Quote of the Day
3 weeks ago I argued the US goal in Iran is to seize the global oil spigot. Venezuela in January -> Iran in February.
Neutralize every supply channel outside the dollar system within 90 days. Achieve a compliant successor government and complete energy dominance.
The oil thesis was the obvious layer. However, when you zoom out & view the last four years as a single sequence rather than isolated geopolitical events, the architecture of the grander US plan becomes visible.
1st was Europe, which laid the groundwork.
The Ukraine conflict provided the justification for sanctions that collapsed Russian pipeline gas from 150 billion cubic meters to 40.
Then Nordstream was destroyed, which rewired the entire European energy system permanently. The US went from supplying 28% of Europe’s LNG in 2021 to 58% by 2025, exporting a record 111 million MTs, the 1st country in history to break 100 MT.
Europe was transformed from a customer with options into a captive market now purchasing its survival in USD.
2nd was Syria.
The fall of Assad severed the critical node connecting China’s Belt & Road Initiative to the Mediterranean.
The trilateral railway linking Iran, Iraq & Syria, designed to bypass Western maritime chokepoints, was completely destroyed.
This isolated Iran geographically & cleared the path for what came next.
3rd was Venezuela.
In January the US effectively took control of the world’s largest heavy crude reserves. The US Gulf Coast has the most advanced refining complex on earth, specifically built for heavy sour crude. Phillips 66, Valero & the rest are now positioned to process hundreds of thousands of barrels of Venezuelan crude daily.
The US captured a massive strategic reserve & solidified its position as the dominant exporter of refined petroleum products, an industry worth $110 billion in 2025 alone.
Venezuela & Iran were the two major oil supply channels that existed outside the dollar system. Both produce heavy crude sold primarily to China & evaded US financial supervision. Both now being neutralized within 90 days, which leads us to..
4th is Iran & the Middle East energy shock.
Israel struck Iran’s South Pars gas field, the world’s largest natural gas reservoir. Iran retaliated against Qatar’s Ras Laffan, the single largest LNG facility on earth, responsible for a fifth of global supply. QatarEnergy’s own assessment is that 17% of export capacity is gone and recovery will take up to 5 years. The Strait of Hormuz is closed. European gas prices spiked 70%. Asian spot prices doubled.
The only remaining scaled supplier? The United States.
If Iran falls & a successor government is installed that the US controls or influences (the Delcy model described weeks ago) then roughly 40 to 45 million barrels per day of global production out of 103 million is effectively under US control. OPEC becomes irrelevant because the US coalition is now the marginal producer. Now add the gas dimension & it goes beyond oil.
This war is solidifying the petrodollar system as it evolves into a hybrid petro/LNG-dollar. The old system was built on Saudi crude priced in USD. The new system is built on American crude plus American gas from the Gulf Coast, with no alternative supplier of comparable scale. The dependency is deeper because LNG infrastructure requires long term contracts & regasification terminals that lock buyers into supply relationships for decades. Europe & the Pacific allies (Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, etc.) cannot pivot away as there is nowhere left to pivot to. They’re now locked into the US energy system.
The market confirms this. DXY went from 96 to 101. Gold down ~20% from its January all time high. Bitcoin down 20% on the year. Brent above $100. European & Asian institutions are liquidating precious metals and crypto to buy dollars because they need dollars to buy the only remaining scaled energy supply. The world is selling its gold to buy American energy in American currency. The dollar is now being weaponized through energy dependency.
The structural repricing is happening regardless of how the conflict resolves.
But the US grand strategy goes deeper..
Artificial intelligence is a physical industry. It runs on power and chips. Data centers require massive uninterrupted baseload electricity, primarily provided by natural gas. Semiconductor fabrication requires helium & rare earths.
By choking the Strait of Hormuz & crippling Middle Eastern LNG & helium production, the US is systematically degrading China’s ability to power its data centers & fabricate semiconductors at scale.
The US is energy self sufficient, especially with newly captured Venezuelan reserves & expanding Gulf Coast capacity running on domestic gas.
On the other hand, China is import dependent & every joule it imports effectively now transits chokepoints the US Navy controls..
Iran was the Belt & Road’s overland energy bypass, the corridor that allowed China to mitigate the Malacca Trap. With Iran neutralized that corridor is severed. China faces a world where its compute infrastructure competes for scraps on a depleted global LNG market, while American data centers run at full capacity on domestic energy.
