Transcription
Hard to believe you don't take a day off. I'm sure you don't either, professor. I see you doing the rounds.
I took off Saturday and part of Sunday is my power went off and we didn't have cell service either in this part of Chicago. It was great. So I I did not watch time and I caught up to a fair bit of what you've been doing, but it was really like almost 36 hours without power.
Wasn't so bad.
Well, now that you're back, we have three ships that were attacked, professor.
Oh, we're up to three. Oh my goodness. I was working this morning before it's growing at Yeah, I see. Yeah. Well, they're just bound and determined. They're bound and determined to keep the model on track.
They're not giving up. The funeral is ongoing. What? During the funeral processions, which are huge, by the way. You saw the numbers.
Well, I did a big post. Oh, well, I've been following it again. I'm about an hour and a half out of because I was preparing for you in a different way. But the um but yesterday, Mario, I did a big post on the escalation trap about the funeral. So, I put it out yesterday morning. Um, and we can talk about it here. I explained and and you're quite right. You you have been covering this extensively.
There it is. The gathering the gather the gathering because I got it in an email. The gathering storm, Iran's funeral and the coming August shock. So that's Yeah. Yeah. This is going to be Yeah. This this is not just a a oneweek story, Mario. and and of course it's historic, but there's a lot more that is likely to unfold uh as a result of this. Uh and it really is quite the it's it's a big story already. I'm really glad you and a few others are covering it. The American media, and I don't know about the European media or the Middle Eastern media, uh they're they're almost not covering it. uh they are like putting in a few seconds here and there from what I've been able to see. Um but they're just simply not uh giving it the attention it really deserves. And what that's going to do is set up for some pretty big surprises as we go forward.
Um, let's start with the attacks on the ships. Um, we had two attacked yesterday, one today. All of them on the Omani side. I know one of them is Qatari. I've got the information on them. So the other two are um one was Saudi and Qatari and then the third one that was struck just today. We don't know um what type of what ship it is and who it belongs to but that is the third such attack and this is um as we got reports in the last few days that the Omani side UK MTO announced that the Omani side is is open for business again has expanded. Obviously, Iran is not happy with this. And the concerning part is that every time this happens, for the last few weeks, the new escalation uh system or escalation rules that we have is every time Iran attacks the ships, the US bombs Iran, Iran retaliates against the US and everyone's worried that this could escalate and and uh get out of control. But um would you expect the same thing to happen again?
Uh, I don't expect the United States to respond till after the funeral. So I think that for the United States to uh to respond during the funeral, which basically is going to go on for a few more days, um would only heighten the uh uh the amount of escalation coming back. I think this is something that's easily anticipated by Sentcom and folks in the White House, even though we keep saying they're a bunch of ninkham poops. uh here they might be at some level but I think that this is even too obvious for them to miss. So uh what I uh what I think is that if you recall a lot of the talk just a few days ago was was there some sort of a secret truth? There was going to be no fighting at all during the uh uh during the funeral. And of course, what you would then do is take strategic advantage of ideas like that to get more out through the Omani uh pipeline or the Omani Avenue, which appears to be what happened. I think this was just simply false uh confidence. I saw no information whatsoever to expect that Iran had actually decided not to attack during the funeral. And I think that um uh what you are seeing is uh just the steady state uh that I've been describing for several weeks now which is that Iran is enforcing the four corners of theou that includes it is in control of the straits. It is in control of the straits and that means that if we try to run and break the the grip so to speak through the southern corridor Iran is going to respond. Um now we then are in a situation as you just said that we don't want to lose faith so we'll do some uh counter responding but the big issue here I just want to be very clear for uh the audience. I understand that escalation is the thing everybody's worrying about. I think there's simply a few weeks too soon for the bigger uh risks that that may be coming here in the short term. What really matters is not whether the United States does a tit fortat response. What really matters is the number of um um ships uh going in and out of Horus. Uh you've been doing a great job of tracking that, Mario. Um I think you're one of the people that consistently tracks it. I think several times a day if I'm not mistaken. And this really is very important because this is the issue uh between now and when the oil inventories run down. So uh since May, okay, I've been explaining this on the Substack that that the key key thing to keep the eye on are whether or not we're going to run down uh the oil inventories. Uh and now folks like you have really gotten that mess. You know, you're on it, man. And um but it is important to know that that is is even more critical than the kind of little these little flare-ups and the things that that people think are like the escalation and so forth because the bigger issue here is Iran the balance of power is