The Trita Parsi post was very interesting. I can understand the sentiment of the Iranians to shift their focus towards the US, banking on the US to have a lower pain tolerance than the Israelis. The problem is that it’s going to take a LOT of work to convince an entire political class in the US that we should STOP going after Iran. $200/barrel oil won’t persuade them to abandon their life’s work. This is what they’ve been working towards for 40 years. Lindsey Graham is in visible ecstasy right now. American casualties won’t change the minds of Graham and the neocons, either. Listen to Ryan Grim’s point about how team Dem wants this war, too. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/1fH3IR7RfNU

          Now that the war has started, the only one who will change their mind and say, “no more, let’s stop this” is Trump himself. The US public, who already didn’t want this are going to turn HARD against it, but they were already against it. The war started in SPITE of their opposition. There was very little effort to manufacture consent ahead of time. Public opinion was considered to be irrelevant.

          It’s going to take a big, tangible feeling of economic pain to get the necessary level of radicalization among the public to really hate this war. That means a big recession is baked in. And then what? Does the US just take a big L? Again, the political class in the US doesn’t take L’s very well.

  63. RookieEMT

    I don’t have much to add in terms of intelligence. The only real impression I have so far is the psychotic levels of hypocrisy displayed by European governments and US officials. We struck during negotiations and we struck when they weren’t attacking us. We are the bad guys.

    These European fools are ‘condemning’ Iran for indiscriminate bombing. So far it’s mostly been US installations and hotels filled US officials that are getting attacked. Minimal civilian casualties. The Saudis are threatening Iran, well you hosted US bases that are coordinating attacks on Iran you absolute fools.

    Gavin Newsom and other Democrats are giving the most pathetic of condemnations of this stupid war while still saying Iran leadership ‘needs to go’. Guess what, your saying you support the war.

    Nothing to do but pray Iran can defend itself and the war ends in a couple weeks without horrible complications.

  64. David in Friday Harbor

    What I find deeply upsetting about all this is that there do not appear to be any clearly defined goals for this illegal act of war — other than for a couple of sociopaths named Trump and Netanyahu to prove their authoritarian extra-legal dominance to each other and to those around them and to divert attention from their own ethical failings.

    Haaretz columnist Gideon Levy reports that settler-colonial bloodlust has replaced the Kumbaya Kibbutznik “make the desert bloom” mentality throughout Israel, while the last claimed “victory” over Iran has lasted “as long as the life of a butterfly.” The only war goal is to rile the peanut gallery.

    This cannot end well. Trump’s failure to consult the Congress as required by Art. I sec. 8 of the constitution or to follow the U.N. charter may not have consequences in the short term, but killing without legal justification or authority is murder, plain and simple.

    Today’s lead editorial in the Chinese Communist Global Times goes beyond their usual rhetorical throat-clearing to call-out the deliberate deception of phony negotiations as “a brazen contempt for and trampling of the fundamental norms of international relations.” If China were to ever get serious about economic sanctions against the U.S. the American economy would collapse within a year. That prospect fills me with dread.

    1. hk

      IMHO, the lack of any clear goals makes perfect sense, at least in political-bureaucratic sense. Among the Western elite classes, nobody likes Iran (much the way nobody likes Russia, or China, beyond a theme park version). But no one really wants to do anything about it since that would mean having to bear a cost. So rather than asking anyone (worth anything) to offer up something (an actual sacrifice), the leadership (wehther it’s Trump or Biden, or, indeed, any of the European leaders), a lot of vague talk and doing everything on the cheap (since no one will actually pay for whatever.)

      This is in marked contrast to what used to be the case: small factions may or may not have had oversized influence in getting gov’t to do things, but they were also willing to bear an oversized cost to achieve “oversized goals” for themselves. These people haven’t exactly disappeared: we still have American Zionists of various stripes and a multitude of exile groups, plus some ideological activists. But none of these people really want to bear an oversized cost either: rather, they talk big, hoping to hoodwink the rest of the people with only vague interests to do something. But all that the latter do is to let existing stocks of “power” be used to pursue these goals–they don’t care that much, but there is a lot of surplus leftover “power” that can be thrown about cheaply. Now, for US, these leftovers were plentiful, in all dimensions. But they won’t last forever–in fact, not even all that long, especially now that so much has been burned at the sacred bonfire of Ukraine. In order to keep going, somebody will have to pay up (and the best they can do is to make the “not so important people” pay for it via fiat, which is feeding the popular discontent.)

