changegonnacome

Yep your right....perfectly competitive and perfectly rational behaviour......who gets squeezed in the chain (apart from consumers) out of interest? I guess fuel distributors who deliver to the gas stations - sounds like a lot more truck rolls with smaller loads per stop and perhaps they bear some incremental working capital squeeze? Never a market I went through the value chain of too much to understand the economic incentives at each layer.

100% - nobody on here should be supportive of the regimes in these places. They are unelected, unaccountable and exist to keep their people in defacto open air prisons to the benefit of a few. As you say wanting to remove them and actually removing them are two different things - the central tenet of CONSERVATISM is an understanding that dismantling the status quo can easily lead to worse outcomes. In foreign policy its a deathly important lesson.. The history of recent US foreign escapades is exactly that - a desire to change the status quo that completely fails flat on its face not because the intentions arent good (they are) but the reality is that on the other side of change is not 100% assured greener grass. Quite the opposite sometimes. Its ironic that the conservative movement came up with Captain Chaos as their candidate the last three times out. He's a change agent no doubt - the question is whether things are demonstrably better or worse after radical departures from orthodoxy. Trump has three overarching grand radical change experiments at play at once (1) trade policy - tariffs etc (2) dismantling US multilateralism & underwriting global institutions/norms established since WWII & (3) labor & immigration as an engine of US prosperity..............its important to point out that the systems Trump are dismantling led to an unprecedented period of prosperity and peace for the United States over the last number of decades and to be a Trump supporter I guess you need to argue that even greater prosperity and even greater peace sits just on the far side of all the change & voluntary chaos he's instituting.....I dont know the answer, the report cards arent in yet so we'll see but that's what the 'conservative' voters of America plus a few low information & low propensity voters stacked on top decided for us in 2024! Very interesting times to live in!

Right - and I guess in their defense each fuel supplier for future inventory refills is facing exploding working capital requirements which needs to be part funded by sweating the existing inventory! Its funny the BBB architects designed it beautifully to deliver nice big chunky tax refunds in April......looks like a good chunk of that surprise tax refunds that were meant to delight midterm voters with a Trump 'dividend' are going to have to be spent on a surprise energy shock expenses created by none other than the same guy - Captain Chaos

Classic Hegseth/Noem/Bondi type answer…..it’s the type of stuff that comes out of C & D players mouths when things aren’t going well….they are so desperate that they attempt to warp reality with a timeshare used car salesman level pitch. If anything it shows the level of anxiety around the Strait being effectively closed. Iran played its two trump cards straight out the gate together - war regionalization AND Strait closure - suspect that US/Israel thought it would be weeks before things would go so far up the escalation ladder but Iran cleverly decided to skip the intermediate escalatory steps and go straight to the end game. Given the game Iran is playing it would be foolish to allow an easy climb down from here for the US/Israel this period of time could be easily dubbed the “pain game”. Iran is indeed degraded militarily and so their deterrents regime against a future US/Israel attack lay heavily on the shoulders of the Straits and war regionalization….its all they have left from a deterrents perspective and so thy need to maximize its efficacy….hence the ME region and US/Israel/Globe need to be delivered pain sufficient to deter future attacks….my guess if they can hold the line is they want to see $4 gas at American pumps. Perhaps some of our O&G experts can explain how long it takes $120 spot oil to flow through to $4+ gas at the pump? Iran is surely thinking about the court of public opinion in the US most especially with the midterms coming up.

or some might call it doubling down on a strategy (regime change) that hasn’t worked out…..my hope is its escalation to de-escalate…going after Kharg will certainly focus the mind of the money motivated Iranians in the regime who are likely Trump’s best chance of getting an off ramp here from a gamble that just hasn’t paid off for him.

So what? Your confusing kinetic activity & target destruction when you should be judging the operation by its strategic objective and whether that has been achieved. The objective was to catalyze regime change. It may and I hope it does achieve that but there is a reason that Trump was told by the Pentagon/ General Caine there was “no viable military solution to topple the regime in Iran” a month ago. The assessment was simple - the regime is deeply embedded, power is distributed across groups to create robust firewalls and if that weren’t enough the Iranian regime opposition deeply fragmented. The ingredients likely arent there to get rebellion started by air power alone. Trump tried anyway - ok he wanted to roll the dice - looks to me like they’ve come up snake eyes. The reality is he didnt have the military assets in the region during the protests a few weeks ago which was the optimal time to act and the regime brutally and disgustingly made examples of those protestors which sadly IMO seem to have been devastatingly effective at quelling the population. I do agree with one element of your narrative - Trump has demonstrated a willingness to act with military power in a very aggressive manner (VZ, Iran + other 6 or 7 international bombings) from a deterrents perspective that is significant change in US willingness to act versus talk relative to his predecessors.