shifting more and more in Iran's favor. The aggregate balance of power has uh shifted for months. That's Iran's control of the straits of four moves. The tactical balance of power has shifted in Iran's favor. Iran can attack these ships at will. There's little there's no sign whatsoever that America can do anything to defend those ships or to um uh to shoot down all of the attacks before they happen. They Iran just can attack at will. So, it controls it has advantages in the tactical balance of power. Um now what you're seeing with the funeral is it is gaining a huge advantage in the balance of resolve. The political element of the balance of power is going dramatically uh in its favor. And this is happening during this period I've been describing where we're entering the period of Iran's maximum coercive leverage. And that has not started yet. that will start once we get to these or near these bottoms of the oil inventories. And the truth is as I had this big uh meeting with some of these oil experts in uh in early May in in May and there's some disagreement and you're covering all the disagreement. There's disagreement about exactly where these bottoms are, what exactly are the limits, um what's happening with the salt, you know, walls and the caverns and all this stuff. And the reason there is some uncertainty Mario is we've never run this down before. Okay. So we're we're this is ter this is not like oh sure we did this in 91 we ran it down to 243 and the walls held and all. We have really no there's a giant unknown unknown here. Okay. And it all but we know the direction of the effect and and that is why you can't really get like 100% agreement among these unbelievably world experts here who are just the best there are. And the reason is because there's really this is going to a new point. But we know that it's coming because you can't like uh talk your way to oil. You you can talk the price down. Maybe you could even talk it up, but you can't invent oil by talking. So, at some point, these inventories really are going to run down. And that's what I'm I'm saying is the August issue that we really need to already be preparing for. Sentcom needs to prepare for this. So, our military needs to prepare for it. folks in the uh uh in in the front lines where you are need to understand what's really uh like the risks that are building building and it's not just the oil prices suddenly going to pop up that that may happen but that's not the actual set of issues here that are coming that that's going to be like people make money on poly market or something I don't do that I I just don't do that maybe I should but I just don't do that it's probably why I'm a professor not like the mega the mega, you know, but still I'm just explaining that that those are the things I've got my focus on and because we're in the middle game of this escalation trap and Iran it's it's advantage Iran that continues to grow and that usually leads to growing ambitions. Uh so that's what you are seeing play itself out and Iran is showing it's not deterred not at all. It's not even going to be deterred during the funeral when you might expect it would be like too busy uh mourning grief etc. Um uh but what is happening here is uh Iran is gaining power and that power framework more than a religious framework more than a pure political framework. that power framework does quite well in helping us to anticipate uh uh events week by week and month by month. Okay. So what's happening right now is over the last few weeks the US is trying to get as many ships out of the straight of as possible to get oil prices down because that's important politically for Trump. It's important economically for the US and it's also the US needs to re or to stop using its strategic reserves because they're almost out. Um and they've been that that process has been going on for a while and what Iran is doing um without jeopardizing the negotiations is trying to en enforce their control of the straight home was something the Americans are trying to break and what happens every few days or weeks maybe every few days is Iran would strike ships going through the Omani side. Now, the amount of ships going through, according to Kepler, um, and according to other sources, but Kepler put out a piece yesterday that said between July 3rd and July 5th, the amount of crossings were 108, which is about 36 ships per day, half of what Trump is claiming, a third of what it was before the war. And that's been the steady number throughout this entire period. Um, now, everyone talked about a massive oil glut, which led to the drop in oil prices. But if there's an massive oil glut then why did yesterday um the the report came out that the US strategic petroleum reserves reserves fell again by 6.2 u million barrels to now 320 million barrels that was last week and that's the lowest level it's been since they started the the strategic reserves in the 80s. Um so if there is an oil glut then why are we seeing that those strategic reserves continue to go down and that is the leverage that Iran has. If Iran maintains that pressure on the Imani side, maintains the limit on the ship that go through the straight of Homo, not stop it completely because that would lead to war. Um that would be a red line for the US, but maintain that pressure, it might eventually force the US to just concede the straight of Homos to get the number of ships going through it up to refill it strategic reserves and that would essentially give Iran control of the straight homes. Something that European countries have already accepted according to a Bloomberg report. They accept there's eur some European and Gulf countries. They accept that Iran will charge some sort of fee. They're just asking for it to be to be to be to for all countries to