Russia is next in the sequence. A post-war Iran reopening under US influence competes directly with Russia for the same refineries in China & India at lower cost. Iran’s production costs are lower. Russia loses its last structural advantage in heavy crude & its economic lifeline. Additionally, under the Iran war cover, Ukraine has been opportunistically destroying Russian energy infrastructure & all signs point towards Russia being at the end of the line. The message from Washington becomes very simple: we dismantled two regimes in three months, your economy is about to get crushed, sign the Ukraine deal.
Then Trump sits down with Xi holding every card. Complete energy dominance. The hybrid petro/LNG-dollar fortified, Iran cleared, Russia cornered, & China facing the Malacca Trap fully closed with no remaining energy bypass.
Israel & the GCC are absorbing the kinetic cost of a conflict whose primary beneficiary, counter to the mainstream narrative, is actually America (First). Qatar offline for 5 years reprices the entire global gas market in favor of US exporters for the remainder of the decade. The Gulf states face years of rebuilding. Europe faces its 2nd energy crisis in four years.
Sure, the average American might face temporary moderate inflation & higher gas prices. But if you are the architect of the US empire & you view the rise of China & Chinese ASI as an existential winner takes all scenario, the collateral damage is acceptable cost.
Whoever controls the energy corridors controls the monetary system. Whoever controls the monetary system & the energy supply simultaneously controls the compute infrastructure that determines which civilization builds ASI first.
The US is seizing all 3.
10Δ @10delta
Posted on X, March 26, 2026
This is an interesting way to look at things. I had grasped upon a small slice of this a few weeks ago. This is a much bigger picture. This is way out of my area of expertise, but I am unable to find fault with it. There are risks, I am pretty sure the “realignment” of Iran is taking longer than expected and the outcome may not be certain. But if successful it will demonstrate that winning through intimidation can reap tremendous rewards. I’m not certain I approve of this lesson in the general case.
America has fully transformed from a beacon of freedom and liberty to a military empire with no concern for anyone but itself, its use of force justified by nothing more than the law of the jungle. Mill and Locke and Jefferson and Adams are all now dead and buried, and their ideas about freedom are dead with them.
Right-wing “historians” and apologists for authoritarianism will of course say “twas ever thus,” but ignore that for a while there we did actually advocate for the rule of law rather than the rule of violence, and that’s why so many others in the world turned to us for leadership. That era is now dead, and we have more enemies than allies.
Yes, yes, how dare we… fight back against a country that has been murdering people (including American) by the tens of thousands for decades, been publicly proclaiming that they will kill us all, etc.
What a joke.
Is that the standard for global war now? “They killed some Americans and said they want us to die, so we get to bomb anybody and everybody.” Republicans don’t ever get to talk about the founders and their principles again…they’ve abandoned Jefferson and Adams and the rule of law entirely.
“Fight back?” We’re committing war crimes on a daily basis, but I guess you don’t think much of the Geneva convention either. And now we’re threatening to destroy civilian infrastructure including desalination plants. You’re not “fighting back,” you’re advocating annihilation, and all because Netenyahu wants to see Greater Israel become a thing. “America first” my ass, this is Israel first all the way.
As I have said several times now, John, the world of your imagination seems like a horrible place – glad we don’t actually live there.
Your comment is so disassociated from reality, I’m not even sure where to start addressing it.
But I will engage with the only part that is actually dealing with reality:
“And now we’re threatening to destroy civilian infrastructure including desalination plants.”
Yep. I don’t really care for that, but 1) welcome to war – not new, not war crimes, 2) Trump blusters a LOT – I hope that’s one of them and nothing more, and 3) I really hope we don’t have to find out one way or the other, because it would suck, either way, and likely result in significant body count either way, too (one is obvious, the other from the exposure of his bluff and the fallout both in dealing with Iran and possibly other places).
Trump shoots his mouth off WAY too much – conservatives’ most common complaint about him.
As an aside, in the horrible case that actually did happen, you know that as soon as hostilities ended, we’d be both stationing the carriers there to produce clean water at a massive scale and rebuilding the plants ASAP. For all that war is horrible (and should be, so that it ends more quickly), Americans really hate to see people suffer and will work hard to alleviate it, whether we caused it or not (please don’t tell me I need to give you the LONG LONG LONG LONG track record on that particular point).
Check out John Schussler, brave Aryan warrior against the Jews. What a cool badass outlaw he is behind a computer screen.
…says the guy who posts anonymously as just “Ken.”
Irony much?
As a side note: I said nothing about Jews, I referred specifically to Netenyahu and Israel. They’re not equivalent to “the Jews”, as anyone who reads Haaretz will tell you. Reading comprehension: it’s a thing.
“I’m not certain I approve of this lesson in the general case.”
