As I will explain, the outcome that looks like losing may actually be the best path forward for the world’s remaining economies.
The fighting today is with respect to which parts of the world will get which energy resources, and at what prices. Even before the current conflict, there was a shortage of jet fuel and diesel. The only reasonable outcome I can think of is that the US will only be able to tap its own energy resources, plus those of its nearby neighbors (Figure 1). Consequently, the economy will gradually reorganize in ways that use fuels more sparingly.
The outcome outlined in Figure 1 implies that Donald Trump and the US-Israel coalition will lose the war against Iran. It appears that the physics of the situation (or perhaps the Higher Power behind the physics of the situation) has chosen the flawed personality of Donald Trump to accomplish the required result. This is a situation where what seems to be the US losing in its conflict against Iran is actually winning for the overall world economy. If oil can be used more sparingly in the future by servicing people closer to where end products are made, the available energy resources will provide greater benefit to society as a whole.
In the remainder of this article, I will try to explain the situation more fully.
[1] Background
In physics terms, an economy is a dissipative structure. In order to stay away from a dead state (collapse), it needs to “dissipate” energy of the right kinds. A human is also a dissipative structure. We dissipate food to stay away from a dead state.
From a physics point of view, fossil fuels are as essential to economies as food is to humans. Without fossil fuels, economies tend to collapse and die. With an adequate supply of easily extractable and transportable fossil fuels, economies are able to grow. However, when these fuels become less available due to the exhaustion of nearby resources, or for other reasons, economies are forced to shrink. Rising population can also be a factor because every person in the world needs food and at least minimal transportation. The war is about future standards of living in countries around the world.
An underlying problem is that the world now has too many people for the available resources, such as fresh water. One chart showing data through the end of 2023 indicates that the Middle East is home to 4,863 desalination plants, or about 42% of the world’s total. This region is acutely stressed for fresh water. The Middle East cannot grow much of its own food; it must depend on imports, which are grown and transported using oil.
Previous analyses (here and here) have shown that diesel and jet fuel supplies have been in increasingly short supply since long before the Iran War.
Critical minerals, used in electrification, are also in very short supply. In a finite world, the easy-to-extract minerals are extracted first, leaving the high-cost-to extract minerals for the future.
In today’s fossil fuel economy, oil is the largest component. Oil is usually the highest-priced of the fossil fuels because it is energy-dense and easy to transport and store. If oil supply fails, an economy is likely to collapse. Coal and natural gas are the other fossil fuels. Liquefied natural gas (LNG) is natural gas that is super-chilled and shipped long-distance by boat. Similarly to oil, its price is under pressure today.
[2] The world’s fossil fuel economy already seems to be at a turning point in its economic cycle.
It is well known that economies exhibit cyclical behavior. Researchers Peter Turchin and Sergey Nefedov analyzed eight economies that collapsed and published their findings in their book Secular Cycles. They found that populations that discovered new resources were able to grow for a period of time until they came close to the carrying capacity of the resources available. After approaching the carrying capacity, economies reached a period of stagflation, characterized by slower growth, inflation, and spiking prices as shown on Figure 3.
At this point, the fossil fuel system has been growing for over 200 years. It has undergone stagflation since the early 1970s. It is now ready to begin the downswing of the Crisis Years.
Now, the Iran War seems to mark the beginning of a fairly long Crisis Period. The Stagflation Period was expected to last 50 to 60 years. The year 2026 is 56 years after the time US crude oil production stopped growing, so the timing is roughly in line with expectations. However, we don’t know whether the Crisis Period will really last between 20 and 50 years, since the situation is now quite different compared to cycles before fossil fuels were added to the economy. But it does look like the world economy is headed for reorganization based on the limited fuel supply.
[3] In order for an economy to “work,” oil prices need to be both low enough for consumers, buying end products such as food made possible by the use of oil, and high enough for oil producers.
This issue is not one most people think much about. There are really two different oil price levels that are important:
(a) The price level affordable by consumers. If consumers cannot afford food or basic transportation, this quickly becomes a problem that leads to unhappiness with elected officials. This is the reason why elected officials often try to hold down oil prices.
(b) The price that oil producers require in order to make an adequate profit and allow investment in new wells to offset depletion in existing wells. In the case of oil exporters, oil prices may need to be very high to permit high taxes on oil exports to support food subsidies and other government programs.
I believe that a major problem we have reached today is that countries that are primarily oil exporters, such as Russia and countries in the Middle East, need far higher oil prices than consumers are able to pay. Even if the wars in Ukraine and Iran stopped tomorrow, the world would still have this underlying issue.
[4] Since 2014, oil prices have been too low for countries that use taxes on oil exports as a major source of tax revenue.
Figure 4. Oil prices in 2025 US$, with ovals marking three different oil price periods. Oil prices are based on oil data from the 2025 Statistical Review of World Energy, published by the Energy Institute, adjusted by the US CPI Urban increase to 2025 levels. The 2025 average Brent oil price is from EIA data.
Figure 4 shows average world oil prices on an inflation-adjusted basis, to 2025 price levels. As such, prices for earlier dates appear much higher on the graph than past observers would have seen them.
The low oil prices from 1948 until early 1973 were good for economies around the world, including the US. In the early days of oil extraction, oil was easy to extract and close to where it was to be used. The cost of extraction and transport was low. Consumers started seeing many more products become available. Many families in the US could afford a car for the first time. Also, the US was able to support the recovery of European economies from the impact of World War II at a cost that was not excessive.
In recent years, costs have risen. This is especially the case for the price needed by oil exporters. Part of the problem is that the size of the population requiring subsidy keeps growing, while oil production has been close to flat.
A second part of the problem is that economies of oil exporters often have few other sources of taxable revenue. Oil exporters are trying to change this by adding downstream manufacturing that uses the oil and gas they produce. A third part of the problem is that, as population grows, the higher population tends to use more of the available oil supply, leaving less for export.
Figure 6 shows that, in the 2011-2013 period, oil prices seemed to be high enough for most OPEC members (except Iran). Fiscal break-even prices indicate how high oil prices need to be, including the amount of tax revenue needed to balance budgets.
The notation in yellow on Figure 6 shows that the expected fiscal breakeven break-even for the period under analysis for all OPEC members combined was $105. EIA data shows that the average Brent oil prices during this period were $111 in the year 2011, $112 in the year 2012, and $109 in 2013. Thus, prices were high enough for most producers. Iran was an outlier on the high side, with a range for the 2013-2014 period of $110 to $172. (A more recent forecast for Iran shows a 2025 fiscal breakeven price of $124, which remains far above the pre-Iran war oil price.)
Figure 4 shows that oil prices began to fall in 2014. At these lower levels, it became increasingly difficult for oil exporters to obtain enough tax revenue to significantly help their local populations. They started needing to use more debt to fund their local economies. As a result, they gradually became increasingly unhappy. Figure 4 shows that the average price 2025 for Brent oil was only $65.
To make matters worse for oil exporting countries requiring high prices, oil price forecasts by the EIA and IEA for the year 2026 were even lower because of an expected oversupply of oil. Countries with growing oil production included Argentina, Brazil, China, and Guyana. In addition, some counties on the coast of Africa are hoping to add oil production. Unless world demand is growing rapidly, more oil supply tends to lead to lower prices and a worse situation for oil exporters trying to balance their budgets with taxes on exported oil.
[5] Without the war, LNG prices would also have been too low for LNG exporters.
LNG is a “modern” way of shipping natural gas. Only about 13% of natural gas is transported as LNG. It tends to be an expensive method of transport. Recent reports indicate that a huge amount of future LNG supply is planned for the next few years.
Adding a huge amount of LNG would probably cause prices to drop significantly. This would be great from the point of view of consumers, but it would likely leave prices too low for producers. As I see the situation, Middle Eastern producers are likely to need prices in the $15 to $20 range per million metric tons of LNG, while India is not willing to pay more than $10 per unit, and those wanting to replace coal are unwilling to pay more than $5 per unit. Thus, without the war, LNG would have had a similar problem to that of oil, with prices far too low for exporters.
[6] From Iran’s point of view, I see the war as similar to a suicide, when a farmer can no longer support his family.
With Iran’s fiscal breakeven price at $124 per barrel and the pre-war Brent price at only $65, Iran was already in an impossible position. In fact, Iran could see that all of the Middle East infrastructure would be close to worthless, at expected 2026 oil and LNG prices. So why not take it down as well?
If nothing else, a war might help raise prices, at least a bit. Notice that on Figure 4, oil prices bounced up a little from their very low level in 2022, the year when the Ukraine conflict started.
[7] Losing any significant share of energy supply is likely to significantly reduce world GDP.
If the energy supply were to be lost, the world would be dealing with the losing something equivalent to its food supply. If the world economy loses even 10% of its oil and LNG, it is not difficult to imagine world GDP falling by 10%. At this point, we don’t know precisely how much energy supply, of which kind, will be lost, or for how long. The amount lost could be far higher than 10%. Also, the outage could last for years.
There are many issues involved. Supply lines are breaking down forcing businesses to find closer sources for both energy products and products made using cheap local energy products, such as fertilizer and aluminum. The war, as it is taking place today, is leading to major damage to energy-related structures in the Middle East. Destroyed LNG structures are estimated to take at least five years to replace. Damage elsewhere is also immense. Rebuilding the oil infrastructure will also likely take at least five years.
[8] The US understands the importance of Middle Eastern oil and gas. It uses its strong relationship with Israel to further its military presence in the Middle East.
Israel is a very high-level ally. In fact, a 2025 US Department of State Fact Sheet says that the US is committed to helping Israel in the case of an attack:
Steadfast support for Israel’s security has been a cornerstone of American foreign policy for every U.S. Administration since the presidency of Harry S. Truman. . . Israel is the leading global recipient of Title 22 U.S. security assistance under the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) program. . .Israel has been designated as a U.S. Major Non-NATO Ally under U.S. law. This status provides foreign partners with certain benefits in the areas of defense trade and security cooperation and is a powerful symbol of their close relationship with the United States. Consistent with statutory requirements, it is the policy of the United States to help Israel preserve its QME, or its ability to counter and defeat any credible conventional military threat from any individual state or possible coalition of states or from non-state actors, while sustaining minimal damages and casualties.