be treated the same. Not China and Russia get no fee, but Europe get to pay a fee. Um and according to Axio, the US is still trying to dangle carrots in front of Iran to convince them not to actually go ahead with it. Now, the question I have for you, professor, is um you said that you don't expect the Americans to respond till after the funeral. I agree. Now, another thing I feel if I if I look at all these different um groups, the Telegram groups, the the Iranian telegram groups is they they're they're very energized, but they're also very angry. And I worry um Iran is going to be different after this funeral processions because it just gives a lot more energy and and support for the IRGC. I worry that they will be more forceful in their responses to the Americans. No longer pragmatic and pragmatic strategic but also more forceful and that increases the likelihood that we fall into the escalation trap. Um I'm not saying this is going to be the case. I'm I'm just saying it's a worry that I have considering that funeral have just ended and you know days after the US is going to respond and attack them. They're responding to these ship attacks. Um, is that a worry that you have or you think that should that should
I do I do but it's not the exact worry I have for August? So, let me just explain. So, that part of this is I I'm I agree with you um 100% on on your analysis. I think it's really quite excellent. uh the figures you're giving, you're keeping us everybody up to date on exactly where the oil inventory draw down is and your your puzzles about, you know, if there's this glut, why are we going down? And that of course reinforces the argument by some of the experts. Well, it's a it's either an imaginary a mirage glut or it's very very temporary, etc., etc. So, so all of that is is is I think in line with this there is a debate among these experts. My point, Mario, is the bounds of the debate are pretty narrow. I don't think people should think, oh yeah, experts disagree 5050. It could be anything. No, you're showing this is what happens when we have serious discussion. The actual mound of expert debate is pretty narrow here. Um, but nonetheless, back to the the bigger picture. So the big reason to worry about Iran overreaching, doing something dramatic is because of the uh what you're seeing in the funeral and what all the other Iranians see in the funeral. You see, it's one thing to be individually angry. It's another thing when you see so too is everybody else. Okay? That's what's happening with the funeral. It's a focal point event. In other words, it has become the norm in uh I I study political violence. I study how it percolates in publics and in audiences, Mario. And and so this is what you uh just a little bit of of of sort of understanding and background framing here. What you are seeing is a focal point event. And what focal point events do is they take that individual who understood I was individually angry or you could also be individually fearful. dot dot dot individually angry and now I realize my goodness so too is just about everybody else I see now maybe it's not literally everybody okay because nobody can really see everybody but what you're seeing here when you have uh well over 10 million I mean we we might end up with 30 million uh by the time all said and done uh coming out it's clearly going to be in that giant you know unprecedented historic range we just don't know exactly where it's going to settle out. But what that what that means, Mario, is that uh that body politic now is not just traumatized in an individual way from what's happening to the war. They are they are now translating that trauma, that grief into anger in a way that is now coming to be. And that takes time. People don't really fully. So I study populations under air attack. I study what happens to the people over time. Been doing this for 30 years. People think, "Oh, there was an attack today. That must mean all the anger happened, the emotion happened today and it's over. The attack's over." Well, and from the attackers's perspective, that seems to be the case because they don't see it. However, from the population's perspective, this is a brew. This goes on. This this is why you got Britain uh two years after the bombing of London to blast those German cities on purpose. They they're disappointed they didn't kill more German civilians. They're not embarrassed by the German civilians. They now 30 years later they're embarrassed, but not at the time. And this is true with democracies. It's true with authoritarian states. You don't have to be a religious nut to go down this road. This is what happens when you have traumatized populations. For America, just to put this in a little bit of context that a lot of Americans will remember, this is what happened to us after 9/11. What happened to us after 911 is that 3,000 people died that day. We watched as many of them jumped voluntarily to their death to avoid being burned to death at the top of those buildings. We saw that in real time, Mario. Um, for people who see it in in historical time don't really fully realize the terror as we literally watched it on TV, not knowing what was coming. No trigger warning. This was unbelievably terrifying for 50 70 million Americans. And then what happened is uh and I know because I was on the the 911 I was on the talking head show in Chicago with our senators Rahm Emanuel and I was it's a big honor. I'll explain why I was on there at a different time. But I said we need to be careful because this fear is going to translate into anger and that will translate into overreaction. Every one of those politicians, Mario, said, "Not gonna happen, Professor Pave. Not gonna happen." What did we do 18 months later? Iraq. What happened with Iraq? This wasn't three people