Trump's Excursion

Thing's Are Going Pete Tong

Mar 17, 2026

So, Trump went and did it, as always seemed likely. Bashing those Islamists before they could have another go at taking him out, apparently. At least, that was one of the explanations offered up. Then there was the one that insisted that Trump was ending a 47 year war – that’s the favourite doing the rounds, at present. Then there’s the ever-popular ‘the mullahs are days away from getting the Bomb!’, which should properly be considered the mother of all justifications, as it has been touted for thirty years or more.

Not forgetting the regime change (or not) rationale, for the ‘benefit of the people’ of course, who deserve to live ‘free from terror’, or some such. Aiding these rationales are the simps, aka ‘MAGA influencers’, who insist that Trump is playing 5D chess (we wouldn’t understand) and that no other president in history is fit to carry his jockstrap. Tucker, Megyn Kelly and their fellow groypers have their own pet theory (the same theory that they reflexively deploy whenever 47 ventures abroad in search of monsters to destroy), which is that Bibi is leading Orange Man Bad around by the nose and that we are condemned to forever exist within Israel First territory.

Sometimes, just sometimes, the pathologically juvenile, histrionic, mendacious nature of American politics surpasses itself and this is one of those occasions - which seem to be coming around with increasing regularity - and the shamelessness of it all is next level. Perhaps that’s a symptom of the self-righteousness that runs like a toxic seam through public life in the good old US of A. I inured myself from as much of that as I could by avoiding the noxious proclamations of the progressive press, only to find that the ‘conservative’ mainstream – latterly – is just as drenched in hubris.

Our soothsayers are all lying; we know that because we can see their lips moving, and because they are part of an ecosystem that polices itself and controls all opposition. None of them ever crash and burn, because they are all playing the same game and they are all transparent bullshitters, execrable by definition, plying their ‘WOW! BREAKING!’ shtick and bamboozling both the terminally naïve and those incapable of independent thought – a target-rich environment, to be sure.

We also know this because the real reason for the current imbroglio has been dreamt up, typed up and published by the establishment itself, within the past four months. But before the big reveal, let’s have a relaxed canter through what passes for American statesmanship in the current age and tick off all the terminological inexactitudes.

Firstly, then, Trump’s assertion (parroted by Pete ‘Strangelove’ Hegseth) that he got the Ayatollah before the Iranians succeeded in their efforts to kill him. Regrettably, there is no evidence that either attempt on Trump was sponsored by Iran, just the usual opaque, unverifiable drivel served up by the FBI about Iranian hit squads with ground-to-air missiles, followed by one of those bespoke, hermetically-sealed ‘sting’ operations on some inept Pakistani businessman, who just happened to recruit two Bureau snitches for the mission. The detailed sketch of the planned hit looked liked this.

Figure 1

Next up, the incessantly repeated claim that a ‘war’ with Iran has been ongoing for 47 years and Trump is the only one with the cojones to say it like it is. Has Iran been hostile to the US (and the West, in general) since the Iranian Revolution? Yes, mostly. Has there been a war? No, but had there been, it would be almost entirely the fault of the Americans themselves. Because, whilst the cognoscenti are prepared to permit a smattering of dissident talk about the CIA’s first successful coup d’etat in Iran in 1953, I haven’t read a single account that accurately depicts the role of the Agency and MI6 in the subsequent removal of the Shah in 1979. Perhaps that’s because some people might get the crazy idea that the aforementioned 47 years of strife – for the Iranian people, more than anyone – were the fault of the Americans and the Brits.

In both 1953 and in 1979, the bone of contention had been Iran’s oil and which ruler would play by the rules imposed on them. The Shah was initially a beneficiary and then a target when he got too big for his britches. In 1978, BP was turning the screw in contract negotiations, refusing to honour conditions and precipitating a crisis. The Shah started harbouring delusions of independence, but it was not to be. Trained agitators fanned the flames of religious discontent and the oil workers went on strike:

“As Iran’s domestic economic troubles grew, American ‘security’ advisers to the Shah’s Savak secret police implemented a policy of ever more brutal repression, in a manner calculated to maximize popular antipathy to the Shah. At the same time, the Carter administration cynically began protesting abuses of ‘human rights’ under the Shah.”(2)

The Agency was an old hand by then. It was at this time that the BBC was giving Khomeini his propaganda platform on their Persian-language broadcasts and refusing the Shah the right of reply. Their correspondents fanned out into the Iranian rural, fanning the flames. BP organised a flight of capital from Tehran, through its strong ties with financial institutions. Carter, a president who desired a moral foreign policy, was simply kept in the dark. The CIA’s top brass, in their hubris, reckoned that they could control Khomeini – they were wrong.

Which is not to say that they didn’t try to ‘make it right’. Carter greenlit Saddam’s invasion in 1980, but Bush and Reagan (soon to be the next cabs off the presidential rank) and their Israeli contacts shipped war materiel to the Ayatollah –(3) it is also rumoured that, with the active cooperation of the US military, they also stripped weapons stockpiles in Europe and shipped them to Iran. All whilst Carter was still president.

Reagan was compromised before he had even taken office. He had been part of a criminal conspiracy that he was now obligated to extend, as required. Iran, subject of Carter’s arms embargo (which Reagan supported in public), was supplied with arms from the very beginning of Reagan’s presidency.(4) This was the Iran-Contra scandal, in which – incidentally – Epstein was embroiled, but that’s a story for another day. So, the US and Iran were bedfellows, not enemies in the early-to-mid eighties, regardless of the religious fundamentalism of the Ayatollah’s regime.

Another justification trotted out by Trump et al is the ‘terrorist attack’ on the Marine barracks in Beirut, in 1983. Lebanon had been embroiled in a civil war for seven years by 1982, when Israel invaded in an attempt to evict the PLO, which had taken refuge in the capital city. US troops were briefly deployed in August of that year as part of a ceasefire force and exited once the PLO decamped for Tunisia. They were back again soon enough when the Phalangists, a Lebanese national party, sent its militia into two camps in West Beirut on the coattails of the IDF and slaughtered more than 2,000 men, women and children. At the least, the Israelis failed to stop the massacre; at the worst, they facilitated it by arming the militia and blockading the camps.(5)

Reagan sent the ‘peacekeeping’ troops back in, at the request of the Lebanese government, but they armed and trained the Lebanese Army, thus becoming embroiled in the ongoing war themselves. The IDF also did its utmost to involve the Americans.(6) In April, the US embassy was attacked with a truck bomb, the third such attack – the Iraqi and French embassies had already been wrecked in similar fashion. Rather than exit stage left, the US president doubled-down. By the late summer, the Marines were being targeted by Muslim snipers on a daily basis. Reagan authorised air strikes and the Navy repeatedly bombarded Muslim positions over a period of weeks.(7)

Early on Sunday, October 23^rd, a lone bomber drove a truck through non-existent security (the Marine guards were not even allowed loaded weapons), lodged it in the lobby of Marine headquarters and detonated it. The result was the deaths of 243 soldiers. What then followed was a series of obfuscations, outright lies and special pleading from the president on down. It was decided that it would be labelled a ‘terrorist attack’, even though the target was military and the US had involved itself in someone else’s war.