They win by surviving. Would anyone say we won in Vietnam? I mean we seriously degraded the North Vietnamese military capability while we there but lets remember who was running the country soon after? Would anyone say we won in Afghanistan? I mean we seriously degraded the Taliban's capability and actual place running the country for the nearly 20yrs we were there. But I dont think anyone is calling Afghanisation a win, a victory are they? You get my point. Its very simple @cubsfan. The US set out to remove the regime (read Trump's own words). If the regime persists the overarching strategic objective was not met. Now you get some minor short term degradation wins that will be dressed up as the POINT all along and sure a degraded Iran is certainly less dangerous in the short term however more dangerous (i would argue) over the medium to long term. Yeah a win, kind of, if you measure things in months, not decades. I'm not saying all this to call Trump an idiot or loser - on balance perhaps it was worth a shot at regime change if he had some special intel that indicated they were particularly vulnerable (all the reporting is he was told there was no viable military option to effect regime change) but perhaps it was worth a shot. I think a rational assessment of where we are is that Iranian regime has proven way more resilient and indeed more esctlatory than anyone suspected. Remember what the Taliban used to say that proved quite insightful. "You have the watch, we have the time"

If the regime in Tehran survives, which right now looks like the most likely outcome, Iran has won. Nobody wants to hear that but thats the reality here as we all know what Trump was reaching for - dont believe me go read his own truth social post announcing the operation - "For many years, you have asked for America's help. But you never got it. No president was willing to do what I am willing to do tonight. Now you have a president who is giving you what you want. So let's see how you respond. America is backing you with overwhelming strength and devastating force. Now is the time to seize control of your destiny, and to unleash the prosperous and glorious future that is close within your reach. This is the moment for action. Do not let it pass." The aim here was to bloody regime so its own people would overthrow it. I've heard every administration official in the recent days move the strategic aim goalpost to simply the degradation of their ability to project power which tells you a lot about the intelligence assessment of how the orginal strategic aim is going. Degradation will be a win with a small 'w' and the final bill (in terms of global economic damage done), well the invoice for that hasn'y arrived yet so not even sure the small win will be that great.

thanks to @Spekulatius for bringing Michael Clarke to my attention. Another good one from him today with some high level contexting setting on where we are -

The JCPOA was always an "if that, then this" arrangement......JCPOA never precluded bombing the hell out of Iran if it was ever suspected for second not living up to even the spirit of the deal. I think alot debates become so binary when they cross party lines. JCPOA is one of those. The partisan version of the debate is: GOP > you cant trust a bunch of jihadists. Bomb the shit out of them. It's the only way. DEM > no no your wrong can trust them, tust me, let's do a deal In reality, of course, you can do both- you can do a deal with Iran, monitor them like a hawk and then still bomb the shit out of them at any point your not comfortable. This hybrid approach is strategically superior to the binary one above. JCPOA is one of those areas where partisanship really leads to dumb policy outcomes.

The bigger problem - is what the hell are we doing potentially getting bogged down in the Middle East anyway......East Asia is the real security theatre which matters for the US, like really matters....folks can tell themselves that striking Iran is a twofor in terms weakening China but that overstates the benefit China gets from discounted oil imports from Iran. I think China would trade discounted Iranian oil all day long for a US military perpetually stretched thin in multiple global arenas Ukraine, the Middle East, maybe somewhere in S.America too. The more the better. You really want your only peer competitor to have a security ADHD problem.

Yep the issue with bringing a nuclear threshold state to the edge of existence.....is they remember it.