There have been many, MANY such lessons, very much in the general case, for… well, pretty much forever. China and Russia have each given entire academic career’s worth of examples in the last century.
And honestly, the method itself isn’t really *inherently* bad. You prevent a LOT of actual combat through proper use of intimidation – a bar with Andre the Giant as the bouncer will have very few bar fights, for example.
The GOAL is what makes it good or bad.
“The ends justifies the means” gets a bad wrap – means are ONLY justified by ends, after all. Killing someone to defend yourself from their violent aggression is justified; killing someone because you want their stuff is not.
Intimidation to prevent wider conflict is good. Intimidation to aggressively take their stuff is bad. Not a hard concept.
And (for John), justification is justification, even if there are ADDITIONAL reasons that would not be sufficient justification. We would be justified in a ground force invasion of Iran to completely and utterly destroy their government and entire system of governance. It is a pox on the world and on us. That there are *additional* benefits does not change that justification one way or the other.
It does mean that justification deserves extra scrutiny – people are tempted to *come up with* justification for things they already want to do, after all.
But if someone is aggressively, dangerously violent to me, whether or not I might have prior desire to want him dead is irrelevant to a claim of self defense. Actual justification justifies, even when there additional reasons that would NOT justify.
Several problems with this grand conspiracy theory. Iran declared war on us when they seized our embassy and held our diplomats hostage for over a year. Congress should have declared war at that time and we should have wiped the nascent Ayatollah’s regime off the face of the planet in 1979. It would have prevented so many foreseeable problems and saved hundreds of billions of dollars in the long run. But that was the height of the Carter malaise… The other thing to recognize is that sanctions against Russian petroleum could have been stopped entirely by simply stopping Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and signing a peace treaty. But I guess grand, complicated conspiracy theories are so much more satisfying when you can pin it all on the bad orange man instead of multiple bad actors getting justice for playing FAFO
Complete agreement on that, generally speaking. It’s definitely not some grand “47-D chess” BS. Trump wasn’t even in office when the Ukraine thing started (and, by track record, it would likely NOT have started with him in office), as just the most obvious thing among many.
That doesn’t mean the general idea is wrong, though – taking the state of the board and coming up with a good strategy.
Ya, started a bit before ’79.
When the Mullahs wanted to take over British petroleum’s oil infrastructure in Iran in the ’50’s.
The CIA installed the Shah. And the brutal crackdowns that were necessary to keep him there.
Then after the whole ’79 thing, we did declare war on Iran like we always do. We used Saddam Hussein and Iraq. Gave him supplies and support. And fertilizer that could very easily be turn into poison gas. (You know, the stuff he gassed the Kurds with just before we invaded him.)
The Iraq-Iran war we sponsored went on for 8 years. And thousands died on both sides.
So, if Iran didn’t have much reason to hate us before ’79,(Which they did.) They certainly did by 1990.
Their Persians. Not sand nigs. They invented chess. And being muslim just makes them very strong willed.
And right now us preparing to put boots on the ground is everything they could possibly want.
And the “Mango emperor’s” hubris on this is going to destroy the American empire.
But never let it be said we didn’t destroy ourselves by not heeding George Washington’s warnings, too.
“Beware of foreign entanglements.”
“The US is seizing all 3.”
OK, Interesting idea, but, can we keep them? The enemy always gets a vote, right?
So, what we have to be done in America to keep them?
With drones and every point of our infrastructure mapped? With 40 different factions already infilled into society. From suicide jadhis, murderous cartels, to Chinese command and control. Not to mention the low IQ crowd, both foreign and domestic.
Even AI is going to have a hard time keeping up with the necessary lockdowns.
The only thing for sure is the price of oil is going up. And then up again. (Along with everything else.)
And most of the idiot class will be begging for the chains. Just to make it all stop.
“Jesus Christ has no advantage over Genghis Khan, because if you are strong enough, ruthless enough, powerful enough, evil will overcome good.”
Benjamin Netanyahu
He wasn’t just quoting someone else. He was telling us what truly runs the world, and how it will be run in the future. And the mercy you can expect.
Plan accordingly. (Even though it’s probably too late for that.)
If Jihadist cells were going to hit us, they would have by now. They were either neutralized, did not exist, or were not aligned with Iran.
Ya, been asking that same question myself for years now.
No good answers.
If they are truly the world’s terror masterminds/state sponsors thereof, why would they pass up the Biden immigration window?
But it won’t matter at this point. As anyone can do anything and make it look like someone else did it.
Which is kind of how our CIA likes to work, isn’t it?
And if they have been taken down? What kind of control grid do we already have in place?