Every other day of the year, the mission would have been regarded – by non-partisan actors – as legitimate; the investigating commission found that there was a direct link between the Navy shelling of Muslims and the attack on the Marines.(8) The arrogance and incompetence of the top brass in Beirut, who seemed to believe that they could do as they pleased, was exposed and hundreds lost their lives. It’s likely that the truck-bomber himself was from an Iranian-linked group (according to the CIA, so make of that what you will), but that’s about it.

A bombing, in Lebanon, by Lebanese Muslims fighting in the Lebanese Civil War against Americans who had exceeded their charter and were actively supporting the enemy. The outrage machine that accompanies any pushback against US actions is to be expected, but it’s pretty thin gruel as a justification for the ongoing war. None of which prevents the current administration and the entire ‘conservative’ blogosphere from railing against the ‘terror regime’ in Tehran which dares to quibble with America’s ‘divine mission’, as many would characterise it – including some in uniform.

The US had already involved itself in the Middle East in a big way. Nixon had found himself without a chair when the Bretton Woods music finally stopped in 1971. The post-war Bretton Woods arrangement had been straightforward. Forty three allied countries agreed to peg their currencies to the dollar, which in turned was pegged to gold at a fixed rate. By this mechanism, currencies were stable and all dollars owned were convertible to gold at a known rate, as required, or in a circumstance where a country harboured some doubts as to the virility of the dollar. Because the dollar was backed by gold, there was strong demand for the currency. The ensuing problems weren’t founded on the arrangement itself, but on the fallibility of human nature.

LBJ got the ball rolling in earnest and was responsible for a vast expansion in federal deficit spending to finance both the Vietnam War and the Great Society; the creation of Medicare and Medicaid stem from this period. Spending money that it didn’t have became a temptation too difficult for government to resist. After all, the dollar was the anchor of the world financial system, so liberties could be taken with little risk; or so it was believed – by Americans.

Other countries came to feel rather differently. Economies such as Japan, Germany and France were dependent on the US dollar to maintain the economic growth that they were enjoying and the reckless deficit spending and large trade deficits which were becoming a permanent feature of the American policy landscape did not inspire confidence. The element causing the most disquiet was the foundational commitment to peg the dollar to gold at $35 an ounce.

America had accumulated vast new debt, did not have the money to pay for it and was haemorrhaging its gold reserves as nation after nation redeemed its dollars. As 1971 progressed, it became apparent that the Bretton Woods agreement was in its death throes. Having to become the global gold repository, in order to satisfy foreigners who doubted the strength of the dollar, had never been part of the US plan; the idea was that the gold backstop engendered trust in the dollar, trust which had now been compromised.(4)

There were solutions to hand, two in particular, but both shared one unattractive attribute. They required fiscal responsibility. The US could have got its economic house in order, ameliorated deficit spending and reduced its trade deficit or it could have renegotiated the rate of dollar to gold conversion and similarly exercised monetary restraint in the aftermath. It chose to do neither, but to instead untether the dollar from gold and abandon any further pretence. This is what is now known as The Nixon Shock.

But some other arrangement was nonetheless needed if the US government was to continue splashing the cash like a drunken sailor on shore leave. Bretton Woods had propped up the dollar artificially and, with demand set to crater, birds would come home to roost. That would never do. Fortunately, the Saudis saw an opportunity to have their cake and eat it, although the arrangement took four long years to implement. We know it as petrodollars, which are US dollars that are received by oil producers in payment for oil and which are then deposited in Western banks.

This system, arrived at via a 1974 agreement with the Saudi Arabians, was introduced by virtue of the Saudis insisting that every nation that wished to purchase oil from them had to pay for it in US dollars:

“The petrodollar was a simple deal. The Gulf states price their oil in dollars, recycle the surplus into US Treasuries, and in exchange get American military protection. Clean, elegant, and - for fifty years - it actually worked. The US got permanent demand for its currency and its debt. The Gulf got security guarantees backed by the most powerful military on earth.”(9)

By 1975, all of the oil producing countries of OPEC (the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries) had decided to take advantage of a similar offer. Et voilà. A long term guaranteed demand, not just for US dollars, but for the purchase of government debt as well and all the Americans had to do was – notionally – protect the Gulf States (an agreement that had already been in place since 1945). The Sunni Gulf States. The ones with US bases festooned across the landscape, like this.

Figure 2

These bases have been sold as the muscle that backs up the guarantee. Not everyone in the region was onboard with the Gulf States’ leadership, however – not that their opinions were sought. The Arab clergy (and the public) were largely of the view that they had been sold down the river and that Arabian autonomy was now denominated in US dollars.(10) An impartial observer might be tempted to give credence to such a view, given that the vaunted ‘joint venture’ reads far more like an American corporate takeover, with millions of foreign professionals ‘guiding’ the OECD governments. It would not be difficult to understand why Arab patriots might feel humiliated by the US presence in the region.

Iran, though, was a founder member of OPEC, as were Iraq and Libya. There were no US bases in these countries. Iran is over 90% Shia Muslim, Iraq was around 61% Shia (although Saddam was Sunni) and Gaddafi’s Libya was overwhelmingly Sunni. Hussein, however, was America’s friend (until he wasn’t), so the free-thinking Gaddafi and the CIA’s epic fail of a regime in Iran were the problem children, along with non-OPEC Syria, a Sunni nation ruled by Alawites (a Shia offshoot).

Neither Saddam nor Gaddafi ran theocratic regimes; their fates were sealed when they started getting ideas beyond their station. The former, having failed to come to heel after getting pummelled in the First Gulf War, devoted a deal of energy to a campaign to sell Iraq’s oil in euros.(11)(12) Libya went further yet, proposing a new currency – the gold dinar – for Arab and African countries, reviving an earlier idea that had failed to gain traction due to “a number of unexplained deaths, murders, plane crashes, sanctions, guerilla warfare and NATO interventions.”(13) We know what happened to those two.