    2. nyleta

      Early days yet but the Iranian strategy seems to be area denial for first the US Navy and in the future US air forces. Chinese targeting help has enabled them to really utilise the good CEP of their missiles now.

      The present president of Iran was a combat medic in the Iran/Iraq war and knows about casualties in war. It really depends on how the missile cities can operate under real pressure, if they hold up the US Fifth Fleet needs to find a new home. Iran needs to operate close to home at first because flight times to Israel is losing them too many missiles early on.

      The use of nuclear weapons by any party will be a declaration of defeat and withdrawal.

  65. Tom Stone

    A solemn promise from Trump has less value than a used Kleenex because you can compost the Kleenex and get something useful.

  66. Yves Smith Post author

    Latest info porn.

    Important. Click through:

    Note the first is a re-report of IRGC claims:

    Turning in now…

    1. Ben Panga

      There’s a photo here supposedly of Ebril. That is a very big explosion.

      From the same account, plenty of photos/video of Israel being successfully hit also.

    2. skippy

      I would point out per my comment the other day, about the change in tactics, past was drone swarms first and then missiles. It seems more mixed so far with up grades for both. Videos of ballistics in terminal phase as a shower and not a single warhead. Options are decoys, mixed with cluster munitions, w/a side of debris from anti missile impact. I am leaning more on the cluster/decoy option as it would cause more dramas for engaging them at this stage. Not to mention deplete counter fire faster or wasted on all the randomness and still take hits.

      I think it will be a tell when Iran starts using its more advanced missiles. I wonder how this situation is being viewed by US/Israel military intel i.e. outcomes at this stage vs escalation.

  67. Jason Boxman

    Oops?

    U.S. Races to Accomplish Iran Mission Before Munitions Run Out” That is a headline on the current front page of the WSJ (Twitter Unroll)

    “One of the challenges is you can deplete these really quickly,” said Kelly Grieco, a senior fellow at the Stimson Center think tank who used to teach at the Air Command and Staff College. “We’re using them faster than we can replace them.”
    5/
    “A major concern for the Pentagon is to maintain a sufficient stock of interceptors for the Thaad, which U.S. forces also operate in South Korea and Guam, to deter North Korea and China.”
    6/

    I can see why Trump is making noise about an off ramp, even if it is one the Iranians would never acquiesce to.

    1. alrhundi

      Either munitions stock is better than expected or the establishment has already turned on trump and the war.

      1. JohnnyGL

        The US political class will absolutely hang him with this war. In fact, they HAVE to do so, because otherwise they’ll all have to share the blame. They should share it, because they all wanted it. There was barely any opposition to the war in Congress.

        Now, team dem MOSTLY got away with dumping the Iraq war on GW Bush. I think it’s going to be a tougher lift this time, but, then again, there’s no vote in congress to point to.

        1. ChrisPacific

          Trump’s refusal to seek authorization from Congress was a huge break for Dems. If he had, they’d all have lined up to vote yes, like they always do. Now it will be much easier for them to pretend they were against it if it all goes wrong.

    2. ChrisFromGA

      One might think that Russia would take advantage and launch the biggest attack ever on Kiev tonight.

      But the Russians don’t seem to think that way, to their own detriment, in terms of ending the war.

      1. ChrisRUEcon

        Oooooh … this made me understand a tweet I saw yesterday better. Z-man not only watching US deplete munitions he would have dearly wanted for himself on 15r43L, but also the spectre of Russia absolutely using this opportunity to land the coup-de-grâce. Brill.

        1. chris

          I have been wondering the same things my finely named fellow Chris’.

          I also wonder if China and Russia will support Iran to keep the US pinned down so that they are more free to do what they want in other locations. They don’t have to attack Kiev or Taiwan to take advantage of this situation. They can just make us waste all our resources and then negotiate with an obviously stronger hand.

