[Today\u2019s Iran war post launched before complete because I had to run out. It should be done by 8:00 AM EDT. Please return or refresh this page then for the final version]<\/p>\n
As the MOU expires, Trump is doubling down on his bad form of needing to dominate at any price. He made a threat against Oman for what appears to be \u201cjust because\u201d reasons, like the stereotypical beta male who had a bad day at the office and kicks the dog when he gets home to vent his frustration. One has to guess what Oman\u2019s sins are. Presumably they consist of daring to talk to Iran about the operation of the Strait of Hormuz even though the MOU clearly contemplated that.1<\/sup> Perhaps Oman is also deemed to be somehow too helpful to Iran on the shipping front, as in undermining the corridor the US has set up on the Oman side of the Strait of Hormuz. That of course would contradict the US claims of the great success it is having in sneaking oil out under Iran\u2019s nose (which we will also cover in due course). <\/p>\n In a telling contrast, the Wall Street Journal published a lead story which gives a surprisingly fair-minded account (by Western MSM standards) of why and how Iran is setting about to escalate. <\/p>\n As we will discuss soon, Marjorie Taylor Greene has also reported that Trump is considering the use of nuclear weapons.2<\/sup> While I may be unduly hopeful, if Trump gets insistent, this may produce the military soft coup scenario we had discussed even before the war began, that the armed services start refusing to execute his commands. Keep in mind that all of the UN prohibitions against committing war crimes are also enshrined in US law, so there are clear formal grounds for rejecting illegal orders. Note we had also raised the possibility of a Trump analogue to Nixon\u2019s Saturday Massacre, where Nixon fired Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox after first having Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus refuse to remove Cox and resigned instead.<\/p>\n On the economic front, Scott Bessent oddly has not announced what his sanctions version of reducing Iran to the Stone Age plan. One of the bright ideas was secondary sanctions, as in targeting entities that did business with Iran. Perhaps China informed the Trump Administration that they could kiss the upcoming summit with Xi and\/or all sorts of Chinese critical materials goodbye if the US tried anything cute, and Bessent is having to recalibrate? He has apparently moved his big shock and awe announcement back to next week:<\/p>\n \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\uddf8\ud83c\uddee\ud83c\uddf7 Sec. Bessent laid out how the U.S. is trying to financially dismantle the Iranian regime.<\/p>\n He said they\u2019ve been going after Iranian bank accounts, crypto wallets and assets around the world. <\/p>\n One of the country\u2019s largest banks already collapsed, forcing the central bank to\u2026<\/p>\n \u2014 Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) August 18, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n First to Trump\u2019s hissy over Oman. From Bloomberg\u2019s landing page:<\/p>\n From the article proper<\/a>:<\/p>\n Trump told Fox News in a phone interview that a US naval blockade on Iranian ports is putting pressure on the country and he has no timeline for resolving the conflict.<\/p>\n He also warned that if \u201cOman gets in the way we\u2019ll bomb the s\u2014\u2014 out of them,\u201d without give any further details. He made a similar threat in May. Oman is negotiating with Iran on how the Strait of Hormuz should be managed, but the US isn\u2019t part of those discussions\u2026.<\/p>\n Intensive talks are continuing, but reaching a deal has been time consuming because of security complexities and the \u201cobstructionist behavior of destructive elements,\u201d Iran\u2019s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei told reporters on Monday.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n More detail from the Wall Street Journal in Trump Threatens to Bomb Oman if It \u2018Gets in the Way\u2019 of Iran Conflict<\/a>:<\/p>\n Iranian negotiators have held talks with Oman in recent weeks over a provisional arrangement to manage shipping through the strait. Those talks are continuing, and yet to yield any tangible results.<\/p>\n Iran\u2019s military has continued to fire at ships transiting the waterway without its permission, seeking to maintain its grip on commercial traffic. Unlike earlier in the conflict, when the U.S. retaliated against such attacks by striking Iranian targets along the strait, the U.S. has so far stood down, frustrating some Gulf allies\u2026.<\/p>\n Muscat\u2019s efforts to act as a neutral broker in the Gulf has rankled U.S. officials who are increasingly interpreting the Omani approach as hostile to American interests.<\/p>\n Iran has launched a series of strikes on Omani sites since the start of the war, including drone attacks on ports used by the U.S.<\/p>\n In June, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Trump administration had threatened to sanction and bomb Oman after intelligence assessments concluded that Muscat was planning to join Iran in tolling vessels in the strategic strait. Oman has repeatedly denied such plans.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Iran is rubbing Trump\u2019s nose in the US\u2019 military shortcomings. Even if Trump never sees stories like this, many in the region and international community will. From PressTV in Source: Pentagon concedes no military plan can secure Strait of Hormuz as Trump seeks scapegoats<\/a>: <\/p>\n Pentagon has concluded that no existing military plan can guarantee the safe passage of shipping through the Strait of Hormuz or ensure energy stability in the region, according to a regional intelligence source speaking to Press TV.<\/p>\n The assessment, shared by an intelligence official familiar with US military deliberations, paints a stark picture of Washington\u2019s strategic deadlock in the Persian Gulf\u2026<\/p>\n \u201cThe Pentagon\u2019s assessment is that, at present, no military plan has the political and security capacity to guarantee the Strait of Hormuz remains open, ensure safe passage, and maintain energy stability,\u201d the informed regional source told Press TV.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n And yet another report of US military weakness from RT in US warship loses power and toilets in South China Sea \u2013 CNN<\/a>:<\/p>\n A US Navy destroyer spent four days without power in the South China Sea last month, depriving its crew of hot meals, flushing toilets, and air conditioning, CNN has reported. The report comes as US sailors in the Persian Gulf are facing similar conditions.