But Iran (and Syria) hung on in there, despite ruinous sanctions which, in the former’s case, have been in place in one form or another since 1979. In 1984, Reagan first designated Iran as a State Sponsor of Terrorism, whilst at the same time arming the regime on the down-low which, to a normal person, might seem a little counter-intuitive, not to say hypocritical. The US consistently claims that Iran sponsors groups whose interests “run counter to US interests in other conflicts”,(14) such as the Houthis, Hamas and Hezbollah, although it is the US that has involved itself in the region and it is often US allies that are targeted. That said:

“Iran has also backed groups that...attacked US soldiers in Iraq, and fought against US allies in Syria.”(15)

The mullahs are prepared, in exceptional circumstances, to fund Sunni groups such as Hamas, if they can reliably hassle the US, Israel or the Saudis. Mostly, the proxy battles are concerned with disputing regional hegemony with Saudi Arabia, and the groups that are funded also have their own interests, independent of Iran. The other Gulf States do not sit idly by, either. Qatar was sending Hamas $30 million a month as of late 2023, for instance.(16) Turkey also lends support. The UN sends Hamas money that is used to construct fortifications. Israel, too, from as far back as 1977. Netanyahu is an advocate – this is him, in 2019, addressing Likud party members:

“Anyone who wants to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state has to support bolstering Hamas and transferring money to Hamas. This is part of our strategy.”(17)

Divide and conquer, you see. The Americans themselves proposed training and financing a force of 5,000 PLO ‘commandos’ in the West Bank – this would be the same PLO responsible for Intifadas and scores of suicide bombings which, by any metric, were terrorist acts.(18) And these would be the same Americans who fund the Lebanese Army, knowing that the money and equipment they supply is used to uncover Israeli spy cells attempting to gather intelligence on Hezbollah and Hamas.(19) And also produce textbooks like this.

Figure 3

Daesh (ISIS) was created by US, British and Israeli intelligence and is funded by the US, the Saudis, Kuwait, Turkey and Qatar and uses US weaponry.(20)(21)(22)(23) I’m pretty sure ISIS is regarded as a terrorist organisation, notwithstanding the fact that one of Trump’s most recent buddies is Abu Mohammed al-Julani, ‘formerly’ of al-Qaeda and Islamic State, now recognised as the legitimate Syrian leader, following a CIA-sponsored coup. That would be this guy.

Figure 4

“What Iran’s done is support the Lebanese Hezbollah, the Palestinian Hamas, and the Yemeni Houthis in their wars against Israel. I’m no fan of the Iranian regime; the world would be better off without them. But everyone in the Muslim world is either a declared or covert enemy of Israel.”(24)

But some are more of a problem than others. Salafi-Jihadi groups – Sunnis – openly call for random violence against civilians, whereas ‘radical Shiites’ don’t, a distinction apparent in the Iranian response to the assassination of Soleimani by 45. In the aftermath, US troops were legitimate targets, but not Americans at large. Almost all Islamist attacks in the West have been committed by Sunnis, not Shiites. Funny how that fact doesn’t feature in mainstream communication, is it not? And strange that the US would have cosied up to the more venomous of the two branches.

It’s also worth noting that Iran’s GDP is around $375 billion per year. In contrast, the UAE’s is $569 billion, Saudi Arabia’s is $1.27 trillion and the US is going to be spending nearly a trillion dollars per annum on its military alone. Methinks that there is a distinct possibility that Iran’s mischievousness has been considerably over-emphasised and that context is almost entirely absent. US leadership is not hurrying to indict other sponsors of terrorism - because they’re mates with them - nor are they contemplating a mea culpe. Additionally, the Middle East has a flavour that’s all its own:

“It’s a neighbourhood where actors whack each other with sticks. If one of them whacks you, you *need* to come back with a bigger stick and whack them back (and harder) to show you’re serious....the issue is that if you whack someone in this region TOO hard/with too big of a stick...they actually start believing that you *actually* intend to kill them this time. In that case, they come back with a gun instead of a bigger stick.”(25)

It doesn’t sound like a region where restraint and hand-sitting are rewarded. But it does sound like a place with a highly flexible code of honour, a circumstance that the censorious, judgemental and perpetually sanctimonious US leadership is unwilling to allow. So, like always, they lie. They refuse to acknowledge that their own machinations and those of the Iranians are morally on a par, and that American mischief-making is considerably more pervasive, given the financial disparity. Instead, they prefer to focus on yet another sin of commission – Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

How do you imagine that Iran started down that road in the first place? After all, there are only nine nuclear powers in the world; the US, Russia, the UK, France, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel. Nuclear power plants operate in another twenty-two. So which country gave the Iranians the original assist? You’ve guessed it – the US, which even gifted Tehran a small reactor in 1967.(26) However, once Khomeini went off-script, about a fortnight after assuming power, all bets were off.

By 1998, Clinton was warning that weapons, not energy, was the goal and from 2003 onwards, the Iranians were under the microscope. The UN, in a rare departure, passed a resolution targeting one of Israel’s enemies, rather than Israel itself, and then went to work on sanctions. From there on in, it’s a story replete with claim and counter-claim, the assassination of nuclear scientists and, to the layperson, an impenetrable fog of assertions by inherently unreliable actors. Obama’s flawed reset in 2013, which purposely avoided any restrictions on ICBMs, didn’t survive the ascension of Orange Man Bad, who appears to harbour considerable animus for Iran.

It seems to me that we, the public, have no way of knowing the truth of the matter. I suspect that Iran wants nuclear weapons but, whilst India and Pakistan didn’t sign the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, Iran did. Israel and the US are probably the best informed, but neither can be trusted to play it straight. The prospect of an Islamic fundamentalists’ finger hovering over the big red button is an appalling one and Israel, in particular, has a legitimate interest in preventing that outcome. Perhaps, then, last year’s bombing runs on Iran’s nuclear facilities pass the sniff test. Perhaps; although it would suit both Trump and Bibi to exaggerate.