          We also keep hearing US spokesholes talking about using sanctions, ethnic tensions, drones, etc. to attack and frustrate “our” enemies. It seems like the US is more than susceptible to the same strategies. I would hope that we have people other than Elbridge Colby to think through these issues because Mr. Colby appears to be a very 1-dimensional thinker. The path we’re on makes me think Mr. Colby is the one eyed man in a kingdom of cubicles populated by blind fools. I have not heard of any public plans for us to support 3 different conflicts simultaneously. I haven’t even heard that we successfully recharged the Strategic Petroleum Reserve after Biden’s disastrous drawdown. China only needs to slow walk deliveries of processed rare earths. They don’t even need to stop deliveries to hamstring us.

          I don’t see how people on the US mainland are going to escape serious economic consequences from these terrible decisions. I am afraid we will also see loss of life in the “homeland” before it’s over too.

          1. ChrisPacific

            I see the council of Chrises has convened, so I guess I’d better weigh in.

            I’m not sure I have too much to add, though. My main worry remains what the US and/or Israel will do if they’re too obviously revealed as paper tigers. Israel in particular has a history of particularly brutal escalation when that happens, and Trump is almost certainly incapable of admitting to a mistake.

            1. chris

              All Chris are welcome!

              Yes. I think this is what results in some party using non conventional warheads. Maybe even chemical weapons.

              The other thing to be concerned about are things that aren’t aimed at humans but that we rely on. Plants for instance. Standard US and Western oriental bias asserts that these sarc/ silly bearded towel heads /sarc have no science programs we would consider impressive. But Iran is not Iraq. Several years ago they were advertising capabilities that could easily be used to distribute viruses and diseases that could cripple crop yields.

              There’s the question of what exactly the US was funding in those facilities in Wuhan and Ukraine. It would not surprise me in the least if we’ve developed bioweapons illegally. A desert environment with higher temperatures and dryer conditions would make for a good testing ground, and give the people deploying the weapons some confidence that spread could be contained.

              If this goes bad I expect someone involved to release something we will all regret.

            2. mrsyk

              To parse, we are worried how quickly team z’s hand is down to its last card, nukes?
              Count me in.

        1. Revenant

          Yes, China has the chance do something hilarious at this point and blockade Taiwan! What assets would USA send to the Pacific?

          For that matter, North Korea could move south….

    3. Acacia

      Yep. Must be a bummer having zero cred because they kept stabbing people in the back whilst pretending to “negotiate”. Why should Iran talk with Trump any further?

      Iran saying they will decide when this ends, not Trump:

      Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi:

      🔹 We have had 2 decades to study the defeats of the US army in the east and west of their borders and draw the necessary lessons from this.

      🔹 Bombing our capital will not affect our ability to continue the war. A multi-layered decentralized defense allows us to determine the time and method of ending the war ourselves.

      https://x.com/araghchi/status/2028171586365178103

    1. ambrit

      Will it be like the Thunderdome?
      “Two go in, one comes out!”
      That would be a major disaster for the US. Both materially, reputationally, and psychologically.

  69. hamstak

    For anyone interested at this late hour, here are a few relevant headlines from the Russian TASS news agency (English version):

    – IRGC announces launch of another series of attacks on Israeli, US targets [9th round]

    – Iran targets German bases in Jordan, Iraq — [Der Spiegel]

    – Iran claims to have destroyed US naval base in Kuwait

    – Israeli army to call up 100,000 reservists amid situation around Iran

  70. Googoogajoob

    I don’t want to give the American political body any benefit of the doubt, credit, or whatever it could be characterized as but I cannot help but feel the Congress vote on the war being delayed until Monday is an orchestrated hedge.

    I have no illusions that the elected body is more than happy that Iran is being attacked but are aware of how deeply unpopular this is amongst the population.. If the action was proceeding as envisioned, it’d be voted yes and the bitter pill would be forced down throats of the voters. If the fantasy does not materialize, a no should follow

    The odds are swinging in that direction given that Iran did not cease to function when Khamenei was assassinated and is showing no signs that their collapse is imminent. That being said, watching the American media apparatus attempting to polish this turd to a mirror shine does make me still dread that the wishful thinking will never cease.