<\/p>\n The USS Benfold, an Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer, suffered an \u201cengineering casualty involving its generators\u201d while on an exercise in the South China Sea last month, a Navy spokesman told CNN on Monday.<\/p>\n The Benfold lost the ability to maneuver on its own, and lost galley services, toilets, air conditioning, and drinking water, the spokesman said. At the time of the incident, temperatures in the South China Sea averaged between 32 and 37 degrees Celsius.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n What is pretty sure to get some notice by Trump is a lead story at the Wall Street Journal, Wall Street Journal Iran\u2019s Secret Plan to Escalate the War<\/a>. Obviously, this plan s not a secret if it is the lead story in the Journal particularly since Iran has been saying for weeks that it intends to adopt a more aggressive posture. This article is nevertheless important in that, contrary to Administration regular invocations that Iran\u2019s military has been destroyed and its economy is about to go tits up, it depicts the Iran fighting forces as effective and becoming more so:<\/p>\n Iran\u2019s hard-line leaders huddled in Tehran and came up with a different plan [than seeing the MOU as a path to resolution], according to Iranian and Arab officials. In their view the pact was likely just an attempt by the U.S. and Israel to take pressure off the global economy and buy time for a bigger attack down the road. Instead of putting faith in talks, they took the past two months to prepare for a bigger fight. <\/p>\n Their efforts include giving the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps more control of the country\u2019s regular army, appointing hardened veterans of the war with Iraq and past internal crackdowns to key posts, expanding domestic counterintelligence operations and ramping up production of missiles and drones. The leadership quickly seized the initiative, attacking ships to tighten Iran\u2019s grip on Hormuz and expanding the battlefield to the Red Sea, which Saudi Arabia has used to get around Iran\u2019s chokehold on the Persian Gulf.<\/p>\n Arab intelligence officials have picked up evidence\u2014including communications between Iran and militia allies in countries such as Yemen and Iraq\u2014of a strategic shift inside the country\u2019s hard-line leadership to get their forces ready to widen the war and raise the costs for the U.S., officials familiar with the findings say. Alarming weaker Gulf countries like Kuwait, Iran\u2019s leaders are increasingly talking about offensive operations on enemy territory.<\/p>\n Their overriding goal is to inflict enough pain to ensure the kind of attacks Iran has endured with the 12-day war last year and the continuing conflict aren\u2019t repeated.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is also a widespread view in Iran that the main war has not yet begun,\u201d said Mohammad Hassan Sangtarash, a Tehran-based defense analyst close to the Iranian government. \u201cWhat we have seen so far is increasingly interpreted through the lens of \u2018salami-slicing\u2019 tactics\u2014limited, incremental escalation designed to weaken capabilities before a larger confrontation.\u201d<\/p>\n The Iranian preparations point to an enormous gulf between how Washington and Tehran are perceiving this stage of the war. The divergence has driven a hard-line negotiating stance and reluctance to close deals by Iran\u2019s leaders that has persistently flummoxed Trump, who has called them crazy and accused them of lying.<\/p>\n Iran\u2019s readiness to fight also highlights a deep lack of trust that is likely to keep the two sides from reaching a durable deal to end the conflict any time soon. <\/p>\n Iran\u2019s proclamations include plenty of bravado. The country\u2019s military and economic base have been battered by U.S. and Israeli airstrikes. More pragmatic members of the leadership including Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian have repeatedly warned Iran needs to negotiate a deal to end the war that brings sanctions relief or face the collapse of its economy.<\/p>\n But Iran is rebuilding its infrastructure and restoring access to missile bases much more quickly than expected, a concern to Israeli officials who are familiar with the progress. It also has successfully targeted U.S. bases and retains enough firepower to threaten ships and Gulf energy infrastructure. Arab officials are bracing for continued fighting and an extended disruption of energy supplies.<\/p>\n For the regime, \u201cthe baseline is war,\u201d said Alan Eyre, a former senior U.S. diplomat and nuclear negotiator with Iran. \u201cIran will remain on a wartime footing, preparing for a subsequent attack.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The normally negotiations-optimist Trita Parsi also sees the odds of a new hot phase as high. From Twitter:<\/a><\/p>\n I am increasingly convinced that there will be a third round in the US-Israel-Iran war. It is not inevitable, but the signals I am picking up from the two sides, as well as from key GCC states, leaves me quite pessimistic.<\/p>\n Tehran believes it has the military edge and is openly discussing going on the offensive instead of merely responding to American attacks. By that, Iran will not only have wrested control of the scope and geography of the war from the US, but also its timing.<\/p>\n In the US, on the other hand, an increasingly frustrated Trump not only promises to annex a Strait he can\u2019t open, but also threatens to bomb Oman, even though Muscat by all accounts has become very helpful to the US\u2019s broader strategy. Meaning, it is increasingly representing the US position in the talks rather than its own, given it was Oman\u2019s previous compromise proposals that prompted the first threat by Trump to bomb America\u2019s own mediator.<\/p>\n And of course, Trump has formally endorsed the Pakistan-Saudi-Turkey defense pact, while Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei has reshuffled much of the top Iranian leadership.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Briefly, to Trump perhaps going nuclear. First to the Marjorie Taylor Green tweet that raised well-warranted alarm:<\/p>\n They are discussing using nuclear weapons on Iran in strategy meetings.<\/p>\n Yes you read that correctly. It\u2019s real. I\u2019m not speculating, I know.<\/p>\n And it\u2019s pure evil.<\/p>\n The last time a nuclear weapon was used was August 6th and 9th of 1945 on two cities in Japan, Hiroshima and\u2026<\/p>\n \u2014 Former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene\ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\uddf8 (@FmrRepMTG) August 16, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n More detail comes via a typically lively and informative discussion between Robert Barnes and Brandon Weichert:<\/p>\n\n
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