The mullahs undoubtedly see things differently and, in fairness, the difference between the clerics and neocon sociopaths like Lindsey Graham may not be all that marked. They are also, no doubt, mindful of the lessons of history although, as far as I can tell, nobody on ‘our side’ has ever floated the possibility that defence, rather than offense, might be the primary objective. However, Saddam gave up his WMD programme under pressure and ended up in a hangman’s noose. Gaddafi eased off on his own similar programme and was sodomised with a bayonet before being beaten to death. Little Rocket Man, on the other hand, is now untouchable.

A nuclear bomb would reset the balance of Middle Eastern power in a profound way – although the Saudis would still benefit from America’s nuclear umbrella, the regional match up would now be on an equal footing and the Israelis might think twice before acting. However, the petrodollar merry-go-round relies upon at least the pretence that the Gulf States are getting some bang for their bucks, so Trump has an excuse to mount his white charger and do battle.

At least, he may have done last year, prior to the Twelve-Day War, but – if we recall – that was a resounding success, was it not? The most successful success ever, or some such? He was still banging on about it a week or so ago:

“Trump Tuesday night reiterated that Iran’s nuclear program had been ‘obliterated’ - and so it presents the contradiction of the US wanting to once again wipe out a nuclear program which the administration says is actually no longer there.”(27)

So far, then, none of the reasons given hold much in the way of water. Had Iran been at war with the US for the past 47 years, I’m reasonably confident that most Americans would at least be aware of it, rather than having to have it rammed down their throats by soy boys like Benny Johnson. The assertion that Iran was days away from making a nuclear weapon might be more credible if the boys and girls in the MIC hadn’t been crying wolf for the past thirty years. No evidence has been presented – either to Congress or to the public – which doesn’t necessarily mean anything either way, but the ‘trust, but verify’ days ought to be long in the past, by now.

Trump’s bluster about Iranian assassination attempts might be believed if evidence could be provided by the same agencies that have repeatedly (and provably) lied to us all for the past decade and more. And throwing the word ‘terrorist’ around whilst cosying up to ISIS, Qatar and other state sponsors is a workable definition of hypocrisy. All in all, then, a veritable cavalcade of bullshit, lies and unverifiable ‘trust me’ assertions.

There is one further, half-hearted justification that is being trotted out – that bombing the crap out of Iran (on top of the sanctions that have decimated the economy) is to the benefit of the Iranian people, toiling under the yoke of religious extremism. It’s not my impression that Trump and Hegseth care a single jot about ordinary Iranians but, as they both style themselves ‘Christians’ (kinda), perhaps they feel obligated to pretend that they do. So, here’s a starter for ten. Which Muslim country didn’t send a team to the ongoing Women’s Asia Cup football competition, because women and sport are mutually exclusive?

And, as a follow-up, which Middle Eastern theocracy requires a burkha, and which merely a headscarf? Answers, respectively; Afghanistan, Afghanistan and Iran. Yet the US has sent billions of dollars to the Taliban since the snafu also known as the US withdrawal,(28) but has crippled Iran with sanctions, prior to using the country as target practice. If you’re seeking to find the kind of moral authority claimed by Trump, you’ll be needing an excavator on a long lease. Perhaps, in the longer run, half a million dead kids will be an acceptable price again for ‘democracy’, as it was in Iraq according to Albright.(29)

I have no truck with Islam. If it was a political party, espousing second-class status for women, throwing gay people off the roofs of tall buildings and exhorting its adherents to kill infidels, it would be banned. If the Palestinians voted in Hamas and allowed it to use them as human shields – yet still approved of the militants – I’m not going to be draping a keffiyeh around my shoulders and claiming a genocide in Gaza. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. But, with the exception of Israel, the entire Middle East is Islamic; friends and enemies alike. It’s not my job – and it’s not your job – to tell them what they can and can’t believe.

None of America’s friends in the Gulf States are democracies. They are all absolute monarchies or sheikdoms; there are no meaningful elections amongst them. Human rights abuses of non-Muslims and foreign workers are a feature across them all. In Saudi Arabia, no political parties or national elections are allowed. The king must comply with Sharia, and the Quran and Sunnah (the traditions of Muhammad) comprise the constitution.(30) Trump’s buddy in Qatar presides over a political system that ranked 172^nd out of 179 on the Electoral Democracy Index last year.(31) He has also provided a safe haven for the Hamas leadership for many years.

Iran’s Supreme Leader is elected by the Assembly of Experts, eighty-eight members directly elected by the public, albeit from a thoroughly vetted list of candidates. The Guardian Council, an unelected 12-member council of clerics and lawyers, sits above the popularly elected legislature and may veto legislation. It also ensures that reform-minded candidates cannot run for office. The legislature – the Iranian Parliament – is not quite a paper tiger, as international treaties and the like must be approved by it.

The president of the Islamic Republic of Iran, elected by universal adult suffrage by Iranians of at least 18 years of age, is the 2 I/C, answering to the Supreme Leader. The Guardian Council has stated that there is no legal impediment to a woman being president. The president is responsible for the day-to-day running of the government, under supervision, and is effectively the XO. Sharia law, with elements of civil law, is the basis of the legal system and Iran’s human rights record – whilst downright poor - is in line with others in the region. On the other hand, Iran was the first country to introduce unconditional basic income. Nonetheless, turnout in presidential elections has dipped from 73% in 2017 to under 50% in 2024.(32)

The activists at V-Dem, whilst not to be wholly trusted ideologically, have Iran pegged as an electoral autocracy, one category up from the rest of the Gulf Countries.(33) It’s effectively “a republic nestled within a theocracy.”(34) Not the best overall, but far from the worst in the Islamic world. And, despite the electorate’s increasing ennui, one should exercise considerable caution when assessing the recent wall-to-wall reporting about ‘popular uprisings’ and ‘massacres’ (see The Law Of The Jungle). All is not as it seems.

The final thing that Trump’s excursion isn’t is Israel’s war. Does it benefit Israel? Yes. Was it coordinated with Israel? Again, yes; I think Netanyahu has visited the White House seven times since last June. Was it undertaken solely at Israel’s behest, as Rubio would have us believe? No, which Little Marco – of all people – knows well enough. The idea that Bibi could not be contained, so the US was obliged to undertake a pre-emptive strike to protect its assets in the region is a deflection. The ‘Greater Israel’, ‘Israel First’ numbskulls – those that can read, at any rate - know that Iran is a US priority and that the reasoning behind the targetting has nothing to do with Israel. Bibi is opportunistically making hay while the sun shines and the remainder of the Gulf States aren’t going to go to bat for a rogue Shia state. The petrodollar lives on, for now.