below is the central JCPOA argument as articulated at the time….short version it prevented a nuclear Iran at very low no cost while preserving all strategic optionality to step up the escalation ladder if required….your gut might not like it….everyone wants to ‘get’ the bad guys….but as I said some scenarios only present bad options and Iran is one of those for sure. ”Assessing the JCPOA vs. War: A Risk Management Perspective When evaluating the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) against an active kinetic conflict, advocates of the nuclear deal frame it fundamentally as a risk-mitigation vehicle. From this perspective, the JCPOA was not built on trust, but on verifiable metrics designed to cap downside exposure while preserving policy optionality. Here are the primary arguments for how the JCPOA managed risks more effectively than an offensive war: * Mitigating Information Asymmetry (Visibility and Data) * The JCPOA: Acted as a continuous audit. It implemented the most intrusive International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspection regime in history, providing real-time data on enrichment levels, centrifuge production, and uranium supply chains. This continuous monitoring heavily reduced the "unknown unknowns." * The War Scenario: Destroys visibility. In a conflict, inspectors are expelled, cameras are dismantled, and nuclear infrastructure is driven deep underground. The loss of on-the-ground intelligence creates a blind spot, making it nearly impossible to accurately price the risk of a sudden nuclear breakout. * Capping Tail Risk (The Nuclear Threshold) * The JCPOA: Physically constrained the path to a nuclear weapon by capping enrichment at 3.67%, eliminating 98% of the uranium stockpile, and altering the Arak reactor to block the plutonium route. It extended the "breakout time" (the time needed to produce enough fissile material for one weapon) from weeks to over a year, providing a long runway to react to any breach. * The War Scenario: Dramatically increases tail risk. Facing an existential threat to its regime, a state actor is incentivized to accelerate its nuclear program to secure the ultimate deterrent. A kinetic strike might delay the program, but it fundamentally motivates the adversary to acquire a weapon at all costs once they rebuild, often in harder-to-reach facilities. * Systemic Contagion vs. Compartmentalization * The JCPOA: Attempted to ring-fence the nuclear issue. By compartmentalizing the nuclear portfolio, it aimed to prevent the most catastrophic threat from bleeding into other regional frictions, allowing stakeholders to manage proxy conflicts without the overarching threat of a nuclear umbrella. * The War Scenario: Represents massive systemic risk. A war with Iran cannot be isolated; it inherently triggers contagion across multiple theaters. It activates proxy networks across the region, threatens critical maritime chokepoints like the Strait of Hormuz, and injects severe volatility into global energy markets and supply chains. * Cost of Capital and Resource Allocation * The JCPOA: Achieved its primary objective—halting the nuclear weapons program—with zero expenditure of military capital or loss of life. It allowed the U.S. and its allies to allocate strategic resources and focus toward other long-term geopolitical competitors. * The War Scenario: Requires immense upfront and ongoing capital. An offensive war involves staggering military costs, inevitable economic disruptions, and the heavy burden of post-conflict stabilization. The return on investment is highly uncertain, historically yielding protracted engagements rather than clean resolutions. * Reversibility and Preserving Optionality * The JCPOA: Maintained strategic flexibility. If the counterparty breached the agreement, the "snapback" mechanism allowed for the immediate reimposition of global sanctions, and the military option always remained fully on the table as a last resort. It was a reversible policy. * The War Scenario: Is an irreversible sunk cost. Once kinetic action is taken, the escalation ladder is highly unpredictable. It eliminates diplomatic off-ramps and locks all parties into a high-stakes conflict with no guaranteed exit strategy. In essence, advocates argue that the JCPOA functioned as a strategic hedge. It traded temporary economic relief for hard data and physical limits, successfully managing the most severe threat while keeping options open. War, by contrast, is viewed as an unhedged position—incurring massive, immediate costs while exposing the region to entirely unpredictable downside variables.“ We are in some half hearted war scenario as laid out….its regime change but it isn’t…it’s a uranium collection exercise but it isn’t….its just a capability degradation exercise but it isn’t

Well it’s question of defining what are the strategic aims. If the US set out in the hope of destroying the regime and the regime survives however bloodied and battered. Well they’ve won and we’ve lost. In the same way we lost in Vietnam, Afghanistan. Couple of sayings I heard yesterday apparently from the region that kind of get at the heart of the matter they go like this - “America comes and goes but Iran stays” & ”They (the US) have the clock, we (Iran) have the time” For Iran above you could easily sub Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam…..I really thought we’d learns this lesson.

I'm sorry - I dont require top level security clearance to come to the conclusion that no imminent threat was identified. Gang of Eight members briefed by Rubio have confirmed the same....the imminent threat identified was a derivative and circular one which when said aloud is nonsensical..... It goes like this - Israel was going to attack Iran, Iran's response to that attack was likely to include US assets in the region ipso facto an imminent threat (it of course forgets that Israel is 100% dependent on the US for its defense and its ability to executive those offensive attacks in safety is a derivative of that security umbrella we provide). What a beautiful circular word salad by Rubio below -