    1. Hepativore

      What difference would a war-authorization vote by Congress make at this stage in the game? The damage by Trump/Israel has already been done, so a “no” vote is not going to put a stop to hostilities, and a “yes” vote is just going to greenlight the whole thing even if the horse has already left the barn.

      I think the latter is more likely, but either way, it is too late now.

      1. Googoogajoob

        I would absolutely agree the fact that it’s delayed to Monday goes to show how little it matters in substance.

        What I’m getting at is it’s been a strain of American politics, especially with the election of Trump 1 that the American population has little appetite for regime change / interventionist wars and short of achieving a quick win, any politician supporting this is going to be wearing it like a millstone around their neck. *Especially* if a lot of negative consequences start materializing (For example – I’m inclined to agree with Yves this could result in a financial crash if this does not result in the outcome the American/Israeli’s wanted. It’s the biggest signal how washed America is as the domineering power in the world)

        Hence, even though it is in large part theater it can still be represented as an escape hatch. How it’s attempted to be sold as such is nothing I’d ever give credence to.

        1. MH

          Don’t know how much good it will do ultimately but it’s starting to feel like running on Medicare for all and F Israel could be election winning themes come 2028.

  71. Acacia

    The Green Zone in Baghdad, housing the U.S. Embassy, is being stormed by pro-Iranian protesters:

    https://t.me/Middle_East_Spectator/29271

    Middle East Spectator also reporting Senior U.S. officials telling Al Jazeera that ‘The war against Iran is now expected to last multiple weeks, not days’.

    1. Balakirev

      Middle East Spectator also reporting Senior U.S. officials telling Al Jazeera that ‘The war against Iran is now expected to last multiple weeks, not days’.

      Was there anyone outside our breed of frenzied neocons who thought that a war on Iran would last days? And weeks is definitely pushing it. I’ve no idea who those “senior US officials” are, but they seem to have bought into their own propaganda.

  72. Jonathan Holland Becnel

    ALL HANDS ON DECK, BOYS

    THE TRAIN HAS LEFT THE STATION

    ALSO, THANKS, YVES & NC, FOR BEING THE FUCKING BEST

    YOU TOO, LAMBERT

    YOU SON OF A BITCH

    WHEREVER YOU ARE BRO, YOU BETTER BE RINGING THE BELL OF LIBERTY 🔔

    1. Keith Newman

      Lambert!! Where art thou Lambert?!
      We need an update from Lambert on what he’s up to.
      And how he is.

      1. ambrit

        I have the feeling that the Late Lamented Lambert has run for the shadows and is quite happy to be there.
        Stay safe, space fan, wherever you are.

  73. wl

    Trump post seems to hint at use of a neutron bomb. Yves, what is the main deterrent to their use of this?

    1. ambrit

      Not replying for Yves, but all wargames where any atomic ordinance has been introduced eventually escalated to full intercontinental exchange. So, as the saying goes; “Bend over, grab your ankles and kiss your a– goodbye.”

  76. hazelbee

    Starmer has brought us into it :(

    UK will allow US to use bases to strike Iranian missile sites, PM says

    Starmer saying he has learnt the mistakes of the iraq war, that we were not involved in the initial strikes on iran.

    but then goes on to say:

    “The US will use the bases for the “specific and limited defensive purpose” of destroying Iran’s missiles “at source”, he added.”

    oh ffs.

    so we are being dragged in with the starmer using weasel words to make it appear we are being all defensive. No. What that actually says is the US can use our bases to attack Iranian military assets.

    and we are only on day 2.

    sweepstake – by what date is this not the top story on NC?

    The cynical depressive side of me can imagine this still ongoing in a year. After all – a war with real threat going for long enough and that’s reason to avoid having midterms yes?

    1. Ben Panga

      >by what date is this not the top story on NC?

      When Trump ‘dies’/is removed. So according to my highest tinfoil yarn-diagram fairly soon, maybe weeks.

    2. Huey

      I’m wholly out of my depth, but with the current number of targets Iran is attacking plus the emptying Western missile supply, assuming no major reductions in the intensity, I feel like this is going to conclude within three months.

      1. chris

        Oh yeah. Stuff is going to get weird on the home front. Especially when gas prices spike and we get new shipping fees on everything.

