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Notes -
There have been some interesting updates to the Iran War, if anyone would like to discuss.
IRGC-aligned elements in Iraq launched a drone strike at the Saudi East-West crude oil pipeline, which KSA has since shut down. This pipeline may have been transferring up to 5mb/d of crude. Some are claiming these were Yemeni drones and the Shia militias are being blamed for larger geopolitical reasons, as America and KSA would like the Iran-backed Shia militias in Iraq to be disarmed by the end of the month. But the official statement is that the drones were from Iraq.
The Houthis have expanded rapidly and now have dominion over the Bab El-Mandeb Strait, capturing the important Perim island. This cuts off an additional 3mb/d of oil typically exiting through Yanbu out of the strait
Iran launched 20 ballistic missiles at American bases in Jordan this week, and may be repairing all of their old missile cities in order to produce missiles (in smaller quantities). "Satellite imagery shows Iran is rebuilding everything from bridges and roads to production sites at a pace that is worrying Israeli officials, The Wall Street Journal has reported. Iran has restored access to tunnel entrances for missile bases that had been collapsed by U.S. and Israeli airstrikes. Weapons stored inside those underground sites are likely to be well-preserved, according to Israeli military assessments. Challenges to returning to full-scale missile manufacturing include damage to chemical facilities needed to make liquid propellants and industrial mixers for producing solid fuel, Arab officials said."
As far as oil going through the strait, IMO it is difficult to ascertain the true figures. I was trusting Kpler but they stopped making their numbers public and literally deleted all of their previous posts on traffic (they got the call?). I don't trust the other firms much. Reuters is reporting 6-7 ships through the strait per day the past four days, which could indicate 30% of the normal oil flow. Maybe someone has better data.
The WSJ has also reported some of the admin's top advisors fear the war will continue throughout the term https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/trumps-top-advisers-confront-possibility-that-iran-war-lasts-through-end-of-term-5f4e23d7
Iranian leaders probably cannot help comparing Trump to Carter, and will likely try to hurt him politically in the same way as revenge. Unlike Carter, Trump's on his second term. Midterms are probably a tempting target so they can cripple Trump legislatively.
The recent news on the Iranian backed Houthis making waves in the Red Sea and destroying oil pipelines seem curiously timed to annoy midterm voters with high oil prices.
I would not be surprised to learn that the IRGC has sworn an oath to destroy Trump even if it meant relying on his political rivals to do the heavy lifting. Carter never killed an Iranian ayatollah and they hated him.
Obviously, yes. For Iran, the victory condition in this war is "establish that attacking Iran is a presidency-ending mistake".
This was clear from the beginning, and is sound strategy on their part. The Trump administration is the main obstacle to a peace favorable to Iran. Trump started the war, so any concession to Iran will look like a defeat, so he needs to keep bombing them and hope that they will change their mind, and conduct an expensive escort operation to stabilize the oil price.
Any future administration will have the excuse "the Iran war was a stupid blunder". Unlike the occupation of Afghanistan, this is not something which the US will want to keep up for a few decades, even AIPAC will not be able to make them shrug off the high oil prices.
I think it is reasonable to presume that Biden knew that he was effectively signing over Afghanistan to the Taliban when he had the coalition troops leave, but was doing it anyway because he believed it was the right thing to do (which I concur on).
I am sure that a future president will find a similar fig leaf as Biden handing control to the new Afghan government. "Under this peace treaty, the US will leave the Strait of Hormuz and Iran will guarantee the freedom of navigation, and hand over some of their enriched uranium. Oh, now they are demanding tolls all of a sudden. Who would have thought! We will have to write a sternly worded letter to the UN complaining about that."
At the end of the day, if Iran manages to charge as much as $1.5 per barrel, that is a rounding error for gas station customers. And Iran would have some incentive to not take 10x as much because then it would risk getting bombed again (or annoying China, for that matter).
Seeing as how Iran supposedly tracked Trump's location in Turkey, I'm wondering why ground troops haven't already been sent to enact regime change in Iran. They don't seem likely to forgive and forget unless they can charge massive tolls per barrel.
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It's hard to say what Biden's actual beliefs on the matter were as the withdrawal agreement and the details of it were hashed out by the previous administration in 2020. Biden was stuck to a May 2021 withdrawal deadline, just a few months into his term, which they extended but it's not like he could just ignore the deal either, as most of the withdrawal had already occured before inauguration with 80% of troops pulled.
A lot of the military bases in the area were already closed down, allied nations had their own plans to withdraw already drawn up, it was a whole clusterfuck that got inherited.
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