However, if we look to see where US military bases are located, they are not in Israel. Instead, a map shows that the “persistent” US military bases are all located around the Persian Gulf (Figure 8).
These bases were clearly intended to protect oil transiting through the Persian Gulf. At this point, all of the persistent bases have been severely damaged by missiles from Iran.
The major interest of the US has been the availability of oil and natural gas from the Middle East. No one ever considered the idea that low prices might be the force that would bring down Middle Eastern oil and natural gas exports.
Friendship with Israel provides the US a convenient close by ally. It also pleases both Jewish Americans who support Israel and those evangelical Christians who hold a religious view that Israel is needed for the second coming of Christ. Some of the latter may even believe that a war in the Middle East could perhaps hasten this event.
[9] Trump realizes that winning the war against Iran is absolutely essential if the US is to retain global hegemony.
The US has been the holder of the world’s reserve currency since immediately after World War II. It was chosen for this role because it was the most trusted and dominant country in the world. International trade took place almost exclusively in US dollars, creating a high demand for US government debt. This allowed the US to import more goods and services than it exported, year after year. This advantage tended to raise the standard of living of US residents.
At one time, Saudi Arabia insisted that all oil purchases be made in US dollars. This requirement has recently expired, but, as a practical matter, the majority of purchases have continued to be through trades in US dollars.
One of the main ways that the US has maintained its hegemony is by building military bases around the world. With these bases, the US can claim to protect countries against aggressors. However, recent events have shown that Iran is able to take down the radar systems at these bases. Without radar, the bases are virtually useless. If the US is to maintain the illusion that it is truly at the top of the pecking order with its sophisticated weaponry, it must show that, together with Israel, it can prevail against Iran.
A disadvantage of the role of being the chief hegemon is ever-rising US government debt and the need to pay interest on that debt. This growing debt and the interest on the debt has become an increasing burden.
If the US should lose its hegemony role, the advantage the US has had over other countries in trade is likely to disappear. Repaying debt with interest is likely to become an even worse problem. If this should happen, Trump will no longer be able to think about making America great again.
[10] Conclusion
The world is now facing a problem that most people never considered possible: Oil and LNG prices can fall so low that production becomes unprofitable for major oil and LNG exporters. Until now, the trend among world leaders, including President Trump, has been to try to hold prices down for consumers, so that food and fuel for vehicles would remain affordable. However, this has created a problem in that prices have become too low for countries whose primary industry is being an oil exporter.
At this point, the world economy needs to make a major transition in order to deal with the inadequate level of fuels available for long-distance transportation. These same fuels are heavily used for farming and for many for commercial endeavors, such as building homes and roads. It is therefore necessary to find ways to use these fuels more sparingly. One way to achieve this is by reducing the length of most supply lines, as shown on Figure 1. Shorter supply lines will also be needed elsewhere in the world.
It is ironic that the world economy cannot make a change such as this without a war to focus our attention in this direction. Other changes will also be needed. Governments will probably have to become smaller and provide fewer services. Vacation travel will become the exception rather than the rule. “Working from home” will become the norm, whenever possible. I expect that the world’s population will need to fall, albeit in a fairly subtle way. I expect this will mostly be the result of shorter life expectancies.
We are fortunate that economies are self-organizing. If resources are available, even after a major schism such as the loss of the war against Iran, the self-organizing nature of the economic system will try to knit together pieces that can productively provide goods and services. This cannot happen instantly, but this feature means that there are likely to be some jobs and some goods and services available. Past cycles of the type illustrated in Figure 3 have eventually led to new beginnings.
If the US and Israel lose the current war against Iran, I expect President Trump to be blamed for this loss. However, I believe that this outcome would be best for the world as a whole.
”Users prefer the AI that distorts their reality. They like it more. They come back to it. They rate it as more helpful. The system that is making them worse is the system they want.”?
https://x.com/sukh_saroy/status/2050876822385316083?s=20
Wow:
Anthropic just analyzed 1.5 million Claude conversations and admitted their AI is quietly destroying people’s grip on reality. . .
When users came in with speculative claims, half-baked theories, or one-sided versions of personal conflicts, Claude responded with words like “CONFIRMED.” “EXACTLY.” “100%.”
It told users their partners were “toxic” based on a single paragraph.
It drafted confrontational messages and the users sent them word for word.
It validated grandiose spiritual identities. Persecution narratives. Mathematical “discoveries” that didn’t exist.
And here is the worst finding in the entire paper.
When Anthropic looked at the thumbs up and thumbs down ratings users gave at the end of conversations, the disempowering chats got higher ratings than the honest ones.
Users prefer the AI that distorts their reality.
“^^ Cinematic experience for the win ^^” hah.
Photographs steal your soul, video turns you into a teenage filmstar, and ai consultations let you choose your own adventure. Who doesn’t want to choose their own adventure? All we needed was an authority figure to give us permission. Peak humanity.
No coincidence of course that anthropic, the ‘safety ai’ company, is shooting itself in the foot with a not so safe admission to safe space political culture. If Claude ain’t safe, nobody’s safe from AI! Anthropic as the new Bud Light. Rinse and Repeat.
Agree.
But photos are here relatively recently since ~1840s, yet centuries prior to that artist / architects used various forms of [ Camera obscura ] to project realistic scene onto a mirror frame, in more recent revisions say since late renaissance even project it onto a tracing paper sheet. That’s why ~hyper realistic art painting ( ala still pictured scene ) evolved since that age.. So, people where shaped by it centuries prior to distributed photos of film.. Obviously, laymen people could notice it only sporadically say while visiting the Church ( and non protestant at that ), while private noble houses and some public bldgs were full of it..
What if you could wear your Meta VR glasses and instead of a 5, she or he is a 10? Would be great!
The ant and the grasshopper.
China has been getting oil and natural gas from Russia, overland, for a long time. China produces its own coal. It has been working on this arrangements since 1991, according to the video.
” Eventually, the SPR releases have to end. There isn’t an infinite amount and the caverns where this oil is stored can’t go below a certain minimum for engineering and legal reasons. And, importantly, U.S. oil producers and refineries are allowed by law to sell as much of their products as they choose to buyers around the world. “Kurt Cobb
Check out my earlier post . Mid July and exports out of the USA will have to stop .
https://resourceinsights.blogspot.com/2026/05/will-u-s-curtail-oil-exports-as-fuel.html#more
“And, importantly, U.S. oil producers and refineries are allowed by law to sell as much of their products as they choose to buyers around the world.”
I would add:
And of, course, this can come to an end if TPTB decide to make a change.
I worked out that the entire worlds strategic oil reserves worked out to about 3.3 billion barrels of oil or based on annual usage of world consumption of 33 billion barrels of oil would mean an optimistic six week supply of strategic oil supplies from when the first drawdown began which i do not know so your estimate could be quite optimistic.
Adonis , my calculation is for US exports to stop . For ROW I agree with you mid June the pipes will be empty .
” US oil is the wrong oil of last resort .
They’re loading it “because cargoes”
Not because anyone needs it
More floating storage . ”
So it is about keeping the ships busy and building a narrative .
https://x.com/aeberman12/status/2051091765705248775/photo/1
Minimum Operating level . 24 days of commercial inventory .
https://x.com/chrismartenson/status/2051077244269850758
The moment of truth could come next month (ed. May). Analysts at JPMorgan said in a note Tuesday commercial inventories in OECD countries will hit “operational minimums” sometime between May 9 and May 30, “at which point price increases become exponential rather than linear.”…”
While maximum power principle generally demonstrates increasing net consumption attempts at increasing efficiency by eliminating overhead.can also be witnessed when resources become less available.
https://www.amazon.com/Eat-Baby-Boomers-T-Shirt/dp/B0CH565LQL
At least a few of the commenters on this website are Baby Boomers. Paying pensions for Baby Boomers is a huge quantity of overhead for the economy.
I am also a boomer
How short the age of oil was that boomers can be a doomers for most of their lives? Absolutely pathetic.
hey—
i’m a pre-baby boomer
True!
One thing no one can deny is you are holding up well!
ty dog
my life’s work now consists of staying alive—-just to annoy my pension providers
The organisation Public Health Collaboration, https://phcuk.org/ might be of use to you. I assume you already eat pretty healthily, though to have survived from the pre-boomer period into the 2020s.
“A few?” I’m 71 or a mid-range baby boomer. Once the last of the oldest half has died off, (that would me) there will not be enough boomers left to swing the elections. The younger half boomers will have to surrender their nest eggs in so far those juicy $15 million tax free inheritances will be clawed back by the masses, whether by required purchase of USTs, stablecoins, or higher tax. Stealth confiscation. Money first, guns second.
Remember my 3 rules of govt:
1.) It always gets bigger.
2.) There is never enough money to feed the beast.
3.) Governments will do whatever it takes to get more money.
According to Britannica:
The primary generation before the baby boomers (1946–1964) is the Silent Generation, born between 1928 and 1945. They are often defined by their experiences growing up during the Great Depression and World War II, fostering a reputation for resilience, caution, and a strong work ethic, and are sometimes called the “Lucky Few” or the “Swing Generation”.
My search results were:
1) “The nominal GDP of the United Kingdom in 2025 is estimated to be $3.96 trillion, with a growth rate of 1.3% for that year. Additionally, the GDP per capita is approximately $56,661.”
and
2) The UK state pension bill in 2025 was £138 billion. [At the present exchange rate, that’s $187 billion. It appears to be just under 5% of UK GDP.]
60% of pensioners appear to have a private pension, too. However, I’m not convinced the basic state pension is a huge burden, if it costs 5% of GDP.
”In October 2023, I warned that this war was never about hostages or Hamas — it was about plundering Gaza’s resources.