        1. ambrit

          Oooooh! I didn’t think of that aspect of it. Online shopping will take a big hit, and with brick and mortar stores shutting up everywhere, this will perceptibly drop the average American standard of living.
          The Theocratic War becomes the Class War.

  78. Jason Boxman

    Wishful thinking or not?

    Iran has lost around half of its ballistic missile launchers, Israeli official says. (NY Times)

    The Israeli military said on Sunday that airstrikes it has conducted since last June had destroyed about 200 Iranian ballistic missile launchers and rendered dozens more inoperable, roughly half of the launchers Iran currently has.

    The strikes in the current assault and a previous one last summer, known as “Rising Lion,” have also targeted Iran’s central explosives manufacturing facility, which supplies materials for missile warheads and other weapons programs, including rockets, drones and cruise missiles.

    Before Israel launched its 12-day air attack on Iran last summer, Israeli intelligence had determined Iran was seeking to significantly increase its ballistic missile production and fortify its underground infrastructure.

    At the time, Israel estimated Iran’s stockpile stood at roughly 3,000 missiles, but intelligence reports suggested the Iranians planned to produce as many as 8,000 missiles by 2027, “posing a real, direct and existential threat to the State of Israel and the Middle East,” according to one such report.

    Also Patricia Marins on Twitter:

    Iran attacks massively with more modern missiles that make air defenses perform poorly

    In this video, we see at least 12 interceptors being launched against 2 Iranian missiles, where one gets past the interceptors and hits its target.

    As I said earlier, these modern Iranian missiles are very resilient to shrapnel and have high maneuverability.

    On this second night of war, Iran bombarded Israel with several barrages that easily exceed 100 missiles.

  79. johnnyme

    OPEC+ Approves Modest Output Hike as Iran War Jolts Oil Markets

    OPEC+ agreed on Sunday to raise oil output by a modest 206,000 barrels per day (bpd) in April, opting for a cautious supply increase even as the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran disrupts shipments across the Middle East.

    The decision, confirmed in an official statement after the group’s meeting, involves eight core members: Saudi Arabia, Russia, the UAE, Iraq, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Algeria and Oman. The increase ends a three-month pause in production hikes but falls well below the larger boosts of up to 411,000–548,000 bpd that had been discussed in recent days.

    1. Adam

      Modest is doing some very heavy lifting there considering that’s about 1% of what flows through the Straight of Hormuz. If OPEC+ really has that little capacity to increase drilling that really strengthens Iran’s position. SA better have those oil fields well defended.

    2. Jason Boxman

      Oil Prices Jump 10% After Iran Attack, Pointing to Economic Risks (NY Times)

      Oil prices rose 10 percent as markets opened on Sunday evening, underscoring the economic risks of the widening conflict in the Middle East.

      The U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran could severely restrict supplies from a key oil and gas-producing region. Even if the disruption is brief, it will almost certainly make energy more expensive worldwide. The magnitude of those price increases and how long they last will depend on what the United States and Israel do next — and how Iran responds.

      International oil prices had already climbed about 20 percent this year, nearing $73 a barrel on Friday. On Sunday, they crossed $80 a barrel.

      This is gonna get interesting, I guess.

      On Sunday, attention remained on the Strait of Hormuz, where videos verified by The New York Times showed a tanker ablaze while anchored near Oman. Another vessel was also reportedly struck in the area, and a separate projectile was said to have exploded near a third ship.

  80. Balakirev

    Sports hall hit by missile in Lamerd, Iran. Dozens of teenage girls who were playing volleyball, basketball, etc:

    “LAMERD, IRAN—Dozens of teenage girls were attending their regular training sessions of volleyball, basketball, and gymnastics in the main sports hall in Lamerd, a city near the Persian coast, when a missile slammed into the building at 5 p.m. on Saturday. Additional strikes hit two nearby residential areas and a hall adjacent to a school, as the U.S. and Israel pounded targets across Iran on the first day of what President Donald Trump declared as a regime change war. According to local officials cited in Iranian state media, the strikes on Lamerd killed at least 18 civilians and wounded scores more…”

    https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/iran-lamerd-sports-hall-teenage-girls-killed-us-israel-war?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=email-restack-comment&r=3wlos9&triedRedirect=true

    Dear god.

