Beaten and Shopworn Trump Settles on Flaccid 'Forever-Blockade' Strat as Broken-Down Carrier Limps Home
Two interesting contradictory pathways are emerging for Trump on Iran, if we are to trust latest MSM reports.
On one hand, new reports claim that Trump now sees the twin options of either total withdrawal from Iran or resumption of hostilities as equally bad. The reports claim he therefore prefers to now maintain the blockade indefinitely as the chief operative posture toward the Islamic Republic.
But at the same time, Reuters reports the comical news that the Trump admin’s intelligence agencies are “examining” how Iran’s leadership will potentially react to Trump simply declaring a quick “victory” and pulling out of the conflict:
JUST IN - U.S. intelligence agencies are studying how Iran would respond if Trump were to declare a unilateral victory against Iran, and potentially pull back from the war — Reuters
The implication here is obviously that Trump is considering doing so because he knows he has no cards and no further real options—a true zugzwang by any definition.
We’ve known since the beginning that Trump was looking for a quick, easy out. It’s the height of absurdity that advanced “intelligence agency” studies are required to determine what the IRGC’s response to this might be. The response could only be laughter, followed by triumphant exultation: it would be seen worldwide as a decisive US military defeat.
Though many still believe Trump is employing his usual artless wiles to lull Iran into a false sense of security before again attacking when the guard is down. But major news just broke that appears to dim any chances of a serious US military continuation of the conflict. It turns out that the USS Poopy Gerry—as Imetatronink has taken to affectionately calling the ever-troubled floating latrine—is ready to ditch the floundering conflict and head back home to await its uncertain future:
The aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford will depart the Middle East and begin the sail for home in coming days, multiple U.S. officials said, an expected relief for roughly 4,500 sailors who have been deployed for 10 months — but a loss of significant firepower as peace talks between the U.S. and Iran stagnate.
The Ford is one of three aircraft carriers in the region — the others being the USS George H.W. Bush and the USS Abraham Lincoln — amid hostilities with Iran. While the Ford is in the Red Sea, the Lincoln and Bush are operating in the Arabian Sea to enforce the U.S. blockade targeting vessels carrying oil or goods from Iranian ports.
What was the point of all that CENTCOM bragging we saw last time, that whole routine about assembling the largest carrier strike group in the region in decades? Either it was meant as a last-ditch attempt to scare Iran into concessions, or was just another in a long line of emblematic erraticisms from the current administration’s headless policy. More likely, the USS Bush was always meant to come as a replacement to the ailing Ford, and the “three carrier group” bluff was just a transient chest-pound from a rudderless military leadership—one experiencing unprecedented turnover at a critical time.
Granted, two carriers is still enough to give Trump plenty to “play with”, should he choose to continue prosecuting his wayward and futile excursion. The clown president himself continues to embarrassingly posture and peacock in a desperate act of feigning confidence in his misbegotten mission.
Even after years of this, it’s a genuine shock to see such a mockery made of the putatively ‘presidential’ office:
An obviously mentally-declining Trump even confused Iran and Ukraine in an Oval Office interview, telling Kaitlyn Collins that it is Ukraine that has been “militarily defeated” after the US sank “159” of their ships.
As Axios reports, Trump believes that indefinitely continuing the disastrous blockade against Iran is causing Iran to ‘burst’ from the economic damage:
He claimed that Iran wants to reach a deal in order to lift the blockade. “They want to settle. They don’t want me to keep the blockade. I don’t want to [lift the blockade], because I don’t want them to have a nuclear weapon,” Trump added.
The President added that Iran’s oil storage and pipelines “are getting close to exploding” because Iran can’t export oil due to the blockade. Some analysts doubt that Iran is in immediate danger on that front.
But once again, this “policy” is nothing more than the lack of one. Every pathetic attempt to subdue Iran has failed disastrously, and the only scraps left adorning Trump’s golden tabletop are various schemes of economic terrorism against Iranian citizens:
Cowardly sneak-attacks while holding and promising to hold negotiations all failed.