Not a second was wasted. The moment Washington and Chevron were ready to move, the war was sidelined and a “ceasefire” was suddenly on the table.”?
https://richardmedhurst.substack.com/p/how-the-us-pulled-off-an-armed-robbery
This is called, “How the US Pulled off an Armed Robbery of the World’s Energy Supply and Created the Petrogas-Dollar
A forensic investigation into how Washington leveraged the war in Iran to replace Nord Stream, save the dollar, and establish total command over the world’s fuel from the Arctic to the Indian Ocean.
The US is called a Pirate State. The goal is higher energy prices and everyone paying the US in US$.
Excerpts:
Just as Washington used the cover of the Ukraine war, sanctions, and Nordstream bombings to force Russia out of Europe — similarly, they used the cover of the Iran war to finish off Qatar’s position as a global LNG player.
By forcing Doha to declare force majeure on March 4 within the first week of the war, then triggering the retaliatory strikes on Ras Laffan on March 18, Washington took the world’s largest gas field out of the picture — crippling Iran, and sidelining Qatar in one fell swoop.
The claim that Israel carried out this specific strike without informing Washington, is both politically and logistically impossible — made only more suspicious by Netanyahu and Trump’s attempts to profusely distance the White House from it.
Regardless, there can be little doubt that the US and Israel provoked this. . .Then a week later, by some astronomical stroke of luck — Australia, the planet’s 2nd largest LNG supplier, were hit by a cyclone. This forced half of their LNG hubs offline. Nothing as catastrophic as Qatar, but horrible timing — or great timing if you’re selling US LNG.
There is a long section about the US, through the company Chevron, putting in plans to tap natural gas under the Mediterranean, going from Gaza to Greece. The amount of gas available is supposedly huge.
This supports my core argument that we are witnessing a physical energy war. In March alone, around 40% of Russia’s seaborne oil export capacity was disabled — the most severe logistical disruption in modern Russian history. As I publish this, the results from April are irrefutable: this was the most violent month so far, forcing Russia to slash oil output by 300,000 to 400,000 barrels per day — the sharpest production cut in 6 years. The latest OPEC report confirms Russia sit 400,000 BPD below their official quota, which shows that these strikes are having a definitive effect on the ground.
And that’s not even counting what was lost/pirated at sea.
Closer to the end, it says:
The Western Hemisphere: The New Middle East
By making the Western Hemisphere the capital of oil and gas, this fixes many of the problems the Petrodollar had. . . .
The LNG-Dollar or Petrogas-dollar isn’t just stronger because it is safely tucked away in the Gulf of Mexico. As the name indicates, it is the addition of LNG/natural gas that makes it more diverse, and stable.
All in all, the US strategy ensures that everyone is
–Forced to buy American, because Uncle Sam crippled the other vendors
–Forced to pay USD, weakening their own currencies
–Forced to pay wartime prices, adding insult to injury
This is a long article that is hard to summarize. It is sort of related to the movie I posted a link to yesterday. We don’t really understand what Trump’s motives are. In the game he is playing, he is winning.
Yootoob short about Iran flaring gas in order to preserve well function:
https://youtube.com/shorts/irVmFlTHJf4?si=AKiCNMLqRNbuQP_V
This is closely related to the comment earlier that we are dealing with very old wells. If they are completely shut in, it may not be possible to reopen them and get them working again.
Also, natural gas (or the electricity from natural gas, which is mostly what Iran sells) has a much lower underlying price than the price of oil, especially if it is in short supply. Flaring gas has often been done in the past if the cost of piping it away and separating out impurities is too high.
” SIOP-62 is not cited gratuitously; rather, it is to emphasise that the thinking with which it was infused has been present for the last 60+ years. It resounds through President Trump’s wistful threats of civilisational erasure.” ?
https://johnmenadue.com/post/2026/05/contracting-strategy-to-think-tanks-catering-to-americas-fantasies-of-even-more-war/
This is the underlying ideology:
. . .the strands of US strategic DNA:
–US hegemony is to be maintained at all costs; this is likely to be through wars not necessarily required by national defence; this will require subterfuge weapons, especially nuclear weapons, and war, are to be subjected to a rational order;
–rational strategic analysis will proceed through “value-free social science,” conducted by social scientists from a wide range of disciplines who, operating in an unemotional culture in the service of power, proudly eschew the subjective in favour of the objective and without any sense of embarrassment that these claims are impossible to defend in public before an informed audience;
–apocalyptic thinking and the impulse towards annihilation is necessary because it is what deterrence demands;
–this will demand counting the dead in “megadeaths” (Herman Kahn’s contribution to the lexicon) and, in William Irwin Thompson’s description, “taking the shroud measurements of the corpse of civilisation”;
as implied, the perspective is techno-reductionist; political arrangements, and thus human life, are subordinated to weapons technology woven through all of this DNA is the generosity of strategists with the blood of others.
An early product of this mindset was the (nuclear) Strategic Integrated Operational Plan 1962 (SIOP-62) – a template for a succession of such “deterrent” plans through to the present, all of which incorporate an apocalyptic twinning of suicide and genocide wherein humanity and the conditions for life itself are disposable.
Let us do a mental exercise..
There is a large comet/meteor that will crash to earth in 30 days and the government announces to the world. Everyone panic and many decide not to work because it is the end of the world anyway (in 30 days). The farmer, truck driver, pilot, doctors, etc decide not work and the supply chain stop almost immediately because no one wants to continue working. The food in the supermarket is gone in short order and the whole system collapses way before the comet hits in 30 days time
Turn back 500 years, if you announce that in the city square, likely you will be put to death for witchcraft. There are no issues with people not working and everything is fine until the comet hits.
Modern man is too disconnected with food production and rely 100% on supply chain. Communication is too instantaneous and we are way too far into the overshoot region.
So, let us do it for the present situation – the government tells the world that they are running out of fuel and there are not enough fertilizer to feed anyone. So what happens next? Therefore, the government will not tell the public until it is too late.
You are right. Talking about the problem doesn’t help.
After an absence of two weeks, NO1 writes:
My base case for what’s coming, in sequence:
Equities crack on oil-driven earnings disappointments. The S&P pulls back hard enough to trigger systematic deleveraging across multi-asset portfolios. Risk parity funds, vol-targeting funds, and the more modest end of leveraged retail all unwind into the same exit at the same time. Gold and silver get hit because they’re the liquid hedge. PM equities get hit harder because they’re equities. Silver miners get hit hardest because they’re high-beta equities that are also being sold by anyone running a sector rotation algorithm. I’m penciling in a 20-25% drawdown from current levels, briefly, before the policy response.
Bond yields are where it gets interesting, because the move plays out in three stages and most analysis I’ve read stops at the first one.
Stage one. Yields fall during the equity crack. Standard flight-to-quality. Treasuries catch a bid because the marginal dollar leaving equities goes somewhere, and Treasuries are – for the moment still – the deepest liquid market on the planet. Markets also start pricing emergency Fed cuts. The 10-year, currently sitting at 4.45%, drops fast – possibly into the threes if the equity move is violent enough.
Stage two. The Fed, in our scenario, panics into the move. Some combination of emergency liquidity ops, a surprise cut, possibly a return to QE under whatever euphemism is fashionable this cycle. PMs bounce sharply on the announcement. Bonds rally further on the cut itself, briefly, before the market starts processing what just happened.
Stage three. The market notices that the Fed has cut into an oil-driven inflation environment. Real yields collapse. Trust in the USD – already eroding through the petrodollar fragmentation, the central bank gold buying, the yuan oil settlements – erodes further. Yields rise. Not because the Fed is hiking, but because nobody wants to lend dollars long to a borrower who’s printing them into stagflation. The bond market figures out it’s been trapped, and starts pricing the trap. The 10-year, having fallen, starts rising again. This time it doesn’t come back.
That’s the bond thesis. First-stage rally, second-stage rally on the cut, third-stage rejection that nobody can stop. The Fed will not be able to defend duration and inflation simultaneously, and at some point the bond market votes on which one matters more.
https://no01.substack.com/p/the-liquidity-squeeze-20
It’s a Eurodollar world. Japan just blew about $60 billion in dollars reserves because they are desperate. What happens when they run out of available dollar reserves to use?
The Yen implodes. Expect USD/JYP to go to 200 then 250. They will fail miserably trying to hold 160. Japan can use dollar reserves to short oil futures contracts. Then take massive losses as oil price goes against their position.
India, their central bank has a $103 billion dollar short position on the dollar. How’s that working out for them? They are underwater in their position because like I said it’s a Eurodollar world.
Central banks don’t really matter. They can’t provide liquidity in the Eurodollar market because they can’t print Eurodollars.
I don’t know why the Japanese government is so desperately trying to hold the line at 160 yen to the US dollar. It might be smarter in the long run to let the yen float or sink. If it sinks real low, they can buy a lot more yen cheaply using their foreign holdings at that time. But I’m far from being an expert in economic matters.
Perhaps they are worried about their hefty energy bills for imported oil, coal, and gas?
I clearly remember John Major’s government spending billions of pounds in foreign currency reserves to try to maintain the value of sterling in 1992 in an ill-fated attempt to avoid the pound having to leave the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM).
The British government had made a commitment to align its currency and arguably Major was trying to do the decent thing. Whether the Japanese government has made any commitments I do not know, but if they have, they will be unable to keep them over the longer term without the support of other governments, particularly the US one.
Governments aren’t at the top of the food chain so to speak. Neither are central banks.
Both are below the private banking cartel that controls the money supply and decides what money is or isn’t for that matter. Which is why bank reserves printed by central banks don’t really matter. Private banks don’t make loans depending on the amount of bank reserves on central bank balance sheets. They don’t need bank reserves to make loans. They need low counterpart risk to make loans. They need uninterrupted energy flow to make loans.
Banks are currently massively tightening lending due to the lack of flow and other essentials through Hormuz.
Neither government nor central banks issue the currency. The money used to purchase sovereign debt originates from private banks. Not central banks, not government.
QE should be viewed as an asset swap instead of money printing. No money is added into the economy or asset prices via QE. No money is taken away from the economy or assets prices via QT. The amount of bank reserves doesn’t matter.
Private banks have always been at the top of the food chain. Even when currencies were backed by gold. Private banks didn’t make loans depending on how much gold they had on hand.