in the Oval Office the way we try to pretend it was now. 70% of the American public, 67% to be precise, supported going to war against Iraq. I was a I disagreed with that war at the time. I know what it was like to stand up in public audiences and say, "This was not going to work out. Bad idea. No WMD." All of that. Oh my goodness gracious. The amount of anger in those rooms was unbelievable, Mario. And that was the churches I went to. Think about the I'm just trying to point out. So the we often think, well, the you know, the the religious people, oh, they're going to be more passive. I'm telling you, they're going to be often leading the charge, not the other way around. And so what you're seeing here is a bubbling brew. And this is now four months after this. But also keep in mind what happened in the first week of this war is we meaning the United States and Israel killed not just the supreme leader, but his wife, three other members of his inner family. That's like killing the president of the United States, Melani, the first lady, and the members of the first family. And then we killed uh the senior members of the military, religious establishment, uh intelligence establishment, top 50. That's like taking out the Pentagon, the top leadership in the Pentagon, the CIA, uh the cabinet, who would be then in replacement. That's why nobody really was going to be sure how you even going to be able to replace the supreme leader. So think about the And then in addition to that, then after that we did a six-week air campaign where we killed something like 3,700 people. A mix of civilian and military to be sure, but
threaten and then threatened to wipe out a civilization.
Yeah. And this was 911. 3,000 people died. A mix of civilian and military first responders. And so the so what you what you did what you had happen here if we also control for population size is Iran's about a third a little little less a third the size of population of the United States we basically inflicted a 911 every week for the opening weeks of this war on this population and now we're surprised that this is this is what nationalism looks like that I've been talking about for a long period of time and This is when it comes to the floor and it is just an outpouring and it translates the grief, the trauma, the fear into anger. A lot of Americans after 911 and I live in Chicago where we talk about the Chicago way with the mobsters. They put one of our one one of us in the morg. We put two of theirs in the se or one of us in the hospital. We put two of theirs in the morg. That's what everybody was talking like in Chicago after 911. They they hit us once. We're taking out Afghanistan and Iraq and they don't care that they killing hundreds of thousands of Muslims and so forth. They're they're really really angry. Mario, this is this is something that is the real the the emboldening here that's going to happen over time is going to get stronger and stronger and over and this is where if America does the resistance as it likely will. They're up against the tiger of nationalism now. This is riding the tiger of nationalism and and we we America is used to riding it on the other side and then saying, "Oh, we don't care that, you know, the world doesn't think we should do Iraq and and you know, we're just going to, you know, who are we, you know, who's the French to be criticizing us when we go into Iraq?" Well, this is, you know, a lot worse trauma uh for Iran than we experienced on 911. And I think that this is this is what you are seeing coming and it's not going to be over here uh by January. It there's stuff to worry about between now and then that I I I try to keep my my focus on like the nearer term assessments, Mario. But your basic point is right. You're not calling Look at Israel after October 7, three years later almost. What do they want to do? They want to go in and wreak havoc in Lebanon. You you see doesn't that you see the commonalities
comparison? Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. It's a very good comparison. Very relevant one
that so that that really increases the likelihood for for getting back into an escalation trap. You've got one.
Yes. We're in the middle game of the escalation trap. Everybody keeps thinking in the West this is over. Why? because they weren't behind this in the first place. They never did understand, most people why we're doing this. Okay, we can give them explanations, but the bottom line is uh you know, I talk to people in my neighborhood all the time. They have no idea what's going on here. Okay, and the big thing they see is the price of gas and now they're worried about other prices going up. And so of course they want the war to be over and they see it through that lens which is uh well we just want the war to be over right they'll the Iranians will understand yeah we killed a few of them you know but you know they'll understand really did we understand when when uh al-Qaeda only killed a few Americans on 911? I don't think so. And I think this is what we're really not this is when I when I talk about the polit. So, I'm a realist who attends to domestic politics. Most realists hive that off. They don't want to touch domestic politics or it's always a problem for their theories. I'm the realist who is really focusing on how wars actually work. And I think this is why in a lot of cases for 30 years uh these expectations uh have have come uh have been have been more accurate. And it's because I'm attending to the impact of the military action on politics on both the attacker and the target. And that helps to explain a lot about what to expect. And that's why it's not just a chess game the way a lot of realists want it to be. Or it's a chess game with a lot of emotion charged in that chess game. Put it that way.