How’s that going to get used in the future against us?
We think Iran’s bad?
I think the Bebe quote is most relevant in all this.
Is that quote incorrect in this world?
Don’t blame the messenger. Don’t blame the guy *pointing out* the rules as *responsible for* or approving of those rules.
As for the quote being correct? It’s the most infantile thing I’ve ever heard come out of a leader’s mouth. And completely ignores the last 2,000 years of world history.
As for the messenger? The most telling part. Someone who would say such a thing will have no problem acting like that.
As we have seen already out of Bebe.
He was telling us who he is.
The only real question is. Who is the target today? And is that what you want lording over you?
Genghis Khan with AI and nukes?
F’in glad I’m short this place. You can have it.
Right. Forgot the level of Jew-hate I was dealing with with you. Forget I said anything.
Jews??? What jews are you talking about?
Bebe ain’t jewish. He’s Polish.
But thanks for losing the argument so quick by going straight to the race card. Or was it the religion card? Or the business model card?
It’s hard to tell these days.
Once a Somali gets to America, their American? That’s your argument? Once you move to Isreal, your Jewish?
Not jew hate silly. Just America first.
Not racist, realist.
Wake up and smell the goyim, buddy.
“Wake up and smell the goyim, buddy.”
Yep, very convincing on your non-racism. Totally convinced. Yep.
I will now continue nodding and affirming as I back away slowly and get out of your presence. Because I’m so convinced. Yep.
“I will now continue nodding and affirming as I back away slowly and get out of your presence. Because I’m so convinced. Yep.”
Ya, that seems to be how you tough guy/Linsey Graham types win arguments these days. Whine and run away.
And you all want to fight islam??? Or just want someone else to do it?
Good luck.
“Ya, that seems to be how you tough guy/Linsey Graham types win arguments these days.”
No, that’s how sane people deal with people immune to logic and reason. No reason wasting time trying to convince someone like that.
And your activity doesn’t justify military action or self-defense, so the comparison to Islam is poor.
But sure, if it makes you feel better, you “won”. Enjoy.
It is fascinating how these conversations seem to stray from the initial point. The primary issue to be resolved is the baseline belief of the Muslim clerics that are calling the shots in Iran. When the Holy Writ of Islam authorizes death to infidels & glorifies presenting falsehoods if necessary to carry the day, how can any sane person believe that this group will ever be trustworthy in any way? These basic beliefs are inimical to an equitable world civilization. The only way this gets resolved is to render this philosophy totally impotent in perpetuity. There are several ways this can be done. None of them simple. Lacking the will to do the hard work we will be doomed to continue to fight or convert. For the Islamists, there is no middle ground.
This! Exactly! I’m amazed how few recognize the danger they, and their posterity, face.
Wasn’t the name on the post, America first?
Underlying issues with islame? You are correct, no middle ground.
But have you seen anyone seriously going about debunking them/ it?
50 years of CIA playing all sides. And over 20 years of GWOT. Actively bombing, hunting, and murdering them in their sleep, us bleeding and dying and wasting treasure, has, done what?
Got a huge chunk of them moved right into our soft middle and put them on welfare. And armed those that stayed to the teeth.
Ya, that’ll fix’em.
And if it all plays out where Bebe’s ruthlessness, couple with DJT’s hubris actually does something more than get a bunch more of our people murdered for fun and profit?
Look me up, I’ll be more than happy to apologize.
But to date. I ain’t seen anything like America first.
Eh, that’s the primary issue to be resolved *with Iran*, and maybe a few other countries/areas.
But China is a whole different problem – communist dictatorship with a very strong dose of racial supremacism.
The long-term outlook on Islam is as you said, but to worry about the long term, you need to get through the short and medium term.
In the short to medium term, we have to deal with China as it is now.
“America first”, as the post talks about, is talking about more than just Iran/Islam.
Given the timeline, it would be necessary to believe that *Biden had the same grand strategy as Trump. That strains a grasp on reality.
Or it means that when Trump wears a MAGA hat with “45-47”, it’s deliberately not “45, 47”.
There has been talk for years about entrenched bureaucrats behind the scenes pulling levers. They are the group that gives info to whoever is elected to shape their decisions. They didn’t all leave when the administrstion changed.
Whoever is making the calls has to make them based on their perception of reality.
“ all signs point towards Russia being at the end of the line. ”
This is where I bailed out. The end of the line? The line is a warm myth to Russians, a mythical situation spoken of fondly by old timers. These are the people who starved Ukraine in the holomodor, who industrialized the nazi camps in the Siberian model, and who made bread lines GOOD news, because it meant there was enough bread to line up for.