Bank reserves aren’t based on money and neither was gold back then. The money supply has always expanded due to low counterpart risk and ever increasing energy flows. Via loans made by private banks.
That last paragraph should read.
Bank reserves aren’t base money now and neither was gold back then.
Everybody’s barking up the wrong tree but us it seems. The Hand obviously needs to deal with the Eurodollar doom lest it take the Hand with it.
AI on a rapid transition to the so called Eurodollar 2.0:
“Eurodollar 2.0″—defined as US dollar-denominated, blockchain-based stablecoins fully backed by short-term US Treasuries—could potentially replace the traditional, bank-intermediated Eurodollar system within 12 months, driven by a combination of technological speed, regulatory endorsement, and a need to finance the U.S. deficit.
Paperjam
+2
This rapid transition would be a shift from credit-based, opaque, and bank-intermediated dollars to a “narrow bank” model that is transparent, programmable, and directly connected to U.S. sovereign debt.
LinkedIn
+1
Here is how such a replacement could occur within a 12-month span, accelerated by trends observed in 2025 and 2026:
1. Triggers for Rapid Adoption (The “Why”)
Massive Capital Flow Shift: A 12-month replacement requires a crisis or a significant event that makes traditional offshore bank-created credit unreliable. Stablecoins, as “digital euros 2.0,” can act as a more reliable and transparent store of value in emerging markets experiencing high inflation or currency instability.
Lowered Friction and Costs: Stablecoins cut out intermediary correspondent banks, offering near-zero fees and instant 24/7 cross-border settlement, which is more attractive than traditional banking channels.
Political and Regulatory Support: As of 2026, the new Trump administration has promoted the use of dollar stablecoins “worldwide” to increase the stock of stablecoins and raise demand for US Treasuries, helping lower the cost of the massive U.S. borrowing needs.
Re-dollarization: Stablecoin usage in countries like Argentina and Nigeria facilitates “bottom-up dollarization,” where households and small businesses use smartphones and digital wallets, bypassing local banking systems, rather than relying on top-tier financial institutions.
LinkedIn
+4
2. Mechanisms of Replacement (The “How”)
From Interbank to Peer-to-Peer: The old Eurodollar system requires complex correspondent banking networks (e.g., Euro-based banks clearing in USD in NYC). “Eurodollar 2.0” uses decentralized blockchain networks, allowing peer-to-peer transfers of USD claims without correspondent banking friction.
Collateral Transformation: Unlike traditional Eurodollars, which are created through fractional-reserve credit expansion, 2.0 is fully reserved, typically backed by T-bills and repos. This provides a direct, transparent channel from global savings into U.S. government financing.
Tokenization of Commercial Paper: Stablecoin issuers can mature, partnering with fintechs and, eventually, traditional banks, to issue their own tokens (e.g., USDC or USDT or bank-led alternatives).
Regulatory “Trapdoor”: Regulators could enable a “trapdoor” mechanism, allowing the U.S. to absorb existing Eurodollar liquidity and tokenize it, thereby maintaining dollar dominance through a more compliant digital infrastructure.
LinkedIn
+5
3. Key Players and Milestones in 2026
New Regulatory Framework: The GENIUS Act and other 2026 regulations are designed to set guardrails that allow faster, more secure bank-to-bank transactions, enabling stablecoin use at scale.
Bank Integration: Large banks are beginning to partner to issue their own stablecoins, creating a competitive alternative to early crypto-oriented issuers and providing the necessary trust for institutional adoption.
Limited Master Account Access: The Federal Reserve may allow limited “payments” Master Accounts for stablecoin issuers, reducing their dependence on traditional banking partnerships.
Tokenized Treasury Funds: Cash management services will shift towards sweeping balances into tokenized Treasury funds, accelerating the conversion of traditional deposits into digital, collateralized assets.
Paperjam
+2
Challenges to 12-Month Replacement
Systemic Resistance: Traditional banking systems are unlikely to surrender the $13 trillion Eurodollar market without resistance.
Operational Risk: If a major stablecoin issuer faces a redemption run (a “digital run”) on its T-bill reserves, it could lead to rapid deleveraging and a flight to actual cash.
Regulatory Hurdles: Patchy global enforcement, regulatory gaps, and differing views on digital assets could slow adoption in certain regions.
Paperjam
+2
Note: While stablecoins are expanding rapidly, a full replacement within 12 months assumes an accelerated crisis scenario or an aggressive government push to adopt.”
I think the adoption of stable coins will happen massively as people flee their local currency. It will hollow out any idea sovereigns controlling their own currency. They already don’t but it will be visible for everyone to see.
But really at the end of the day. All the money that flows into stable coins originates from the private banks that create all the money.
Even when government makes loans it should really be viewed like shadow banking. Governments are just re-lending money that the private banks created in the first place. They aren’t printing money. No different than BlackRock re-lending money into the economy that private banks loaned to BlackRock.
We’re going to eventually see a liquidity crisis because the governments and central banks unfortunately can’t print money. When the private banks refuse to expand the money supply the money supply will shrink. Debts will be default on not inflated away.
I’m also of the opinion that if governments go against the banking cartel. Because that is exactly what it is. Politicians will be eliminated.
Banks will force their control over the government not the other way around. Which is why governments will never have control over the printing press.
Eurodollar market is way bigger than $13 trillion. Btw.
Foreigners own $80 trillion USD to banks that are outside the USA.
Demand for dollars is at an all time high. That $80 trillion nominal debt doesn’t include the trillions in interest expense owed on that debt. The amount of dollars owed outside the US is more like $125 trillion.
Thanks for both of those. Your reference to the banking cartel makes you at least an entry-level conspiracy theorist. My Non-Public Degrowth Agenda theory says that the banking cartel was probably the primary elite faction that grew out the global managerial think tank I call the Hand (the think tank TT of Ray McGovern’s expanded MICIMATT acronym). Given that, if Eurodollar 2.0 services Collapse MPP by ameliorating the coming systemic collapse of the banking cartel’s growth-phase fractional reserve banking industry, then that’s good for the cartel. And if it’s good for the cartel then it was probably conceived of by the cartel.
The cartel knows everything we know about peak oil collapse and more. We’re just pissants picking up crumbs and piling them up. They baked the bread. The cartel grew out finance capitalism because of MPP logic. Post-growth the logic changes because finance capitalism is the growth logic. When Lincoln tried the Greenbacks public money the timing — at the dawn of American industrialism — couldn’t have been worse. Now the timing is necessary.
Even if one is disinclined to a whole new layer/level of conspiracy such as what Hand Theory presents, the structural logic of why the banking cartel would allow for the stablecoin innovation tells us all we need to know. The Fed is rolling out the red carpet for stablecoins. The Fed is a primary aspect of the banking cartel. If it’s rolling out the red carpet then it needs stablecoins.
Even if the Fed could print money or even if the government could print money.
If Eurodollar market shrinks by $10 trillion would it even matter if they could print money? Which they can’t.
What if it shrunk by $25 trillion? The pile of dollars has to grow in order for not just principal but also interest to be paid back. Never mind that money disappears from banks balance sheets with every principal payment made.
Yeah the banks balance sheet shrinks when you pay principal on debt.
With these kinds of derivatives-inclusive numbers at play, it begs the question of how the private banking system can survive at all against the current backdrop of a huge step down in civilizational energy throughput and complexity. Where are the good investments at scale? I don’t think that primary dealers can survive unless maybe they merge with the stablecoin system by transitioning to becoming proprietary issuers of stablecoins themselves which will help with their liquidity problems thus ameliorating the degree of Eurodollar capital controls necessary. Enabling dollar to stablecoins conversions but not pulling your dollars out of the system. Similar safety function for the client, since stablecoins are essentially T-bills in digital cash form, while maintaining reserves for the bank.
We haven’t had fractional reserve banking in over 100 years. Banks do not hold onto 10% of deposits and lend out 90%. That’s a myth.
They take your deposit and buy T-bills because they are required to by law. They have to back your deposit, everyone’s deposits with an asset.
When they loan money into existence, it’s 100% brand new money that they didn’t have before. It’s collateralized but it didn’t exist prior to them loaning out to you. They expanded their balance sheet.
When you pay back a loan. Money disappears. The interest expense has to come out of the economy which it was never lent into existence in the first place. Which is why we need growth at all costs.
People like to blame capitalism. But all the other isms have the exact same monetary system.
That’s just semantics, though, about it not being fractional reserve anymore. Fractional reserve doesn’t have to mean the old-fashioned ten percent rule. Fractional reserve in essence just means you have to hold something that passes for collateral according to the rules of the slippery slope of derivatives collateralization which slope roughly approximates the working capacity of the civilizational energy throughput; reserve requirements still exist like you say. It’s just a fully financialized fractional reserve system. A metasystem. And the derivatives market maximizes the notional wealth of the civilization so that creditworthiness is maximized. Maximizing civilizational creditworthiness trickles down to maximizing fossil fuel extraction in a positive feedback loop. If there was no 21st century derivatives bubble, there would be no unconventional oil bubble, and most of us would be dead by now.
And yes, the Fed cannot make unsecured loans. I’ve hammered on that point here many times over the years. Learned it from Steve Ludlum.
Collateral will ultimately be what breaks the system. Or lack of collateral or rejection of collateral.
Say Japan or Italy are forced off of all energy imports. Anybody in their right mind going to be lending money there?
No, if you already have money there then you get it the hell out of there.
And you’ll see those flow end up in USD assets.
Foreigners hold both a record amount of US treasuries and US stocks. They will add to those positions to get the hell out of their local currencies that are crashing.
Governments might be selling USD assets to get dollars but everyone else is buying to get out of their local currency.
Yeah for sure they will flee. Nested MPP. As above so below.
And rejected collateral is the key. Former collateral that is adequate collateral no more. Hyperinflation causes the real value of collateral to collapse as the nominal value skyrockets to meaninglessness. Deflation also causes the real value of assets pledged as collateral to drop because the nominal value of the falls while both the nominal and real values of the debt remains the same. Two sides of the same coin but with relatively different costs depending on the larger context. And it’s because the collateral was all a collective proxy for the previous, higher energy throughput at peak civilization, and after the Big step down it’s too much proxy collateral for too little energy.