Yeah. like seeing those people, millions of people on the streets and them chanting death to Israel, death to the US. I just don't don't think people in the West really understand how big of a liability or a threat that is. You those people
imagine Kuwait Imagine Imagine Kuwait decides to dig its heels in and it's going to keep thousands of American troops based in Kuwait. Okay, imagine that. and we're going to say, "Oh, those Iranians, man, they would never launch an attack on Kuwait. We'd kill them by the hundreds and so forth." Really? Really? You see, this is what I mean by the the not taking seriously the domestic politics or or doing it in a way that only like doesn't I you need to take it ser now. Does that mean it will certainly happen? I don't think the that kind of a thing and I and I've had audiences here that are on the front lines asking these questions Mara. So not just you know uh with you. So I'm just explaining I don't think that's likely to happen in the next couple of months at it took us 18 months to do Iraq. 18 months to do Iraq and we did not calm down in that 18 months. It wasn't like oh yeah we understood we we understood why uh why it was okay to kill 3,000 Americans. No, that's not what happened uh here. And so I think that we do have to worry about things longer term. The nearer term, however, is likely to be a little bit different uh here. And so if if it's okay, could we talk maybe about the nearer term a little bit, but I did want to I did want to support what you are your basic instinct, Mario, I think is 100% on the money. It's just that we need to understand that that just like when I warned on 911 those senior decision makers not to let that grief morph into anger and they dismissed me. Okay. Um I wasn't telling them it was going to happen tomorrow. I was warning something like an Iraq was going to happen. And look, they they didn't do anything to stop it. In fact, most of them were in favor of it. They were pissed, too. They were angry, too.
Yeah. And and just imagine those countries, those Gulf countries um as they decide how to adapt to this new reality, this new shift in balance of power, seeing Iran, all these people galvanized the anger towards the US. How do you think the Kuwait example is a great one or the Emirates or Saudi etc. How what would their mindset be as they they be talking to some American companies or Israeli companies or the Israeli or American military?
The near terms. Yeah. Yeah. This gets us to the nearer term things to worry about as the getting back to the trajectory we started with, which is still true. So, notice all of this nationalist anger is laden on top of what we're talking about, not going in a different direction. So, um, come August, we are going to be in more of a panic than we are today about those oil inventories drawing down. And you just said we're down another 6.2 million here. We're drawing them down at about 08.9 million a day. Not too different than it was. It's not.13 1.3, but still we're still drawing it down. And we're getting closer to those minimums here that we've never really hit. And we get to watch the the salt caverns uh cave in or not. We're going to find out if that actually happens. So, so as we um as that happens, Iran's leverage is going to grow. Now, what are the more natural uses of that leverage? Okay, this is where we got to put ourselves. So what my work that I do, Mario, is look at it from the other side's perspective as what would the STR that's what I look at for the North Vietnamese when we're doing the Bosian civil war. What are the Serbs perspectives here? That's why that's been my what are what's al-Qaeda's perspective? That's what a lot of what I do. And it's not intel. Intel basically says what can I eavesdrop professor pap looks at the incentive structures in terms of power that's where this comes from uh here and so and and what you um are likely to see is not just the hardening of the four ed four corners as I call it of theou that's already happened that happened before the funeral and that's not changing and that's what you see this week okay that is still happening um What you're likely to see is the goalposts of what Iran wants are going to start to change beyond the four corners of theou. Now, they might wait until, you know, theou uh I think it's up on the 17th of August, so they might wait until but they're already talking about what the next goal might be. I put this in my escalation trap post uh yesterday. Okay. Iraqi and others for the last few weeks uh here and you can interview people and you drill you have a lot better contacts than I do. Okay. But you can um about getting American troops out of the region that is not having the bases in the region. The bases are likely to be the concrete issue that starts to come up here for Iran. They're already talking about some of this uh here. And if you start to look into August, how would that goal intersect with their growing leverage with hormones? That's what I put in the escalation trap analysis. That is what the analysis is