Iran, like Venezuela and Cuba, is being attacked because of China and China is being attacked because – geopolitically – the Great Reset is in the process of being hijacked. Not cancelled – captured and reconfigured. You remember the WEF’s infamous “you’ll own nothing and you’ll be happy” nostrum? Well, in the same video there was another prediction; “The US won’t be the world’s leading superpower. A handful of countries will dominate.”(35) I have never been able to reconcile that future with what we know of the character of the US predator class.

The rest of the gibberish – 3-D printed transplant organs, renting everything, the climate apocalypse, multiculturalism on steroids, heading to Mars to find alien life – was all of a piece, but the likelihood of American high net-worth sociopaths blending back into the pack voluntarily? Not so much. I could see them availing themselves of the digital control grid that is being erected around us, the better to enhance compliance and profits, but I couldn’t see them magnanimously surrendering their first-amongst-equals status. However, I couldn’t see how it was all going to pan out with Biden and his fellow travellers in the White House.

It’s taking shape now. Gone are the relatively non-interventionist, self-flagellating America-hating, collectivist wokesters, to be replaced by the previously dominant American exceptionalists, who are determined to halt multipolarity in its tracks and reassert American hegemony. There’ll be none of this ‘breaking bread with equals’ nonsense; it’ll be ‘do as we say or else’. At present, it’s being dressed up as some variation on the Monroe Doctrine – now reinterpreted as an all-powerful America in the Western hemisphere – but that’s only Phase One. Whilst Iran obviously isn’t in the West, China’s influence is. So, attack China’s Achilles heel, and reap the knock-on effects closer to home.

Venezuela was Round One, Iran is the follow-up. The Chinese are the top buyers of Iranian oil, although they claim that they aren’t. As much as 90% of Iran’s crude oil flows to China, in defiance of US sanctions, most of it on shadow fleet tankers.(36) In response to the attempt to stymie them via the global financial system, Beijing and Tehran have developed a parallel oil trading system, which is denominated in Chinese currency. But the hegemon cannot be seen to be defied, because others might also chance their arm.

So, it was only a matter of time before Trump – having degraded Iran’s defences – went after Kharg Island, which handles 90% of Iran’s crude oil exports. Which he duly did, claiming that he was only targeting military installations, but reserving the right to reconsider if Iran continues to block the Straits of Hormuz. Hot on the heels of that threat came yet another justification for US actions:

“Iran had plans for taking over the entire Middle East and completely obliterating Israel. JUST LIKE IRAN, THOSE PLANS ARE NOW DEAD.”(37)

The Marines are allegedly en-route, perhaps to Kharg Island itself, which would be an ambitious (for which read potentially suicidal) operation, as it is only 16 miles off the coast of Iran. Who knows? One bright spark over at American Thinker believes that it would be a good idea to occupy and keep the island “to deter future Iranian aggression, charging Iran top dollar fees for allowing it to export its oil.”(38) The calculation may be that if the Revolutionary Guard can’t get paid, the end would be nigh.

Figure 5

There would be the odd risk attached to taking out the oil terminal, the most notable being that the missiles that the Iranians have said they will launch at all the oil terminals in countries bordering the Persian Gulf are not to be found on the island, but elsewhere. The Saudis, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain would all be vulnerable. The potential targets include the largest marine oil loading centre in the world (capacity 6 million barrels a day) and the largest LNG terminal, too.(39) We don’t know whether the strategic geniuses in the Pentagon are fully cognisant of the potential downsides of attacking Kharg.

What we do know is that the US National Security Strategy is centred on denying China any kind of leadership, even in her own hemisphere. And, given that the US is effectively at war with her only other serious rival in Ukraine, it is clear that peaceful co-existence in the Brave New World is not on Trump’s agenda. No new wars? How about not stopping the one and starting the other? The entire strategy document is written in the tone that a hall monitor would use; it reeks of American exceptionalism. A few examples:

“We want other nations to see us as their partner of first choice, and we will (through various means) discourage their collaboration with others.”(40)

“The choice all countries should face is whether they want to live in an American-led world...or in a parallel one in which they are influenced by countries on the other side of the world.”(41)

The odd bromide is mixed in, not to be taken too seriously:

“It is natural and just that all nations put their interests first and guard their sovereignty...We stand for the sovereign rights of nations...”(42)

“The key to successful relations in the Middle East is accepting the region, its leaders, and its nations as they are...”(43)

The “country on the other side of the world” is in the cross-hairs, so it is apparent that Trump only stands for the sovereign rights of some nations. So much for leaving the Middle East be. Regardless of how long the war with Iran lasts – and it is a war – there will be consequences. Some of them are already becoming apparent.

The Kurds, for instance, are no longer persona non grata, as Trump casts around for people to do his dirty work for him. Having thrown them under the bus in Syria in order to curry favour with ISIS Boy, the Iranian chapter (currently across the border in Iran) is now being buttered up. Orange Man Bad wants them in the fight.(44) The CIA is, naturally, handing over small arms like candy.(45) But the Kurds appear hesitant, as well they might.

As well as Trump’s recent betrayal, they will remember Poppy Bush’s 1991 call for the Kurds to overthrow Saddam Hussein. When they attempted to do so, Bush did nothing to help – tens of thousands were killed and nearly two million displaced.(46) In total, the US has done the dirty on them at least nine times over the years, including another by Trump himself in 2019.(47)(48) Plus, the terrain is formidable (the Kurds would be attacking from the south-west) and a ground invasion is more likely to rally the Iranian people to the cause than splinter them. In the pantheon of stupid ideas, the proposal would be vying for a podium spot.

Figure 6

Then there’s the vast expense of the bombardment and the well-founded suspicion that the US is running out of munitions. The Pentagon reckons it’s spending a couple of billion a day, but that’s from an outfit that hasn’t passed an audit in eight years. Counting stuff does not appear to be its strong suit. The bill for missile defence alone is likely to be at least that high, without any allowance for deployment, logistical support and so forth.(49) In addition, the military has “already burned through stockpiles of critical munitions that would normally last for years.”(50) Cue a cranked-up printing press, higher interest rates and higher prices for American consumers.