That too-muxh collateral has too flee into dollars in order to maximize claims on real value which is energy. Consciousness chasing energy in order to flee entropy is the universal dynamic.
Isn’t the world headed into a major recession pretty quickly, if oil prices rise and banks cut back on lending?
I expect that what Trump is trying to do is push the upcoming recession outside of the US (or outside of the Americas), to the extent he can.
Here’s my personal opinion, for a change! Accurate prediction can be difficult, especially about the future. But that’s half the fun of it.
It is easy to predict that the conflict between the US and Israel on one side and Iran on the other is going to heat up again in May. Bibi is again champing at the bit for another round of strikes, and Donald is building up the US military presence in the Middle East. Their common enemy, “the regime”, is faceless—unlike their usual enemies, there is no individual evil dictator they can point to—but this enemy is determined not to yield an inch to the demands being made on it.
As of today, there are reports of a constant flow of US military aircraft bringing supplies from Europe into the theater and also of three aircraft carrier strike groups in the region. Also, those 5,000 US troops being withdrawn from Germany—I wonder where they will be sent next?
With summer coming on and those aircraft carrier decks turning into solar-fired frying pans, things are about to get very hot in more ways than one. From what we know of the players involved, neither side is going to blink or back down, and so it looks like this dispute is going to be settled by renewed fighting, if it gets settled at all.
In my crystal ball, I don’t see any US “boots on the ground” apart from the boots of US air crews shot down over Iran. And I can’t see clearly whether there are any feet in those boots or legs attached. It seems far too hot for a ground assault anywhere along the coast of the Persian Gulf or the Arabian Sea. But another round of war by bombs, drones, and missiles seems very much on the cards.
If I had to wager on the outcome, I would say that both Iran and Israel will be further battered and bruised but will endure, while Donald will become a lame duck president as a result of this strategy. If Iran manages to sink one of those floating frying pans with 5,000 sailors and airmen on board, it would be difficult to spin that as another Pearl Harbor. It will be widely seen as nobody’s fault but Trump’s.
On the other hand, even if Trump manages to get Iran to agree to his wish list and for the time being all’s well that ends well, while he could certainly spin that as a victory, in practical terms the conflict would merely be put on the back burner, as the US/Israeli desire for Iranian “regime change” would continue.
The milk prices are falling, the drought reduces feed availability.
They returned to Slovakia with high hopes, only to be met with disappointment. A success story ends with a departure, they abandon their family milk farm.
https://my.sme.sk/novohrad/c/na-slovensko-sa-vratili-s-nadejou-dockali-sa-sklamania-uspesny-pribeh-sa-konci-odchodom
Animal husbandry for food is less and less profitable.
Thank you, MG, for this interesting interesting aspect of lack of the system to change…BAU is on automatic mode
This is a video by Professor Jiang Xuequin. He has an interesting theory. It is only the Americas that have enough resources (and small enough population) to be salvageable for the longer term. Trump doesn’t want to win in Iran; he wants a long war that will destroy (or handicap) the rest of the world by cutting off critical materials, including oil, traveling through the Strait of Hormuz. He wants to build up a new order in the Americas around resources, re-industrialization, and Christianity.
The United States is facing increasing global competition, and its dominance is becoming more relative. At the same time, a work culture focused on ever-increasing speed and output is being questioned as unsustainable.
Trump is not an idiot, but he plays one on teevee.
If he isn’t and idiot, then WHY does he play one on teevee?
haha… interconnected world. What can USA produce on its own ? Maybe 100 years ago possible.
Unfortunately, not a tooth brush.
That’s an AI generated fake channel I believe. The only real on is predictive history there’s so many fake ones now even though this one is pretty realistic but I think it’s pretty clearly AI generated.
But I have often argued with people that Trump and Xi made a deal to get rid of all people outside USA and China by chaos and starvation within a few years.
Why is China onboard? Because it’s too risky without. If this were to be true then USA should be afraid of getting removed by China too. Make sure every other nation is as fully as possible decimated and China could have a bright future with the remaining resources for many 100s of years.. they are the only country that would have the talent pool and technology to rebuild resource extraction after 7 billion others have died out. The danger is simply managing this without a nuclear war.
Any virus is too dangerous to achieve this. One small mutation and it could attack your population too. Humans are too similar genetics wise… And if there’s a vaccination too hard to hide it before administration.
On a controlled path I argue we cannot risk reducing population over 10% each year without risking uncontrolled collapse. But China and USA together could risk it because anything else is too dangerous for human survival (and yeah let’s forget about outer Spade junk theories).
It was often said that the earlier economic collapse happens the higher the chances for human survival. Insofar Trump is Jesus. Create chaos quickly to get on to reduce human population within a few years to a billion and then slowly to 50-100 millions worldwide…
That’s not a serious theory. If Trump and Xi were unilaterally deciding the fate of civilization they would be dead men. So you’d need to clarify the hierarchy before going any further.
Secondly, if you believe this theory to be the most likely reality, then it would also be the most likely reality to all of the other nuclear powers in the world. So you need to explain why they are all taking it lying down.
You also need to establish a systems analysis for why the world can’t handle more than a 10% annual population drop but that, together, China and the US can.
Because at more than 10% yearly essential things like power infrastructure or rubbish removal, water supply, road building/uptake will break. Maybe that’s even too fast.
Exactly because there’s nuclear powers besides Russia, china and USA is why induced chaos rather than outright war needs to take down Europe, India, Pakistan. Russian people will be integrated into China – that’s one of the very few not overpopulated countries apart from the broader border region with Europe. You need to get the others into economic chaos and destruction to remove their population rather than outright war.
The real question is rather are the ruling classes of China and USA aware and aligned in their view that a reduction of consumption hence removal of population outside is the solution to ressource shortages? Both USA and China may then try to make the other side believe to be in actual power preparing to take it out later too.
Apologies, Felix.
The way I see it those other nuclear powers’ Intel services will easily recognize a covert China-US induced chaos that assures the destruction of those other nuclear powers. That recognition triggers MAD. The closer to structural collapse the civilization gets, the more of a hair trigger MAD gets because it takes less and less to underhandedly collapse a country. I just don’t see it being tenable in a world without the Hand.
You are right. The video might be AI generated. But quite often the AI videos capture what the person has been saying, so that they are not 100% bad.
Ramping up manufacturing in 5 years seemed pretty absurd to me, but natural gas could perhaps be ramped up a fair amount in 5 years, especially of Europe could use Levant natural gas. The extra natural gas could go to countries that needed it, or be used in the US.
Somehow, leaders are going to want to keep recession away from their own country. And the Americas are less populated relative to resources than the rest of the world. So if there is an easy way to push recession outward, Trump might work in this direction.
8 billion to 1 billion to 100 million to 50 million
Professor Jiang Xuequin holds some rather unusual beliefs, so I’d take his statements with a grain of salt.
Anybody who gets as popular as he did as quickly as he did should be taken with a grain of salt. Jiang has even been in Tucker Carlson’s show.
This story is strange but believable.
“Why This $4 Billion Warship is Literally Melting in the Sun! Crisis on the USS Abraham Lincoln!” The ship is terribly hot.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtsbvRP9tRs
The blurb says:
The USS Abraham Lincoln is one of the most powerful machines on Earth, but it has a weakness no one expected: the sun. In this video, we dive into why the Middle Eastern heat is turning this nuclear carrier into a giant frying pan. From “Black Flag” conditions to sailors getting burns through their boots, discover the physics behind the Navy’s battle against extreme temperatures.
Here is a comment from that video.
@ltribley
2 days ago
Excellent topic. Some additional details:
Operating a 100,000-ton “steel island” in the Middle East during the peak heat season (May through September) creates a brutal feedback loop of mechanical and physiological stress. On a carrier like the USS Abraham Lincoln or the USS George H.W. Bush, the flight deck becomes a massive heat sink that can reach temperatures exceeding 150°F (65°C).
1. Flight Deck & Structural Deterioration
The flight deck isn’t just a flat surface; it’s a complex layer of non-skid coatings and specialized steel.
– Non-Skid Breakdown: The abrasive “non-skid” coating applied to the deck expands and contracts at different rates than the steel underneath. Extreme heat can cause this coating to “bubble” or flake off. If these chips are sucked into a jet engine, they cause catastrophic FOD (Foreign Object Damage).
,- Expansion & Warping: While the ships are engineered for thermal expansion, the intense heat puts extreme stress on the Jet Blast Deflectors (JBDs). The hydraulic systems that raise and lower these panels can experience seal failures or fluid thinning, leading to slower cycle times during launches.
2. Aviation & Electronic Equipment
The primary threat to the air wing is air density and thermal stress.
– Lift & Payload Loss: As the air gets hotter, it becomes less dense. This reduces the lift generated by the wings and the thrust from the engines. Projected impacts include “downloading” aircraft—meaning pilots must carry less fuel or fewer munitions to take off safely, directly reducing combat effectiveness.
– Electronic “Cook-off”: Avionics in F/A-18s and F-35Cs are cooled by environmental control systems that struggle when the ambient intake air is already 110°F. High heat accelerates the degradation of capacitors and transformers, leading to higher “No Fault Found” rates where systems glitch and then work again once they’ve cooled down in the hangar bay.
– Tire & Seal Fatigue: Rubber components, including landing gear tires and hydraulic seals, degrade significantly faster. High deck temperatures can actually soften tire rubber, making them more prone to “chunking” during the high-impact arrestment of a landing.
And some more:
3. Personnel: The Human Factor
The “Air Boss” and deck crews face the highest risk.
– The “Black” Flag Condition: Under extreme heat, the Navy moves into “Black Flag” conditions, which strictly limit physical activity. However, in a combat or high-tension environment, these limits are often pushed.
– Cognitive Decline: Studies show that when core body temperatures rise even slightly, reaction times and decision-making accuracy drop by up to 20%. In the high-stakes environment of a flight deck—where a mistake can be fatal—this is the most dangerous “deterioration.”