about. Okay. And what I think is and it's a it's a plausible scenario I would call it. I wouldn't say it's absolutely certain, but I think the most plausible scenario is um they are going to not just have fees, but they're going to have contingent fees based on whether you're a friendly country. They're already talking about doing this with China. Now, with China, they're friendly. And how do they define it? You can look at what what the foreign ministry has said. It's because uh they're not supporting the US military in this war. Well, what would that look like here then to make Kuwait a friendly country? Okay. Or other Gulf states a friendly country where then they would have either no fees or diminished, you know, lower fees. Um, that would mean they don't have US for basis. You see what I mean? So, so this is a baby step from where they are now. It is a natural step because it just simply intersects the different lines, the incentive structures that are already in place. And that's what I that's what I do with risk assessment. That's that's what I'm worried about as the August shock, which is we're going to discover that that Iran is not just slow rolling the discussion on the nuclear program. Uh Iran is not feeling the pressure of oh my god Iran can't couldn't imagine the US blockade coming back or another six weeks of bombing. No, I don't think so. Uh here I don't think they're going to be deterred. They're not deterred now. And those uh tens of millions that are pouring out in the street, they're not going to be deterred by, you know, um uh another six-week bombing campaign. In fact, they might be more emboldened than ever by that. Um, what you're gonna what you're going to see is I think this will start to get channeled to the next set of goals. And this is where President Trump is in real hot water right now. And I don't think his team is really taking this. They're focusing on how can they wiggle out of theou. They're fighting yesterday's war. That's what Rubio's doing. They're fighting yesterday's war. Now, that's important. Okay. And we can talk about the issues in Lebanon and whether Trump can really wiggle out of theou with the framework or will there be a civil war in Lebanon. All those are near-term things this week. Okay. But the bigger thing that's coming is Iran's leverage is going to grow as its anger is growing. Those two lines are going to be connecting. What will that mean? You see, I think in the shorter term, meaning August, that means that they're going to start to think about what's that next objective, and that is getting those bases out of the region. Uh, and they have the midterms, they've got the fall, you know, uh, yep, Trump's not going to want to restart or maybe Keshum Island, you know, maybe he's this this is how you get to a Keshum Island. um uh you know, Bay of Pigs Ba basically. How do you get to these scenarios where um the loser here is so desperate? Uh you see this with Putin as well, but the loser is so desperate they start to do things that only are likely to weaken their strategic position, Mario. And that's what that's the escalation trap. It's the the literally not just go back to escalation, but you're doing it out of desperation to avoid that even bigger loss. And it's because the bigger loss means domestic political loss, something realists rarely really take into account. They're really not. They're looking at it as chess masters where the worst thing that happens to a chess master is they lose a game. The worst thing that happens in international politics is when you lose.
And um I also want to point out there's a lot of people in Iran that are critical of the MOU. And if you can play that clip quickly, uh Alisa, this is a clip of the president of Iran that is uh going to the funeral and people around him are chanting death to the compromiser. So they're calling death to the president because he compromised in the MOU. um when they saw him um when they saw him walking on the streets in the funeral. That was yesterday. You can see in there walking and people just yelling it in Persian. Um and and the reason I bring this up is
this is Mussolini. Can I just point out in Italy in World War II, who kills Mussolini? His own people. They hang him up. They string him up because he was a loser. the losers here. That's what you're seeing with the compromiser. They're viewed as traitors. They're viewed as losers. So, right now, and we talk about, well, is Israel going to assassinate uh the Iran negotiators?
Okay. Well, no. I mean, the the who's I mean, the actual people doing the negotiation. No, I mean, you've had a lot of discussion of this in the last week. Would they, you know, the US warned
New York Times and New York Yeah, exactly. New York Times report came out that the US was warning Iran through Qatar and Pakistan that that was during the Islamabad negotiations that Israel was planning to kill the negotiators and even there was an emergency landing of Galibbath's plane in the airport up north um because they were fighter jets. Israeli fighter jets.