Dr Strangelove assured all and sundry that “our munitions are full up and our will is iron-clad”,(51) but then he would, wouldn’t he? It would give the lie to previous claims that supplies were running low due to the extraordinary generosity of the American tax-payer in supplying Zelensky with American weaponry, to be sold-on at the weapons markets in the Khyber Pass and invested in his pension plan. Replacement weapons are not immediately available and Western capacity is underwhelming. Plus, China controls 79% of global tungsten mined output – tungsten is used in missile components and other weaponry – and Xi has (sensibly) decided that it would be foolish to provide a declared enemy with the means to inflict harm. So, it’s in short supply and the price is through the roof.(52)

Figure 7

I imagine that various governments who might be considered potential future targets are scribbling on the back of fag packets round about now, “but pacifists should rejoice; stupidity in military supply chains puts a binding limit on how many ... people we can kill.”(53) At the outset of the war (of choice, remember) Patriot interceptor systems inventories were only a quarter full and Tomahawks were also in short supply.(54)(55) That’s the kind of thing that happens when military contractors have spent $110 billion on stock buybacks within the past five years, boosting their share price, dividends and executive bonuses.(56) That’s American exceptionalism right there.

There is also the inevitable logjam in the Straits of Hormuz to consider and its longer term lag effect. As soon as the Iranians reacted to the assault by playing their ace in the hole, things got messy, quickly.

Figure 8

Who’d have thunk it? It isn’t necessarily the case that every tanker that chances its arm will get blown up - although at least eighteen have been hit since February 28^th -(57) but the risk sends insurance premiums sky high (or gets policies cancelled) and captains are understandably reluctant to risk lives and hundreds of millions of dollars of assets. Trump told everyone not to worry, the US will cover the insurance costs and the US Navy will escort vessels through, but the sailors had other ideas and risk-assessed themselves out of the game.

The Mensa-nominated Secretary of War, one of the world’s most distinguished hair-splitters, noted that (technically) the Straits are open for transit, if one disregards the fact that Iran is shooting at shipping.(58) That’s what you get when hair-gel, lapel pins and perfectly aligned pocket handkerchiefs are the prerequisites for the top job. To the rest of us, it seems those cheap, one-way Iranian drones are a bit of a bugger. This is the damage they inflicted on the Port of Salah in Oman.

Figure 9

A fifth of the world’s oil supply goes through the Straits plus a third of the world’s fertiliser and, at present, it’s a zero-sum game. Iran’s boats get through – as do Chinese and Indian vessels – and Western boats don’t. The mullahs have now come up with another jolly wheeze; they will let a limited number of tankers through, provided they trade their cargo in Chinese yuan.(59) Trump is naturally upset that the Iranians aren’t prostrating themselves before him, but they don’t seem to be particularly keen to throw in the towel.

They say that they don’t want a ceasefire, because “the aggressor must be punished and taught a lesson.”(60) They may (or may not) be laying mines, which Trump wants removed immediately – naturally. I’m not convinced that they’re going to listen; after all, they haven’t so far. And if Trump ramps up the bombing campaign in response, the likelihood is that the US will simply run out of munitions sooner. If mines are being laid, I can’t see the president ending the war until the problem is fixed and sending minesweepers into the Straits would seem to be a risky business.

And it’s difficult to see how the US could back away if Iran is still dispatching missiles – there have been 48 waves of missile and drone attacks, so far.(61) In short, the decision as to the war’s duration may no longer be Trump’s to make. I am not and never have been a military man, but it does seem to me that this war is a tad asymmetrical, inasmuch as the seemingly huge effort required to completely neutralise Iran’s offensive capabilities can be undone by the deployment of a relatively limited numbers of mines (or the belief that they’ve been deployed) and/or a handful of missile strikes on key targets.

Perhaps there’s a touch of rope-a-dope about Iran’s defensive strategy, and perhaps the Americans are okay with their allies paying more for everything as long as China suffers, too. And China would suffer disproportionately if the Straits were sealed, as would India and Japan.(62) Or – just maybe – they haven’t thought it through properly and, if the shock and awe strategy fails, there isn’t much of a Plan B. It’s beginning to look that way. And there were seemingly well-founded rumours that the top brass at the Department of War thought the war ill-conceived.(63)

Continually muddying the waters as to what constitutes a win might seem clever, but it is somewhat undermined by Trump’s demands for unconditional surrender, which don’t leave a lot of room for an off-ramp. And threatening more of the same unless Iran stops fighting back sounds more like bluster than strategy:

“Trump has blown the opportunity to say we taught them a lesson, back off, and declare victory—like he did when supposedly destroying their nuclear facilities in June. He’s made it an existential fight for the Iranian regime, with elements of religious war. Which is especially dangerous in a region full of true believers.”(64)

One might argue that America’s bluff is already in the process of being called. That pesky petrodollar deal – previously a one way track, paved with fiat money – has now become due, and it turns out that those US bases across the Gulf aren’t all they’re cracked up to be. Dmitry Medvedev, not a man renowned for rhetorical restraint, nonetheless got it at least mostly right:

“The Gulf Arab countries let American bases onto their territory. Naively, they expected protection from them. Like hell! The US just uses them...they’re not protection, they’re a threat.”(65)

The Iranians knows that US bases in the region have been used, for mid-air refuelling at the least. They also know that other Gulf states have allowed US troops to launch attacks from their territories:

“Empty ATAMCS containers were found in the desert[s] of Kuwait and Bahrain. The missiles were used by U.S. troops using HIMARS launchers to fire towards Iran. A recent failure by a U.S. bomber pilot to shut off his air transponder showed that Saudi airspace was used to fuel U’S bombers for attacks in Iran.”(66)

We are not citizens of Iran, but if we were, we would likely be pissed, no matter our opinion of the mullahs. I suspect few of us hail from Bahrain or Dubai, but I imagine they are not best pleased to be in receipt of incoming, either. Not what being an ‘ally’ of the US is supposed to be about. It doesn’t help when the neocon’s neocon is shooting his mouth – in familiar fashion – as a billionaire from the UAE has noted:

“And the clearest thing of all is what Senator Graham himself said when he spoke about oil. He stated that Iran and Venezuela hold together 31% of global oil reserves, and that the United States could establish a partnership with this share of the world’s oil, and that it would be a nightmare for China...”(67)

In the meantime, the Trump administration’s master planners and the rest of the 32-member International Energy Agency (IEA) have approved a 400-million barrel release from Strategic Petroleum Reserves, to help deal with an emergency entirely of America’s doing. In total, the US will release 172 million barrels out of the 415 million held, which will take about three months to deliver. The Energy Secretary’s take on that was to rejoice at Trump’s responsible stewardship of America’s energy security.(68)