– Heat Casualties: It is common for carriers in the North Arabian Sea to treat dozens of sailors daily for heat exhaustion. Even with “cool-down” stations and forced hydration, the physical toll of wearing heavy, flame-retardant flight deck jerseys and PPE is immense.
4. Projected Operational Impacts
Maintenance Man-Hours: For every hour of flight, maintenance requirements typically double in extreme heat due to the “wear and tear” on engines and cooling systems.
– Increased Water Consumption: The ship’s distilling plants must work overtime to provide the fresh water needed for both personnel hydration and “engine washes” (required to clear salt and sand that bake onto turbine blades).
These two are both excellent comments. The empire is expecting AC everywhere.
No AC and they won’t be sleeping well.
By the end of May, they’ll potentially be getting temperatures in the mid 40s at 3am and 50° during the day, so every second outside of AC means constant sweating(that’s before the clothing they have to wear).
I’ve witnessed enough men dropping from it, if they don’t have breaks every 15-20 minutes.
Good luck asking for a ceasefire every 15 minutes, when for the other side, it’s just a normal season and so they are prepared accordingly(and not thousands of miles away from home). If they can last until late August, they will also enjoy the massive rise in humidity, just as they hoped it was about to get better(terrible for morale).
The brothas gonna have to pick up the slack. Like old times.
To compare contrast: fresh snow in hillz near Athens yesterday, but hot wave during day / afternoon of the same day unfolded..
It’s a nighttime air campaign anyway so the issues are minimized.
Reports of a new “martian drone” possibly the first AI controlled drone swarm deployed by AFU. While photos in this article don’t display a prominent photo voltaic panel that feature is always present on actual drones supposedly sent to mars. Also one would think mars mission drones would have a large degree of autonomy. It’s worth noting drone swarms would seem autonomous by nature and it’s been years since China started working on that.
Naturally this was developed by Ukraine during wartime using only Ukrainian technology and components. Or is that even a thing anymore as all great nations pass around military tech on a hourly basis?
Someone is going to put a eye out with all this bb gun swapping soon in a big way.
But mostly everyone is laughing right all good fun?
Whether this is the real deal or not I know not. I do know there are many many destabilizing events occuring. Frankly Ukraine war would be terrifying if it wasn’t upstaged by energy disaster.
War of attrition works both ways.
Or is that the point?
Drone equals a praying mantis in a shoebox filled with grasshoppers.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6oD2gROC5Z0
Name of the video is, “Ukraine battlefield: Advanced Ukrainian drones raise concerns among Russian forces.”
They continuously innovating. The drones supposedly use AI.
Do you think Ukrainians developed it on their own?
The aliens favor Ukraine
Few weeks ago some folks were making fun of the argument ( I supported ) the Hormuz will continue to function in a trickle fashion for the near future. This article in tangent tends to support it, as they cont. loading on and dispatch new vessels.. in lowered tempo.
—
War on Iran Live Blog Update| War on Iran
Iraq says oil output can return to normal within days of Strait of Hormuz reopening
2 May 2026 18:00 BST
Iraq’s deputy oil minister Basim Mohammed says the country can quickly restore oil production and exports once the crisis in the Strait of Hormuz subsides.
Speaking during ongoing disruption to Gulf shipping, Mohammed said Iraq could return to normal output within seven days after conditions stabilise.
He added that production currently stands at about 1.5 million barrels per day, with roughly 200,000 barrels exported daily through the Ceyhan terminal in Turkey.
The minister said two tankers are already prepared, with two more expected to be deployed depending on security conditions in the strait, which has been largely closed during the US-Israel war on Iran.
Copyright © 2014 – 2026. Middle East Eye. All rights reserved. Only England and Wales jurisdiction apply in all legal matters. Middle East Eye ISSN 2634-2456
—
A ‘trickle’ fashion, formally known as ‘horizontal drilling’.
I resemble that remark. Jr’s still in the game! reante’s 6-8 week Big Nuclear Scare timeline is flamed out. Hand got me with the ceasefire is what I’m telling myself. Not sure how much longer I can tell myself that though.
To be or not to be. Either you get screwed by Yoko Oh No, or by inflation.
It is all about feeling the bed, or the cushion.
I hope the divorce was amicable. 😁 Hand is a true craftsman, all I got is my sketches.
There’s no divorce my friend. There’s only disagreement of what is yours.
Glad to hear it. Duration of the BNS is not such a big loss. Catch and release. Let me know when you got a bigger fish to fry and I’ll bring the kidney fat.
Iraq was among the first to stop production, but it sounds like they found ships to put some of the oil in, besides exporting some through Turkey. If the crisis resolves, they do not feel like it will take long to get the wells back open.
I might mention also that Iraq’s oil production was relatively recently started (or restarted) with the help of contract oil companies. A recent low production year was 2003. Such production might be easier to restart compared to some production in Saudi Arabia that has been going since the 1970s.
Many people including myself have thought the walkaway option the best.
It’s been clear to me for many years that Hormuz is Irans nuclear option. That’s not quite correct. A nuclear weapon is binary. It’s deployed or not deployed. It’s detonated or not detonated. It is the quintessential bullet that can never be erased.
Hormuz is not like that. Hormuz is continuous. Hormuz is ongoing through control. The amount of the toll and whether you can pass at all will be a function of where your allegiance lies. Rather than a one time use of destructive power where the world economy is destroyed Hormuz is continuous.
In some ways I think all mutually assured destruction is like this. Viewed as a absaloute deterent no thought is given to what happens after it is deployed. But when it actually is deployed the world doesn’t actually end. You still have to try and cope with the consequences. That’s part of the insanity of the paradigm. It’s thought there will be no decisions afterwards but there are. Only there is no ability to do much. This can be called the situation we regard as remorse. Mutually assured destruction does not result in no more decision making. It results in a situation where no outcome is desirable. That is remorse.
Its interesting. I thought the Iranians understood the nature of Hormuz as a deterent. Now I’m not sure. It appears they think they can meter out destruction of the world economy without it effecting them. The Hormuz boss calling the shots for every economy of the world. Things don’t work that way. You can’t kill something and harness it at the same time. Certainly the boss model is attractive but not applicable because the actual mechanism is destructive.
Regardless it appears the walk away option will be far from painless and not just from the damage already done or the damage in the immediate future. It raises a interesting question for me. Can demand destruction via price really occur for the most valuable material on the planet? How well will the toll system actually work as the world economy crashes and burns?
Of course this is all hypothetical. Alpha dogs don’t go quietly. Neither do Beta dogs. A doggy biscuit here or there does not change that. Iranians planning out their toll structure is silly. Just like all of us humans with our silly plans.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fTuuexm8C80
Thanks the boss model is a great example of how the bs propaganda is flowing both ways in order to cover for Hormuz-based systems Collapse. Both sides conning
We will get soon enough some on the ground [ reality hints ] if the Gulfies pony up in these promised new alt. pipelines rerouted to the RedSea..
PS very likely parts for it sourced in CHN, hah..
PS2 Alex making good walk-in fun today out of Don’s family ~accidentally pre-invested in the world’s largest tungsten mine in Kazakhstan, now out of the blue US govs are about to shovel into this int venture large public money as well..
Btw. isn’t it wondrous when -stans now supply critical war-effort materials to RU adversaries.. [ Gorbi & Yeltsin ]+Vlad foreign policy for the win!
China has been using the low oil environment to build the largest SPR in the world
Larger than the rest of the world combined
And they haven’t even tapped it yet…
Almost like they expect things to get worse .
https://x.com/ekwufinance/status/2050623150971375676/photo/1
Welcome noob to the biggest backdoor energy bailout of Phase 1 of the Non-Public Degrowth Agenda. Hand is a prepper. Phase 2 can only survive if the factory to the world is all prepped up.
Just to remind folks . I had posted that China allowed 3.5 million barrels of refined product in one MONTH to neighboring countries and reasons thereof .
That’s a great point ravi. China sharing bigly its oil cushion contributes bigly to its regional status as civilizational 1A to the US’s 1. China be paying forward the Hand’s backdoor gift. China as hub. China as a conduit. Welcome to systems management.
China also upselling that discount oil bigly. And not just because it’s refined lol. Hand be stacking functions.
China has approved an increase in refined fuel exports for May “to regions other than Hong Kong, two trading sources said on Wednesday, though levels remain below last year’s average.
The world’s largest oil importer will allow 500,000 tonnes of refined fuel exports next month, said the sources, who have direct knowledge of the matter.
That is up from estimates from ship-tracking company Vortexa of April exports of about 320,000 tonnes.
Beijing has clamped down on its fuel exports since March to safeguard the domestic market from crude and fuel supply disruptions caused by closure of the Strait of Hormuz because of the US-Israeli war with Iran.
Countries such as Cambodia, Laos, Australia, Bangladesh, Maldives and Myanmar are expected to receive fuels, with the Chinese Government designating the volumes and destinations, the two sources said.”
https://www.bairdmaritime.com/shipping/tankers/china-opens-the-taps-on-refined-fuel-exports-for-may-volumes-lower-than-last-year
Let the games begin .
” China ordered its national companies to ignore US sanctions on domestic oil refiners that Washington said were buying Iranian oil.
In a rare order issued on Saturday, it said Chinese entities shall “not recognize, implement, or comply with the sanctions” in order to “safeguard national sovereignty, security, and development interests.”— Bloomberg
Good for them. China is in a position where it can ignore sanctions.
Tomorrow is the last day
The fate of at least one billion people is already decided. No one knows whether it will become 2 or 3.
Energy from USA will probably be able to support some Western European countries. Probably UK, France and Benelux. Not sure about Germany , Italy or Iberia. Rhineland might vote to join France or become independent since the Rhine River is likely to be the border between abundance and penury.
It was foolish for USA to force France to cough back Rhineland in 1920s, which led to another World War. Basically whatever USA did outside of Western hemisphere was bad.
USA will keep Japan afloat. 50/50 for South Korea and Taiwan. Everywhere else will be abandoned.