    1. Old Jake

      Is it pitiful of me to hope it was an Israeli munition? American servicemembers are supposed to refuse illegal orders, and targeting civilians is patently illegal. Yes they are likely given coordinates, not name or functions. All the more reason that war is immoral, unethical, and the participants should be beyond the pale.

  81. The Rev Kev

    That poor stupid sap Donny. He thought that once again he would use negotiations to hide a sneak attack on Iranian leadership which would cause the government to collapse allowing for a quick win for him – and all those Iranian oil fields would be there for the taking. Instead he is now in a real war and not just limited to Iran but the entire region up to and including Cyprus. American bases and facilities are being slammed which has not happened on this scale in decades. America’s allies in this region are leaning that there is a major price to be paid for hosting these bases and all those American promises of protecting those countries in return were just so many lies. Even if this war stopped right now, there will be a major reconfiguration of politics in this region – and further. But as it goes on, the US is finding itslef being demilitarized. Good job, Donny. It couldn’t have been done without you.

      1. The Rev Kev

        You can bet that Donny is raging against everybody around him and blaming them for getting him into this situation. Mar el Lago would be more like the Fuhrerbunker right now.

        1. urdsama

          Same here, thank you Yves for all the information you have provided and creating a place where information can be shard and sanely discussed.

          1. Paul J-H

            I concur. I am surprised how much the Dutch news reports strikes on Israel and Bahrain, Dubai, but this is a rather central place to check what happens.

    1. alrhundi

      I don’t see how it isn’t with what’s known of Israeli AI and US AI like Palantir

    3. Philosaruptor

      Oh no! The US Military might have violated the terms&conditions on the use of Claude! And they already decided on the future removal of Anthropic from their infrastructure! I’d enjoy a good terms&conditions legal battle, if we have more than charcoal to defend.

  85. ChrisFromGA

    The Gods of Greed vs. Fear have spoken:

    Dow futures down 1%

    Gold up 1.6%

    Crude oil up 7%

  86. Vincent Cozzy

    Trump did not have a press gaggle on return to Washington from Mar-A-Largo. What can possibly be going wrong – a man who gloats and takes credit for everything – that the cat has his tongue?

  87. chris

    Any idea whether LA loses the 2028 Olympic hosting role due to the US breaking the Olympic Truce?

    1. hk

      God, I hope so. The bruhaha associated with thd olympics will make life miserable for the locals.

  88. Acacia

    George Stephanopoulos interviews Iran Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi

    https://abcnews.com/video/130651380/

    https://x.com/araghchi/status/2028157569064153578

    Araghchi: A deal was within reach. We left Geneva with understanding that we’d seal a deal next time we meet. Those who wanted to spoil diplomacy succeeded in their mission.

    But it was Mr. Trump, yet again, who ultimately ordered bombing of the negotiating table.

    For the record, this was the second time in the past nine months that “diplomacy” on the part of US and “Israel” was just a ruse. There are some people on the Net saying this was how Ali Khamenei was targetted and killed, using the same trick the Zionists pulled to assassinate Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in 2024.

    I.e., act like it’s diplomacy, give the other side “something to discuss” and then wait for the senior leadership to convene a meeting, and then strike that meeting.

  89. Jason Boxman

    Trump Says War Could Last Weeks and Offers Contradictory Visions of New Regime (NY Times)

    President Trump said on Sunday that the U.S. military intends to sustain its assault on Iran for “four to five weeks” if necessary, insisting that it “won’t be difficult” for Israel and the United States to maintain the intensity of the battle even as he warned of the possibility of more American casualties.

    No lack of missiles, I guess?

    Off ramp

    Among the options he suggested was an outcome similar to what he engineered in Venezuela, in which only the top leader was removed during an American military strike and much of the rest of the government remained in place, but newly willing to work pragmatically with the United States.

    This dude is high as a kite.

    But he insisted the Pentagon retained plenty of forces, missiles and bombs to sustain the military assault “if we have to.”

    Asked how long the United States and Israel could keep up this level of attacks, he responded: “Well, we intended four to five weeks.”

    “It won’t be difficult,” Mr. Trump added. “We have tremendous amounts of ammunition. You know, we have ammunition stored all over the world in different countries.”