Attempts to demoralize the nation by assassinating its political and spiritual symbols failed.
Unprecedentedly despicable threats to commit genocide and destroy “entire country” of Iran accomplished zilch.
Secret Special Ops extraction, sabotage, and espionage missions to take out Iran’s uranium epically flopped.
Attempts to beg intermediaries like Pakistan, China, and various Gulf nations to intervene and “convince” Iran to give up while it’s winning equally failed.
Trump’s entire Iranian fiasco has been nothing short of a career-ending bathetic vanity project and failure of historic proportions, and what we’re witnessing now are its last idle dregs of denouement slipping away with a graceless whimper.
Trump’s last-ditch desperate ploy to sink Iran’s economy is only leading to greater economic doom for the US itself and the world, as oil and gas prices have been skyrocketing again:
El Pais reports that Gulf countries have been approaching the US for emergency currency swaps to “bail out” their foundering economies:
This all after the announcement today that UAE is leaving OPEC and OPEC+, which some fear could induce a domino effect of other departures.
Iran’s Ghalibaf warned that $140 oil is up next:
Meanwhile, Iran appears to be doing better than expected. Bloomberg debunked Trump’s claims that the Iranian storage is close to “exploding”, and its economy with it:
The outlet argues that all it will cause is some short term pain for Iran without any true overall structural damage—nothing even remotely close to the type of “pressure” needed to galvanize whatever Trump thinks would “bring down the regime”. Iran and Russia are two countries that were forged in the fires of “sanctions” and are well-versed in suffering through any type of economic attack of this sort.
For instance, there are multiple reports about Pakistan opening half a dozen land routes for Iranian goods to offset the US’s blockade:
From the above—Pakistan has created “an overland sanctions-resilient corridor [to Iran] capable of reshaping regional trade geometry”:
Pakistan’s decision to formally open its territory for third-country goods bound for Iran marks far more than a customs adjustment, because it inserts Islamabad directly into one of the most strategically sensitive logistics contests now unfolding across the Middle East and the northern Arabian Sea.
At a moment when the Strait of Hormuz faces severe disruption, Iranian ports remain under intense maritime pressure, and more than 3,000 Iran-bound containers are stranded at Karachi, Pakistan has effectively created an overland sanctions-resilient corridor capable of reshaping regional trade geometry.
By activating Gwadar, Karachi, Port Qasim, Taftan, Gabd, Quetta, Khuzdar and Ormara as integrated transit nodes, Islamabad is not merely facilitating commerce but redefining force posture, strategic access, and geopolitical leverage between Washington, Tehran, Beijing, and the wider Indo-Pacific maritime system.
In short, there are many tricks an ancient and respected civilization like Iran can employ to mitigate and outlast the unscrupulous, low-impulse, instant-gratification wiles of a mentally deficient adversary; it is simply absurd to imagine such a feeble blockade can bring Iran to its knees, and force it to “cry uncle”, as Trump today urged.
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To cap things off, another fitting demonstration of the current admin’s cartoonish incompetence, as a US senator denudes Whiskey Pete with the quintessential question of the whole Iran debacle—one can imagine it as a deposition of sorts at a future criminal trial proceeding:
So, the US needed to take out Iran’s “conventional missile shield” in order to prevent the “nuclear shield” it had already taken out from reconstituting itself? Yet, as of today it’s said the vast majority of Iran’s conventional missiles remain intact…
The layer-cake of failure here seems beyond ordinary comprehension.
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Great interview on YouTube between Brian Berletic & Glenn Diesen laying out the larger chessboard in play. Well worth a watch:
https://youtu.be/Ef0sHx33C-g?si=QltouNwRf9zDR9cT
Simplicius is using the current lull in the Ukraine War to gain credibility as an American politics commentator.
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don't stray too much outside of your expertise