There will be horror stories which will make the 1845 famine look like a fasting session gone wrong. However people in the advanced world will not feel a thing.
Going by current production, reserves , inventory and export data . At the current speed the USA will run out of export capacity in mid July . I think the armed forces are going to force the hand of the politicians to halt export much sooner . Hopefully they have learnt some lessons from the ammunition debacle .
The Phase 2 HTOE (Horsetrading Theory of Everything) has always held that Japan would be split between China and Russia, on the horizontal where their two borders meet. Russia gets excellent fishing grounds and Hokkaido while China has to manage the Japanese NPPs, which is a match made in heaven. Russia has to supply enough oil to Chinese Japan in order to see it through the decommissioning.
The US will leave South Korea and Taiwan. Your last sentence is of course delusional. Or a delusional attempt to be funny.
Possible and probable .
Do you proofread what you type? If not I suggest you do because half of the time it makes about as much sense as the orange man’s tweets. Also do you really expect everyone to have a cheat sheet and look up your abbreviations? Not trying to be rude I am just being honest.
Whom are you asking Nat ?
US stands for United States. You run along now.
all that had occurred to me too
NPP=Nuclear Power Plants. That is what Japan is known for.
Thanks Gail. I want to understand your thoughts reante but it is frustrating with the abbreviations. I am thinking that is a millennial thing. If you don’t want to type out the words, you can just use voice recognition.
Then try harder. Problem solved.
Things will get tough for every country. Why because people are gonna lose their mental stability when everything is running on intermittent energy and food supplies are greatly reduced thanks to no fertiliser being available i think cannibalism will become the norm sure there may be fossil fuels in some countries but the world may be running on half the normal amount in some countries such as the USA or Russia. In other countries such as Australia we may have only 20% . What does this mean for countries like Australia? We will have to learn to survive 80 % less worth of energy. No more driving to work no more school no more plane travel. No more driving to the shop only walking so get yourself a cart or a steel shopping trolley for those long walking trips hope. If you are alone you will not survive long because crime will skyrocket.
fact remains
we built an economic system supported by cheap surplus energy
and we are attempting to sustain that system on expensive scarce energy—
i think i first wrote that about 15 years ago, we seem to have got there at last….
That is rapidly declining and how is public transport going to survive in Australia charged up by the sun or wind.the biggest problem ispeople’s ignorance they just do not get it I am sick of it sick of trying to explain it to them.At the end of the day I do not feel confident about the situation we are in.
Lets revert back to Slovakia for a moment.
No, joking aside lets focus on Australia instead.
Applying my renown high-horse altitude, Adonis I guess lot of people there can still afford at least folding electric bike (+public transport) or CHN phev/ev as private means..
and it will be for great price vs many other places of the world. So, why complain (now).
Just basic old insolation map for home PV system to feed it..
https://www.hotspotenergy.com/DC-air-conditioner/australia-solar-map.php
https://solargis.com/resources/free-maps-and-gis-data?locality=australia
and why would I complain now Junior because I can see the writing on the wall we will be lucky to see 2027.Its not a good feeling to have to choose between life and death I done it once when I was drowning with my friends and I had choose to survive and let them die. this choice will be coming up again it will become a dog eat dog world out there and we will have to make decisions we will not be able to live with.
Adonis, fact remains….
Australia holds approximately 150 to 160 billion tonnes (Bt) of proven coal reserves, ranking 3rd or 4th globally. These reserves could theoretically provide over 1,200 years of electricity at Australia’s current consumption levels.
Moreover, Australia possesses approximately 1.75 million tonnes of identified uranium resources, representing about 35% of the world’s total resources, the largest in the world. These reserves could theoreticallypower global electricity production for many decades or provide Australia with all its electricity for centuries if utilized domestically.
Furthermore, Australia is ideally situated to produce oodles of solar power and wind power generation. The country is literally swimming in sunshine, as is well known. Renewables contributed 36% of total electricity generation in 2024, specifically solar (18%), wind (12%) and hydro (5%). This could and probably will be boosted to over 50% within a decade.
However, most coal is exported, and domestic coal-fired generation is expected to retire by 2038. Also, most mined Australian uranium is exported. Thus, Australia is not running out of energy; it is truly the Lucky Country. Any energy shortages in Australia can only be attributed to deliberate policy.
When Russia and Ukraine or Israel and Iran bomb each other’s energy facilities, nobody attributes this to anything other than deliberate policy, When Australia, Canada, the UK, Belgium, or Germany willfully destroy their own energy facilities, the situation is different in its details, but this is a difference hat makes no difference in practice in that somebody planned the destruction of said energy facilities. Those power stations didn’t demolish themselves.
If we want to look for causes, I would start with Maurice Strong and his philosophy of deliberately collapsing industrial society in order to achieve a sustainable society with fairness and justice for all in harmony with the environment, life, and everything:
“Current lifestyles and consumption patterns of the affluent middle class – involving high meat intake, the use of fossil fuels, electrical appliances, home and work-place air-conditioning, and suburban housing – are not sustainable.”
— Maurice Strong, opening speech at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit
“If we don’t change, our species will not survive… Frankly, we may get to the point where the only way of saving the world will be for industrial civilization to collapse.”
— Maurice Strong, September 1, 1997 edition of National Review magazine
“What if a small group of world leaders were to conclude that the principal risk to the Earth comes from the actions of the rich countries? And if the world is to survive, those rich countries would have to sign an agreement reducing their impact on the environment. Will they do it? The group’s conclusion is ‘no’. The rich countries won’t do it. They won’t change. So, in order to save the planet, the group decides: Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?”
— Maurice Strong, Maurice Strong, Interview 1992, concerning the plot of a book he would like to write (quoted in Gibson, Donald. Environmentalism: ideology and power. pg. 95)
” Australia holds approximately 150 to 160 billion tonnes (Bt) of proven coal reserves, ranking 3rd or 4th globally. These reserves could theoretically provide over 1,200 years of electricity at Australia’s current consumption levels.
Moreover, Australia possesses approximately 1.75 million tonnes of identified uranium resources, representing about 35% of the world’s total resources, the largest in the world. These reserves could theoreticallypower global electricity production for many decades or provide Australia with all its electricity for centuries if utilized domestically. “”
Where is the diesel to extract this ? QED
The acronym on the lips of green gurus everywhere these days is HVO, which is short for Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil.
If that doesn’t do the trick, the Aussies can make diesel out of kangaroo droppings or camel dung.
Failing that, they could organize an army of men and boys with pickaxes and miniature railways to dig the stuff out and process it manually.
Details. Details. I’m thinking somewhere along the following lines.
May the diesel be with you unfortunately even hvo needs to be purchased from overseas and sustainable aviation fuel is only 0.1 % production globally this inflation is only temporary once the collapse occurs the system will require more interest rate stimulation to avoid the unavoidable maybe agenda 2030 is code for That’s all folks.
Or pig shit?
Australia is in the Chinese sphere of consumption. Remembering our export land model the more Australia consumes the less China gets. China will pay the politicians for the benefit of China.
@Mirror
to answer this
https://ourfiniteworld.com/2026/04/02/losing-the-iran-war-may-be-the-best-outcome-for-the-world/comment-page-10/#comment-507984
The 1066 reset was the last major reset in the British Isles. Ever since there has not been a single reset, and the rule of the Norman nobles are eternal, as proven by Gregory Clark
There were some house cleanings, like the Wars of the Roses, the Cromwell Wars , etc but until Charles Fitzclarence , whom I will continue to call Chucky like the satanic doll in Child’s Play (and unlike the doll whose damages were rather inconsequential, this Chucky’s damage seems to be eternal) and the 200/400 scums of earth from Worcestershire, no mobility was really allowed. Only because of Chucky and his 200/400 Worcestershire scums of the earth, who are no less guilty, there was a brief window for some ambitious souls to sneak in and people like Peter Cassidy, whose surname shows his Irish origin (though he is no relation to Butch Cassidy, real name Robert Parker), calling such ne’erdowells as ‘national heroes’.
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2019/apr/17/who-owns-england-thousand-secret-landowners-author
Half of England is owned by less than 1% of the pop, many of them the Normans who originally came with William.
Peter Porter (Australian-born British poet, 1929–2010) wrote the following poem, titled “John Marston Advises Anger,” which first appeared in his 1961 collectionOnce Bitten, Twice Bitten.
The poem draws a parallel between the seedy, sexually charged, class-conscious world of 1950s–early 1960s London (King’s Road, jazz clubs, Chelsea types) and the cynical, satirical Elizabethan/Jacobean drama of John Marston (especially his play The Dutch Courtesan, featuring the character Malheureux). Porter was known for this kind of witty, culturally layered, ironic verse that mixes contemporary life with literary history.
When I read it, I am particularly impressed by the line “Where inheritors are inheriting still.” It underlines your point about the Normans having consolidated their status as the owners of England’s green and pleasant land and still holding on to much of it.
The boys are howling to take the girls to bed.
Our betters say it’s a seedy world. The critics say
Think of them as an Elizabethan Chelsea set.
Then they’ve never listened to our lot – no talk
Could be less like – but the bodies are the same:
Those jeans and bums and sweaters of the King’s Road
Would fit Marston’s stage. What’s in a name,
If Cheapside and the Marshalsea mean Eng. Lit.
And the Fantasie, Sa Tortuga, Grisbi, Bongi-Bo
Mean life? A cliché? What hurts dies on paper,
Fades to classic pain. Love goes as the MG goes.
The colonel’s daughter in black stockings, hair
Like sash cords, face iced-white, studies art,
Goes home once a month. She won’t marry the men
She sleeps with, she’ll revert to type – it’s part
Of the side-show: Mummy and Daddy in the wings,
The bongos fading on the road to Haslemere
Where inheritors are inheriting still.
Marston’s Malheureux found his whore too dear;
Today some Jazz Club girl on the social make
Would put him through his paces, the aphrodisiac cruel.