Other measures are coming on-stream. Scott Bessent, the Treasury Secretary, graciously granted India a short-term waiver, which gave them permission to buy Russian oil. Scott The Merciful. The Indians responded unnecessarily brusquely, stating that “India has never depended on permission from any country to buy Russian oil.”(69) Which would seem to be the case as, despite Trumpian bullying, Russia is still India’s largest crude oil supplier. And, as Russian crude does not go through the Straits, it is much sought after at present. Putin has signalled that he’s prepared to assist the Europeans with long-term supply deals, if they can “reorient themselves” and ditch their habitual sanctimony.(70) Easier said than done, I would think. The Belgian PM made noises to that effect and got sawn off at the knees by the Eurocrats.(71)

Perhaps the most notable development is what looks a lot like a planned rapprochement between the US and Russia. Bessent has announced that Russia, like India, is to be granted some sanctions relief for a calendar month. All oil or petroleum products that had been loaded onto vessels by March 12^th - which are now ‘stranded at sea’ – can be sold in petrodollars.(72) However, the devil is in the details. Three days after Trump and Putin met in Alaska, the Russians restarted their Arctic-2 LNG terminals and, for the past six months, have been pumping sanctioned oil and gas and storing the product on ‘floating platforms’, despite the lack of customers and the expense and risk involved. Now all of that oil and gas – worth double – can be sold worldwide.(73)

What should we make of that? Or, more importantly, what are other countries going to make of that? It is my suspicion that most of them are going to break out Occam’s Razor and conclude that Trump gave Putin a heads-up last August. They might further surmise that perhaps 47 has found a way to break free of the shackles of his Deep State, by providing a boost to Russia’s war-chest whilst simultaneously depleting US weapons stockpiles to critical levels, thus starving Zelensky of materiel. Maybe.

Intended or otherwise, those are the facts on the ground. It would certainly have been prudent to have a word in Putin’s shell-like, as the Russians are ostensibly Iran’s allies and are in possession of hypersonics that are capable of shredding US carrier-groups. But, if that is Trump’s strategy, it is not without its downsides – the further erosion of trust, for one. The US has now used talks as a cover for war preparations on three separate occasions in the past year; with Venezuela and twice with Iran.

Witkoff and Kushner made some maximalist demands of Iran, which would have required the country to completely surrender its capacity to defend itself. Nonetheless, according to the Omani chief mediator on CBS’s Face the Nation, a draconian nuclear agreement was “within our reach,”(74) one that would have involved zero stockpiling of enriched nuclear material. Oman is a long-standing intermediary in US-Iran diplomacy, with a reputation for honesty and discretion. Making like a talking head on US television is not their style, but my guess is that their envoy knew (or had a suspicion as to) what was coming:

“The Iranians naturally had to think long and hard before agreeing to all our terms. Therefore, they held a full meeting of their top leadership to decide whether to do so. But prompting the Iranians to hold such a high-level meeting had apparently been the underlying goal of our entire negotiating strategy...with so many of Iran’s leaders thus gathered together in one place, they were all killed by an Israeli missile strike, an attack that essentially constituted our official declaration of war..”(75)

This from a US establishment that has spent the past 85 years whingeing about “a date which will live long in infamy,” even though they boxed-in Japan and knew Pearl Harbor was coming, as they had cracked the Japanese Navy’s code. Trump also broke the taboo on assassinating (not just kidnapping) national leaders - together with their extended families - which had already been undermined by American collusion in Zelensky’s attempts to take out Putin, of which there have been at least two. The US president also doubled-down, saying he would be prepared to kill the new Ayatollah, too, if he’s insufficiently poodle-like.(76) That’s the Leader of the Free World speaking. Inspiring, isn’t it? That kind of rhetoric often results in unintended consequences:

“When a regime perceives a threat as existential rather than coercive, incentives for restraint decline sharply, making maximal retaliation and prolonged conflict more likely.”(77)

Trump would have us believe that this time it’s different. Except it isn’t – not really. And no matter what the right-of-centre commentariat proclaims, the whole point of Trump was that he was different in a very specific way – he was supposedly the people’s champion, the blue collar worker’s hero, the sworn enemy of the DC Swamp and the Deep State. He claimed as much every chance he got and, in consequence, found himself under relentless attack; for four years in the White House and another three-and-a-half whilst in exile. He cannot, therefore, be judged by the usual metrics. Dare I say it, but he seemed to be a stickler for fairness, both for himself and others and attacking the Swamp explicitly involved standing up for the little guy and making things right.

Whatever MAGA and America First really meant was pretty obvious back then. ‘America First’ emphatically wasn’t the 0.1% predator class. It was about bringing jobs home, breathing life into the increasingly empty husk of the Rust Belt, repudiating the ‘Anywheres’ in favour of the ‘Somewheres’. In foreign policy terms, it was a promise to put the interests of those Americans first when acting on the world stage.

It wasn’t explicitly isolationist – and beware of anyone using straw man rhetoric like that, as there is a considerable difference between getting involved in foreign entanglements and pulling up the drawbridge – but in rejecting nation-building, regime change interjections and ‘forever wars’, it was a repudiation of Team America as the World’s Police. Mediator, maybe – enforcer, no. And in reality, America had never been genuine global law enforcement, but a corrupt bully in uniform.

The presumption that America has the right to tell other nations how to conduct themselves is wrong and has not resulted in “peace and prosperity but an unending series of wars and crises.”(78) And it was only the other day that we were being showered with that President of Peace dreck, yet Trump’s record of aggression is worse that any of his recent predecessors, with power to add.

Figure 10

Yet we are told that the ‘MAGA coalition’ is holding together. Serious writers like Paul Gottfried and Srdja Trifkovic join court-approved stenographers like VDH and previously reliable commentators such as Roger Kimball and J B Shurk in twisting themselves into pretzels so that they might remain aboard the Trump Train. They do so at varying levels of erudition, but it all comes out the same – some variation on ‘might is right’, no matter how well-dressed. None seem to be familiar with the stricture which asserts that “with great power comes great responsibility,” probably because, to them, Marvel comics’ only utility is as an emergency supply of paper in the smallest room. However, most people, I believe, would not quibble with the sentiment.