What I'm trying to point out is we often think of the assassins coming from the enemy but we don't understand that in reality there's another corner where the assassins often come from. uh who killed Rabbine for instance in the 1990s was a Jew from that is a more extreme uh ideology of Zionism than Rabbine and Rabbine was killed for being a compromiser by another Jew. This was not being killed by um a suicide bomber from Hamas for example. And what I'm trying to point out is this happens all the time in international politics, but we don't tend to focus on that until after the fact. And then I, you know, people like me, come on, what's happening? We explain it after the fact. But it's an extremely common pattern here. And so those Iranians who were doing the negotiation, man, they're this this is a a fully predictable that if they don't get in line with that bubbling nationalism, they too are going to be finding themselves um at the barrel of a gun u by some of their own people. In fact, at the UFC fight here with the White House, I don't know if you covered it, but there was um a terrorist plot here by five people who look like they're basically from the far uh you know, they're upset at Trump because of Israel. And a lot of them could easily have been from the far right. And this is not un you know, people say, "Oh my god, how could that be? Isn't Trump a mega far right?" Well, no, you're you're missing there. These are spectrums. You see what I mean? And so the um uh those negotiators for Iran, man, they're taking their life in their hands. You got Trump threatening to kill. I mean, look at the Israelis threat. I mean, how many people eventually one of them might those assassins might break through because there's so many who are upset about that uh negotiation. And that's exactly why Mushta Kame when he put out the statement after the MOU he said I was hesitant to sign the MOU but I got guarantees from the president and decided to sign it. Him distancing himself from the MOU is exactly one thing but it also adds to the pressure on the other side. So there's both the personal survival motive and then the country the nationalists they go side by side. They're not really at odds. They re they reinforce each other. And this is why I've been saying for some time, Mario, that I understand how desperate everybody was to declare victory. We're gonna And this is why they won't the Iranians are not giving uh Trump a fig leaf here of allowing him an easy out. Trump is complaining, you know, better watch what they say. You know, they're they're getting too, you know, uppety here. Well, the reason the Iranians are getting uppety is because uh you're seeing the nationalist anger. If they don't do that, they're going to get uh in trouble by their own people. And what does that mean? They're not going to give Trump a fig leaf easy way out. They're going to rub his face in that L for months and months and months. And that is then the pressure on Trump because can he really survive being a loser here? Mallos couldn't survive being a loser. Mussolini couldn't survive being a loser. Maybe Trump will be the one loser. I mean, LBJ couldn't survive being the loser. Maybe Trump will be the one loser as a loser who survives. But he's not going to be it because he put lipstick on a pig and everybody's going to agree. Let's be nice to Trump, nice to grandpa, okay? Just let him think what he's thinking and we're going to go about our business. No, the Iranians just aren't having it. And um there is the meeting now between BB and Trump happening in a few days. Do you expect much to come out of this? Obviously Netanyahu is making his position clear. He's dug his heels in when it comes to Lebanon. He's criticizing Trump or pressuring Trump not to do the deal with Erdogan and Turkey for the fighter jets. So there is that power struggle between Turkey and Israel.
And there's trying to get something political. Yeah, I'm expecting most of this is going to be about how they both need each other for each of their domestic politics. I mean, um, again, this is, you know, it could be that this will be the meeting that will blow up the the framework, you know, theou and so forth. That's possible. Uh, I don't I'm not sure that's really the agenda of both these men. I think both of them have are running have elections coming in a not too distant future. BB's uh got to come to Washington to pick up some some cash. Okay. So, he's gonna, you know, be interesting to see if we can, you know, if you can get his schedule and see does he spend more time with Trump or more time with donors uh here. But I also think President Trump is very much going to want to put on a um a case because he's going to need a lot of the pro-Israeli donors um to donate money for candidates in the fall. So, um I think that now it may be uh that that this will then there's also a possibility I would say a lower possibility that this will just blow up uh here because um um Iran won't is not going to accept a civil war in Lebanon is somehow fitting theou and its new power in the Middle East uh here. But I think that that what I'm expecting here more is on uh early Monday is that there'll be an awful lot of reasons why for both of these uh top political leaders, they're going to want to uh raise money from donors for their elections. And I'm and I'm looking at it that way now. Maybe, you know, we'll we'll see where if this really, you know, how this plays itself out. But I think for Trump to read BB the riot act like he did Zalinski. Remember Zalinsky came and he said you don't have the cards in front of everybody. Uh I'm not expecting that. If that that could happen. I would say maybe one in four chance. I would say a three in four chance is uh they're going to talk about how much uh uh they have, you know, a great friendship. They just blah,
you know, and then let Rubio do a lot of the dirty work underneath, you know. I mean I that's what I think is going to happen. I think the dirty work here is going to happen underneath this by uh the second tier. And uh last quick question for you professor is what could we expect once the funeral ends uh the US would strike in your view will strike Iran? How how would that compare to previous strikes? And will Iran retaliate the same? Will they strike the bases? Will it be more intense? What would you expect there?