    Ammo just grows on trees.

    We’re all screwed, this guy is a moron

    But he has been told by his advisers that the vast differences in cultures and history made it virtually impossible to apply the strategy used in Venezuela — in which the existing government was kept in place, after it agreed to take instructions from Washington — and try to replicate it in Tehran.

    Nonetheless, Mr. Trump appears enamored of using a Venezuela-like model in Iran.

    Even Shrub wasn’t this stupid.

  90. Balakirev

    Just when you thought it couldn’t get worse:

    Death toll from Israeli attack on Iran girls’ school rises to ‘about 180’

    “Hossein Kermanpour, the head of public relations at Iran’s Health Ministry, says the Israeli attack on the girls’ school in Minab on Sunday has killed “about 180 young children.”

    Not much else, but it appears more of those who were critically injured have now died. Presumably Bibi’s work (and yes, it could be us in USia, but Israel has form).

    https://aje.news/wwomw4?update=4353586

  91. anarchaeopteryx

    Just wanted to comment to say thank you to Yves and the Commentariat here. I got too depressed to read the news directly for a number of years, quit most social media, deleted my rss feeds, but when all this was showing rumblings I knew this was the place to come back to for legit info without propaganda or sensationalizing. Hang in there everybody.

      1. Acacia

        Many have been tracking his airplane as it traveled to Berlin, though whether he’s actually aboard is another question.

        2. Ben Panga

          Yeah, that’s a long way from conclusive. I would be very surprised. Bibi isn’t the trusting type and if he leaves Israel he gives up functional control.

          Even though there’s a war on, there would be a horde of other Zionist sociopaths trying to fill the power vacuum and increase their power.

          More importantly, he would lose all credibility with the remaining pol-mil leadership and anybody that knew the truth.

          Seems like nonsense tbh.

  93. Jason Boxman

    Conflict expansion

    Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon exchange fire as conflict widens after attack on Iran (BBC)

    Here in the Lebanese capital Beirut people were woken by a series of explosions that sounded through the city shortly before 03:00 local time, as the Israeli military began striking Hezbollah targets after the Iran-backed group fired rockets at northern Israel.

    In a statement, Hezbollah said it was acting in retaliation for the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, calling it a “legitimate act of self-defence”.

    It said it had launched a “salvo of precision rockets and a swarm of drones” at a missile defence site in northern Israel. The Israeli military confirmed that it had launched strikes in response, saying it was operating “against Hezbollah’s decision to join the campaign” and would not allow the group to “constitute a threat to the state of Israel and harm the civilians of northern Israel”.

    Also, Iran applying economic pressure through airports

    As well as the oil industry, the widening conflict is impacting the region’s aviation sector.

    Iran has struck its neighbours where it hurts most: their airports, which serve as vital transit hubs for global trade and travel.

    Airports are an economic cornerstone for Gulf countries, bringing in food, their mostly expatriate workforce and facilitating global trade.

    Notably, flights at Doha’s Hamad International Airport – one of the world’s busiest transport hubs – have been halted. The disruption could impact the significant volume of air cargo shipments that pass through the airport to destinations worldwide.

  94. hamstak

    According to Al Jazeera, Hezbollah has now jumped into the fray by launching rockets into Israel. My guess to further deplete air defenses and occupy/annoy the Israeli military despite claims of revenge for Khamanei’s assassination. Unconfirmed reports that IRGC are present. Israel has responded.

  95. ChrisFromGA

    I’ll close the night out by making an observation. I knew intellectually that the press in this country had been taken over by mega corps that had zero interest in doing actual journalism. But the response to this illegal act of murder by the Trump administration really hit home just how bad it has gotten.

    I’m scanning the AJC headlines, and there is not a single one questioning the war. A once proud paper reduced to shilling for the likes of Lindsay Graham. Then there is CNN, which really seems headed to be the next Fox News. You really have to hand it to them; they’ve gone fully state-sponsored.

    It’s gotten so bad that John Bolton now appears to be playing the role of a functional press skeptic:

    https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2026/03/01/john-bolton-iran-strike-could-mean-turmoil-and-bloodshed-00806066

    1. Acacia

      there is not a single one questioning the war

      In Japan, scanning news headlines on the death of Ali Khamenei tells you something.