In addition, those who wrap themselves in the cloak of Christianity – and there are whole squadrons of them – would have been wise to consult the Ten Commandments as a core part of their textual ruminations, particularly the Third and Sixth; those to with with not taking God’s name in vain and not killing. I don’t know where God stands on killing in self-defence, but combining religiosity with a war of choice would seem to be a clear-cut no-no. But American Christians (a term that, in many cases, doesn’t seem to mean what it should) supported Dubya’s carnage and they aren’t exactly weeping and wailing this time around, either. Which is odd:

“...If there is any group of people that should be opposed to war, bloodshed, death, destruction, militarism, and the warfare state...it is Christians, and especially conservative, evangelical and fundamentalist Christians who claim to strictly follow the dictates of Scripture and worship the Prince of Peace.”(79)

Although this is odder, published by a website run by ‘American Christians’.

Figure 11

Trump’s reaction to the near-certain mass-murder of well over 100 young schoolgirls by the US Navy – that inaccurate Iranian weapons were to blame, even though video clearly shows a Tomahawk missile inbound -(80) when twinned with his declaration from his second inaugural address that he was “saved by God to make America great again”,(81) is suggestive of a man with a Woodrow Wilson-sized Messiah Complex.

Trifkovic maintains that Trump is simply the latest in a long line of ‘strongmen’ forcing the weak to assume the position, only unapologetically, which is seen as a virtue. Presumably, he (and others) are okay with 47’s declaration that “I am killing them” and “what a great honor it is to.”(82) But the whole point of Trump was that he wasn’t a neocon with narcissistic tendencies, unlike Lincoln, both Roosevelts, the aforementioned Wilson, LBJ and the Bush Clan. Except that is what he has become, for whatever reason:

“Knocking the bejesus out of Iran is easy... but military action needs to serve a coherent political strategy—and so far, the administration hasn’t shown any signs of having formulated one. The devil-may-care attitude comes in part, I think, from a conviction that God is on America’s side.”(83)

It may be that he avoids a protracted conflict and boots on the ground, thus allowing some of the dimmer ‘conservative’ bulbs to continue claiming that he isn’t dumping all over his legitimate base which, in reality, doesn’t include any of the online ‘MAGA influencers’ being paid to astroturf the rest of us. But forgoing ‘forever wars’ does not a hero make. Sure, it means that there is a limit on the number of Americans required to sacrifice themselves for the MIC and Wall Street, but it is likely that other proxies will die instead and, regardless of the duration of the conflict, it is the fact that it has happened at all that is the problem.

Whether or not Trump manages to Svengali his genuine supporters into supporting his actions, he has still – objectively – betrayed them. How else would you spin this, from the campaign trail in 2024, when he also sad that “a vote for Donald Trump is a vote to end wars, not to start them”:

“These globalists want to squander all of America’s strength, blood and treasure, chasing monsters and phantoms overseas while keeping us distracted from the havoc they’re creating here at home.”(84)

That hasn’t aged well.

Figure 12

We are being lied to and manipulated. That’s supposed to be what the other side does – the ends justifies the means crew. When our side does, I can guarantee you that things have gone sideways. It’s not just the fact that Trump is betraying those that voted for him; it’s that he seems to be relishing doing so. The influencers are doing their utmost to gaslight the faithful, using all the Bernays-style psychological triggers, but I’m not convinced that it’s working. There’s only so much lipstick you can slather on a pig. I’m tired of the bullshit and the narcissism. I’m tired of the propagandists/liars who claim to be MAGA and the tribal numpties that treat everything they say as gospel.

And I’m especially tired of the religiosity that accompanies it all, which presents as a uniquely American flavour of hubristic projection. Anyone who prays that they will be victorious is a complete tool; how could they possibly assume that they know God’s plan? Seems to me that prayer in those circumstances ought to consist of ‘Thy will be done’ and that should be all she wrote. Last time I checked, this wasn’t the Crusades 2.0.

“Look at the world of international law as a sleazy nightclub with 200 customers. Some are going to be raucous, some will be quiet; some are friendly, some are aggressive; some smart, some stupid... And there’s no cop to keep order. The world is just like that bar. No written rules, just some vague understandings. And lots of misunderstandings. The US used to be the toughest customer in the saloon of international law, buying friends with free drinks. But he’s turned into a mean drunk who’s overdrawn his tab. The other customers who used to tolerate his eccentricities have started to dislike, disrespect, and resent him.”(85)

That, I fear, is where we are. And espousing private Christian beliefs and then choosing to murder innocents - the women and children of Khameini’s extended family - is not a good look. There are signs that worms are turning. So far, for instance, no country appears to be keen to get involved in the Straits. Meloni, a staunch ally of Trump’s, doesn’t believe the war has much of anything to do with Italy. It’s not my impression that – other than Israel – any US ally is on board with this war. Rubio and Vance are nowhere to be seen. No-one knows whether regime-change is still an objective or, indeed, whether unconditional surrender is still the only satisfactory outcome for Trump. However it turns out, I think it will go down as an unforced error.

Citations

(1) https://nypost.com/2026/03/06/us-news/pakistani-terrorist-recruited-by-iranian-spies-convicted-of-plotting-to-kill-trump-other-us-pols-in-harebrained-plan-foiled-by-feds/

(2) William Engdahl, A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order, � 1992, 2004. Pluto Press Ltd. Pages 171-174.

(3) https://consortiumnews.com/2006/102706.html

(4) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Contra_affair#First_few_arms_sales

(5)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabra_and_Shatila_massacre#Foreign_reporters’_testimonies

(6) https://wikispooks.com/wiki/1982_Lebanon_War

(7) https://jimbovard.com/blog/2026/03/06/1983-beirut-barracks-bombing-proves-u-s-policymakers-are-incorrigible/

(8) Ditto

(9)

Gold and Geopolitics

The Bretton Whoops

I’m pulling myself away from the Iran war coverage for a moment - don’t worry, the wrap-up is coming later today. But something needed saying first…

a month ago · 214 likes · 96 comments · No1

(10) William R. Clark (2005) Petrodollar Warfare: Oil, Iraq and the Future of the Dollar, New Society Publishers, ISBN: 978-0865715141, page 194.

(11) William Dowell. “Foreign Exchange: Saddam Turns His Back on Greenbacks”, Time Magazine, New York City, Monday, Nov. 13, 2000, accessed Nov. 14, 2014.

(12) https://www.rferl.org/a/1095057.html

(13) https://wikispooks.com/wiki/Petrodollar

(14) https://www.american.edu/sis/news/20240205-understanding-irans-use-of-terrorist-groups-as-proxies.cfm

(15) Ditto

(16) https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20231014-qatar-iran-turkey-and-beyond-the-galaxy-of-hamas-supporters

(17)