Uh, I expect I I think what's going to happen here between now and next week, it's a little tricky to make literally daybyday predictions, Mario. So, come on. Okay. But what I what I think is that by Monday, we're going to be so focused on uh Netanyahu that even the Trump administration um uh is is is a little bit less likely to attack after. If they're going to attack, I think it's going to be u Sunday, Monday, Tuesday as a result of what just happened. But a lot of the world is going to move on. The bigger picture is going to be what's happening by Monday, Tuesday with those um uh with the ships and and how many exactly are going into Hormuz. And Mario, if you could start asking about how many are newly loaded uh with oil, not in Iran. So you're you're you're anal I mean, oh my goodness. I mean, anybody who's not paying attention to you bringing on so many of the top people here is just missing uh is just missing this. But one of the things that I'm uh trying to find out, and there's a little bit of information in these trackers, but not on the loadings of the oil. I mean literally the loading, how much oil is literally being loaded uh here that wasn't loaded before, which would tell you uh are the oil wells and the gas wells coming back up? Are they actually functioning and so forth? Because if you don't have that that particular critical piece, Mario,
then that's probably why the oil inventories are just running down. That's my hypothesis. My hypothesis is you cut through all this, okay? Because that keep in mind I spend my life with experts, okay? And they are just unbelievably critical. Um, but I I when I listen to all this, I want to know, are we actually pumping oil? I mean, Iran is I'm not that forget Iran. I'm talking about the other countries. Are they pumping oil that they had shut down and putting it and loading it on those empty tankers or not? how much is that actually happening because that I think will be super precise in helping to understand like you know um what's happening with the with the actual oil as it flows in the future.
Yeah, exactly. Um, as you wrap up this is a report done a couple of days ago just some satellite images uh showing that uh the ramp up in the Persian Gulf of the loading activity. There's no numbers very difficult difficult to get numbers but Lisa if you can show the images I've just sent you now just for the audience. So this is um optical satellite imagery showing showing the loading activity in the Persian Gulf. That was about four days ago and I saw something similar.
Yeah. So this would give you so this will give you Mario that loadings and then if you can get the historical comparisons as well you'll be able to get a better sense of what's coming. You see what I mean? Um, because we're getting like the one-third down is is helpful, but the one-/ird down has a lot of ships that are not uh oil. And of course, those other ships matter, too. I'm not saying they don't matter. Um, but the issue that a lot of people are very focused on is oil. And I'm focused on the oil inventory draw down. And I'm and I too am noticing that we're still drawing down. And um uh and that's just a really important uh uh important thing and that's one of the reasons tomorrow night or t Thursday night I'm going to have a big live sub um thing on my Substack uh with one of the people here Kurt Campbell who knows a ton about China because we need to find out what's really going on here inside of China uh from um not just like a technical side but a strategic side to understand that. Agree, professor. Always a pleasure. Thank you for
Thank you for having me. Thank you for having me. Keep up the great great work. Thank you so much.
Thank you, professor.
All right, guys. We have Professor Isadi from Thran University coming on in 9 minutes to continue the conversation, get his analysis on the sentiment in Iran um of what me and Professor Pap just spoke about uh to get an insider's view of what's happening there and get his thoughts on what we could see now in terms of what will Iran do if the US retaliates or maybe I should say when the US retaliates for the ships that were just struck in the last 24 hours. We've got Ian Bremer coming on, Joe Kent, George Gammon for the first time. Um, and we've got the regulars afterwards. Incredible lineup today to um continue the analysis. So, I'll see you guys in nine minutes.