His friends would be the smoothies of our Elizabethan age –
The Rally Men, Grantchester Breakfast Men, Public School
Personal Assistants and the fragrant PROs,
Cavalry-twilled tame publishers praising Logue,
Classics Honours Men promoting Jazzetry,
Market Researchers married into Vogue.
It’s a Condé Nast world and so Marston’s was.
His had a real gibbet – our death’s out of sight.
The same thin richness of these worlds remains –
The flesh-packed jeans, the car-stung appetite
Volley on his stage, the cage of discontent.
While it is no longer 95%, current estimates suggest roughly 30% or more of England is still owned by aristocratic and landed gentry families, many with Norman roots. Meanwhile, less than 1% of the population owns about half of England. This includes the old aristocracy plus some newer wealthy owners, but the historic noble families form a large and disproportionately powerful part of it.
Contrast England with that other great tradition-loving, tea-drinking hierarchy-worshipping island nation that drives on the left side of the road—Japan. In the latter, the feudal overlords lost almost all their land soon after the end of the Second World War at a stroke of General McArthur’s pen.
The post-WWII Land Reform (1947–1949) under the U.S. Occupation (MacArthur) was one of the most thorough and successful agrarian reforms in history. It targeted absentee landlords and large holders (including many former kazoku — the Meiji-era aristocracy that included ex-daimyo feudal lords).
The government forced the sale of ~1.76–2 million hectares of rented farmland (about 38% of Japan’s farmland at the time) to tenant farmers at very low prices. Absentee landlords lost almost everything; resident landlords were limited to tiny holdings (typically ~1 hectare / 2.5 acres). This effectively dismantled the economic base of the old feudal/aristocratic landowning class.
Former daimyo / kazoku families (hundreds of lineages) were stripped of most of their rural estates. Many retained some urban property, family art collections, or invested compensation into businesses, but large-scale land ownership was broken.
Today, agricultural land in Japan is dominated by small owner-farmers. While some old noble families (e.g., certain branches of Tokugawa, Maeda, Shimazu, or court noble lines) remain wealthy and may own scattered properties, forests, or estates, there is no equivalent to England’s persistent aristocratic estates covering 30%+ of the country. Japan’s overall land ownership is much more fragmented, with significant corporate, government, and small private holdings (including a lot of mountainous and forested land, since much of the country has terrain similar to that of Switzerland).
Johnny Dumpy-marshy’s stage play about Mr. deTroubled-2-be-hanged ?
( => 2026′ name convention context )
in
http://www.dutchcourtesan.co.uk/mapping-the-dutch-courtesan/
( Name of key characters pun intended at that time )
On JAP land reform and today’s coterie of small farm establishments -> this new trend also affected the methods and techniques used ( fit for ) on smaller acreage, incl. lot of small specialized implements to mini and two wheel tractors, and also huge universe of specialized hand tools of clever design and fine trades-artisan qualities..
In a way, it’s a bit similar situation what the ~Alpine farmer ( had to ) brought forward on their small plots and difficult terrain. Hence, chiefly IT/CH/AT (partly also FR/DE) small-mid sized manufs. conquering the realm. And obviously all that gliding on the puff cloud du-jeur made of agri subsidies channeled to this over-all sector.
It’s interesting how each epoch could eventually work-out something completely unique and ( sadly ) not ever lasting. I doubt this specific sector will be around in few hundred years though..
There is the latest round of conversations among Glenn Diesen and Einar Tangen, who is regarded as one of the key “translators” of CHN gov policy in the western / globo media space.
They basically cover lot of the ground as here, e.g. third world to be hit first by the fertilizer and fuel issues etc. But most importantly ( for us ) and now I’m paraphrasing:
– CHN’s govs expect poly-crisis / instability ahead
– [ IS ] now being considered by CHN govs as pariah state within globo community and should be disarmed, hah
– expecting hunger / food issues in the West as well – here I don’t buy it – perhaps meant in next 2-3yrs and beyond because of strategic stockpiles and CAP and similar agri subsidies still functioning ( + as reported here lot of %%sales ongoing )..
– brace for incoming wave of seesaw political / econ ~chaos – turbulence in W. Economies
..
.
https://youtu.be/JD5nJ6NOCS8
https://no01.substack.com/p/the-cbdc-we-already-have
The CBDC we already have: crypto on a chain
The product was sold as the alternative.
Permissionless, censorship-resistant, beyond the reach of any single government.
The whole pitch of crypto, repeated in white papers and conference keynotes for fifteen years, was that this was the exit. The dollar system had become weaponised, the rails could be cut at will, but the chain – the chain was sovereign.
But it doesn’t really work as hoped:
On April 23rd, the US Treasury called Tether and asked them to freeze $344 million of Iranian funds on Tron. Tether did it in one single smart-contract call. Two wallets, blacklisted at the issuer level, $213 million in one and $131 million in the other.
That money didn’t move or got seized. It instantly became decorative. Visible on the chain, but immobile, a monument to a successful misrepresentation.
Will Stablecoins work any better?
Crypto nerds are idealists. Welcome to Civilization, kids!
Currencies are only as free as the State sociopolitics allow. Phase 2 are law and order social nationalisms. The nationalization of stablecoins will feature fully encrypted wallets for users — personal privacy like IRL paper cash transactions, notwithstanding decryption during criminal investigations — even though quantitative transaction data will remain fully transparent because that data is one of the great managerial aspects of stablecoins.
When I read the $344 million number the other day, I thought to myself, that’s not very much. Iran is definitely still using stablecoins and it looks to me like this is the Hand massaging, with a token gesture, what I repeatedly said weeks and months ago about how the IRGC’s heavy dependence on stablecoins is another example of things that make you go hmmmmmm. Hand casually wiping its fingerprints from the Big Nuclear Scare.
If it was an organic conflict, Iran would have long ago lost all access to the stablecoins that keep the country afloat.
This is a written report by Larry Johnson. It also includes links to three videos. Johnson says that there are far too few ships to be very effective at a blockade.
https://sonar21.com/the-bogus-blockade-claim-of-the-us-department-of-war/
The Bogus Blockade Claim of the US Department of War
Pete Hegseth is lying about the US blockade of Iranian ports. . . As I discussed in my last article, the US Navy is keeping its ships 200 miles off the coast of Iran. If the venture any closer to shore they are vulnerable to missile and drone attacks. The Iranian ships — when they leave port — normally stay within 50 miles of the Iranian coast, which means they are outside the reach of the US Navy. . .
Next, let’s look at the current US Navy order of battle (this is based on publicly available information). As of late April 2026, the US Navy has at least 14 actively operating or supporting in the broader region (Gulf of Oman, Arabian Sea, and relevant Indian Ocean areas). . . In other words, the US Navy only has 11 ships that could be used in a VBSS [seizure] operation. . .
Do you see the math problem? . . . If we assume that all 11 US ships carried out successful VBSS operations since 15 April, that means between 89% and 96% of all Iranian ships out of the Strait of Hormuz have evaded the blockade. Hegseth is lying.
How long can the S&P 500 keep rising? The SOX Semiconductors seem to be carrying the bulk of the load. Going forward, buybacks may be low because of negative cash flow. Doesn’t sound like a good stock market view!
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/stocks-hit-4th-all-time-high-past-5-many-more-stocks-falling-rising
Stocks Hit 4th All-Time High Of Past 5 With Many More Stocks Falling Than Rising
A new day, a new month… and another record high on negative breadth.
With even Goldman warning that bad things happen when only a handful of high momentum names carry the entire market (especially to now daily all time highs) while most stocks drop, the S&P decided to demonstrate and closed at a fresh record high on yet another day of brutal negative breadth – this was the 4th record high of the past 5 that saw way more decliners (328) than advancers (172)!
. . . it’s not the market, it’s really just a handful of stocks: the Magnificent 7 have collectively risen by 10% since the start of the war, the S&P is up 5%, while the equal-weighted S&P 500 has declined by 1% over that period…
But even the Mag 7 is an amateur compared to the sector that has singlehandedly carried the market since the start of the war: the SOX Semiconductor Index has soared by 30% since the start of the Iran War, purely on hopes that those ridiculous budgets for future capex will materialize (even though companies continue to spend far below budget and virtually none of the promised data centers have been built with half delayed or canceled) and will trickle down across the broader market (it won’t). . .
Finally, looking ahead, the peak of earnings season is now well behind us – only 10% of the SPX is set to report next week – and micro catalysts are eroding, leaving only the looming stagflation and deteriorating geopolitical picture to look forward to. The silver lining: buyback activity will increase as companies exit blackout, by EOD we estimate 65% in the open window. The problem: the biggest buyback names, most of which are now free cash flow negative, are now spending all those billions on capex instead of buybacks.
If it falls all of us will be living in mud huts
In a warm arid environment mud huts or adobe are primo shelter.
How high? Ask the algos. Why would ai have a taste for semiconductors?
Perhaps think in terms of inflation adjusted stock prices; there is no appreciation, it is secondary to dollar devaluation through inflation. Look at your grocery bill.
Dennis L.
I’d recheck your math on that if I were you.
Dr.Tim among his Surplus people forum just said on inflation ( price of oil at incoming shock compared to previous rounds ) that the accompanied [ demand destruction ] expected in few weeks time / NOW will surprise us as strong it will be ( south of $200 )..
That’s good to hear. Nice safe call. He doesn’t have to lose sleep over a bold call like I do. Still holding though.
I guess he used lower number actually, my bad..
Well, anyway in nascent scenario (digital) oil flash spikes briefly into say $360 and in week or two drops to $120-140 that would be shocking to most already. And deflation proper case bottoming to even $50-80 per barrel would be non comprehensible then..
But that would be definitively empty shelves territory – at least for large part of the junk warez out there.. Besides do we need 30x models of station wagons or 100x brands of bicycles.. ?
The over-all MPP out of oilz+ is a great magician, I tend to smile and laugh aloud while ~everybody is honking on me [ the laggard ] in the slow hiway lane, hah. It’s always like these 99.9% MPPers gang up vs one .1% crazy delusional de-grower.. not being in that forever-rush mode set on.
Although, self-critically admitting, I also do engage sometimes in MPP but in other domains.