Russia can’t even see the line from thier house. If your plan is for Russia to give up, that’s not a bad plan, it’s a bad fantasy along the lines of Twilight.
What far too many don’t realize is that the communist totalitarians have regularly partnered with the Islamists to focus on the destruction of Western Civilization with both of them thinking that they will be able to then control the other once Western Civilization has been conquered. We will be facing this end game in every circumstance for a very long timetocome. Up to this point, our leaders have presented conflicts as a single conflict that needs to be controlled and then we will have returned to “peace in our time”. Unfortunately we have very many people within our own government that are effectively working to hasten our fall. Some are idealists & some are opportunists. In either case, we have been dangerously compromised. From my research, I would say that Trump, inspite of his rhetorical gaffs, is really focused on doing what he can to bring back the liberty to this country that far too many people do not even realize they have lost. To do so will require removing from power many international organizations & governments as well as many organizations & people within the US. The propaganda machine of the Left is very effective & is working overtime so be very wary of what is being presented as fact. If similar things were done earlier with no outrage, but now there is outrage, it is a good clue that there are other serious issues being obscured. We will do well to stay the course with Trump while he plays our greatest antagonists off against each other.
On the one hand, it sounds reasonable.
OTOH, given America’s apparent inability to plan its way out of a paper bag, you need a bigger tinfoil hat than mine to think they have anywhere near enough foresight and planning to pull off even half of this. It makes the COVID vax de-pop plan seem relatively simple, with only a few moving parts. And you find it plausible? Do I need to loan you some of my foil stash?
Or do I need to explain how they are both part of the same large operation? (only half-joking, here.)
Yeah, that’s one of several reasons I think the idea that the whole thing was a plan is rather silly.
But it doesn’t have to have been a plan until… well, relatively recently. Look at the state of the “board” circa January 2025, make a plan based on that state, execute.
At *that* level, it does seem fairly plausible. What are the events that reinforce a certain useful position (or can be made to reinforce that position)? Put those things together, add a few more, newer things to ALSO reinforce that position, etc.
The goal of the supposed plan could be correct – in fact, it does seem like a reasonable idea. I certainly HOPE Trump and/or his advisors are thinking ahead a bit…
Ugh, that was supposed to be in reply to Rolf, immediately above. I could swear I hit the proper reply spot… had that happen several times now, and I’ve noticed it’s also happened to the host a couple of times, too. Bug, or just too easy to mess up?
Interesting ramble. However, aren’t Russia and China neighbors? Does Russia now have a bunch of gas to sell and no customer since Europe is cut off as noted? Why would China and Russia not construct pipelines across their shared border and then completely disregard all the other global energy games as they would then have a secure relationship?
China and Russia are not our friends, why would they not work together to their own benefit if they could get us out of the middle of whatever they want to do?
Technically, they can. Practically? These are ginormous nations; moving gas from the Caucuses to Europe is a solved problem. You can’t just use the same pipelines to ship it across Siberia to northwest China. Not that the Chinese have much use for it there when most of their industry is on the SE coast.
And when most of the time you can just move it by ship, you’re less likely to invest in the pipelines.
“China and Russia are not our friends, why would they not work together to their own benefit if they could get us out of the middle of whatever they want to do?”
This has been true for a LONG time…. and yet, they have laid no pipelines, etc, etc. Something is and has been in the way of them becoming closer. I don’t know what it is, but the evidence on that is pretty clear from the last, oh… 80 years or so.
Also, Maxim 29: The enemy of my enemy is my enemy’s enemy. No more. No less.
https://schlockmercenary.fandom.com/wiki/The_Seventy_Maxims_of_Maximally_Effective_Mercenaries
There are SO many good ones there…
It’s an interesting story, but I think there is some contradicting facts that are left out.
Why did Trump remove restrictions on Russian and Iranian oil exports?
Their are rumors that the US is telling Ukraine to stop targeting Russian oil terminals.
Why did Trump let the Russian tanker into Cuba?
Trump’s tweet this morning about other countries need to go take the oil out of the straight.
also
“If Iran falls & a successor government is installed that the US controls or influences…”
is a HUGE if.
I think the evidence in what has happened in Venezuela explains why you are seeing what appears to be incongruous. Leaving leaders in place that have some cachet with the people, even if not all of the people, and they realize where their power limits now are allows for a rebuilding from the inside and we don’t get bogged down in regime change which has been the death knell for past interventions. Easing up on Cuba and Russia just a bit while still making clear where the power lies is a very good way to encourage change. Time, of course, will verify which path is the best.