      Mainichi, Yomiuri, Jiji, Sankei, CNN and BBC in Japanese say “dead”, while Asahi and Akahata say “murdered”.

    2. Balakirev

      You’re right about the mainstream media hosanna’ing the Donald’s bright, new, spit-polished war. Though (and I may be cynical about this), they could be just waiting to see how well it goes. And if it goes south, they’ll fry him hard and fast.

      It may not be long, either, before at least a few of them start. Trump’s already threatened the Iranians with “the most punishing blow” if they don’t ignore the attacks and deaths visited upon their own courtesy of USia and Israel, and get back to the diplomatic table. That sounds like a panicky demand for an off ramp. Newspaper editors have a way of smelling blood in the water.

      Larry Johnson’s come to a similar conclusion, though more eloquently expressed:

      https://larrycjohnson.substack.com/p/is-donald-trump-looking-for-an-exit?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=email-restack-comment&r=3wlos9&triedRedirect=true

      1. Ben Panga

        It’s in CNN. Looks like friendly fire but they do not confirm.

        https://edition.cnn.com/2026/03/02/middleeast/us-kuwait-aircraft-crash-iran-intl-hnk

        Kuwait’s Ministry of Defense said “several United States military aircraft crashed” on Monday and that “all crew members survived.”

        The video shows a jet on fire and falling in a tailspin out of the sky, and it suggests the jet came down within 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) of the US Ali Al Salem base in Kuwait.

    1. Yves Smith Post author

      $72 is nothing. It was up to $78 or $79 not long ago. It was over $100 at the start of the SMO. It was also over $90 (when that was a way bigger number in inflation adjusted terms) before the crisis and for extended times in the 2010 to 2012 period. You need to approach $90 to create real pain.

        2. Louis Fyne

          US stocks typically go up right after shooting starts (reasonable as the US homeland is protected by oceans and war is Keynesian inflationary).

          the major exception to thi trend…the Yom Kippur War, which eventually morphed to the 70s nuclear-winter bear market. even then US stocks marginally went up after the shooting started, too.

          The internet has spoiled us…..we expect history to unfurl and resolve itself in 36 hours, lmao. this probably will take longer than that

    2. Louis Fyne

      oil was very complacent cuz big money are waiting and algos are algos. complacent enough to buy a little more oil as the algos
      sold any slightly dovish Trump newsflash until Iran entered chat, lmao.

      NC commentariat are not Normies (good thing).

      my mother is the Normie barometer. (as always) I didn’t solicit her opinion. she asked, “is the war over?—- they killed that man”

      then I went on to explain the “Supreme Leader” job description in Iran.

  99. dougie

    I had never imagined a scenario where NC could show even more value than it has over the 12 or so years I have been reading, but it has happened. My future financial contributions to the site will reflect that. I will personally raise my $30/month to $50, then add another $50/month to contribute for someone who is unable to. I encourage those of us who are able to consider doing the same. Apoloiges if it is bad form to discuss money so specifically. My heart is in the right place.

    There aren’t many things that I truly believe in any more, but Yves and crew are one of them.

  100. Carolinian

    This long bill of particulars by Craig Mokhiber doesn’t mince words about the openly criminal world that we now seem to live in.

    ———————————–
    The U.S.-Israel Axis has been on a violent rampage for more than two years now, leaving a trail of blood and destruction everywhere in its wake. Iran is but the latest target in what has been an orgy of aggression and genocide all too familiar in centuries past, but unprecedented in modern, post-World War II history.

    Indeed, driven by the same kind of imperial, far-right, supremacist, colonial, and militarist ideology that cursed the planet with the Second World War, the Axis is determined to impose its brutal form of domination across Western Asia and beyond, and to turn back the clock to a darker chapter in our collective history.
    ——————
    https://scheerpost.com/2026/03/02/understanding-the-u-s-and-israels-illegal-aggression-in-iran/

    So one can find justly argued analysis but the facts and news regarding what is happening are becoming increasingly elusive. Here at home I can no longer get Press TV or the Tehran Times.

    Unfortunately for the Trumpies Orwell tactics may be too late since the public are not buying their bs.

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