So the underlying assumption here (which is false) is that Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States and so something just had to be done now. Nobody - not a single person from the admin has articulated the imminent threat thesis in a way that isn't nonsensical. So lets all agree that Trump (with Israel the forcing function) has decided that now would be an optimal time to move on Iran and IMO roll the dice on what emerges post-conflict is something superior to the previous status quo. This is a geoptilcial sitituation completley manufactorered by Trump. Which is just plain dumb. Just not true. I know Trump trained you all to hate the JCPOA and so its dogma now in MAGA.....I mean think about it for a second here MAGA goes on like the JCPOA failed, they tricked Obama and Iran got nukes c.2016, their economy thrived and they became a global superpower....big problem though, they DONT have and didn't get nukes, sanctions even under the JCPOA reliefs meant their economy was a basket case...when you get down to it the big problem for Trump was that he listened to Bibi, killed the deal and then couldn't come up with a better solution than a JCPOA one and so here we are with the Middle East on fire. I mean I dont need to link to the clips again of Bibi since 1992 saying Iran is two weeks away from getting the bomb. Bibi is doing right by Israel - Iran (nuclear or no nuclear) is an existential threat to Israel their great enemy and destroying the Iranian regime is what any nation of 9m people facing a nation of 90m people in their backyard would fantasize about. That the pathway exists for Israel to achieve that via another countries military is the most unusual thing about this whole situation when you stop for two seconds to think about it. No perfect solutions in international relations , only trade offs!!!.....the question always boils down to what is the least worst option! The MAGA fantasy is that advocates for a JCPOA type solution are somehow naive morons who trust a bunch of jihadists - on the contrary the JCPOA advocates are the least naive people in the arena here. They are realists here. They realize and don't trust Iranian intentions but they also don't trust Israeli's intentions. Its the correct posture. This is at the end of the United States of America the Middle East is a gazillion miles away. They realize Israel/Bibi's desire to destroy Iran using US military might and that nuclear threat inflation has always been Israel's best vehicle to advance that aim and pull the US into doing just that but that this is something to be avoided. The JCPOA advocates also recognize the cultish jihadist danger of an Iranian regime ever getting a bomb. It also can't be allowed to happen. Nobody ever claimed the JCPOA was perfect - but a war deferred is a war won sometimes.....and I can tell a story about a Iranian regime that could be kept pre-lift off and that might have collapsed of its own accord a decade (or two) from now. An old boss of mine always said that in business and in life enough troubles will come at you from areas of life in which you have ZERO control or agency and therefore its incumbent on smart people to recognize that and engage in risk minimization in the areas in which you have agency. The same is true for international affairs. The JCPOA was precisely that - a low cost deferment & risk minimization mechanism. You take those wins all day long in international affairs, the world is troublesome enough without catalysing problems yourself. This is precisely what Trump has done and its about the dumbest thing you can do as commander in chief

temporary win..........until they build back better (which is to say their nuclear program is even deeper underground, even more secret and even more directed and expedited to achieve lift off). As I've said before for Iran to win here all they need to do is survive - the Pentagon, General Cain seem to have spent an inordinate amount of time explaining that to Captain Chaos - just how the Islamic regime could absorb weeks of aerial bombardment with our best weapons tech and survive to come back even more determined to haunt the US and Israel. So Trump will degrade their offensive capabilities in the short run for sure - the reality is he's left one giant turd sitting on the resolute desk for the next guy or maybe the guy after the next guy to deal with (assuming he doesn't start hearing voices about sending troops in on the ground this time around, maybe he's gunning to have a country named after him - Trumpistan has a nice ring to it....we've already got Trump-Kennedy Center, Trump-class warships, F47, Trump Accounts, Trump Gold Card, TrumpRX, Trump Ballroom).

No disasters yet….just a sense that a lot of people seem to think that Trump has discovered something that Reagan, Bush Snr, Clinton, Bush Jnr, Obama & Biden somehow missed….that all they had to do to fix the Iran nuclear conundrum & end the Iranian Islamic revolution was to bomb the hell out of them for a few weeks….easy peazy…very strange they didn’t?!?!?…it’s a fine line between a disrupter and a moron. Needless to say Trump’s tweets about unconditional surrender and picking Iran’s new leader are not going to age well IMO….don’t believe me - all the reporting coming out of the Pentagon has the chance of what Trump is saying as coming to pass (regime change) having depressingly low probability….maybe Donald has variant perception on the situation, guess we’ll find out!

Narrative will meet reality at the midterms. As I've said Iran is a conundrum - to put the the nuclear threat to bed for good requires root and branch regime which would require hundreds of thousands of American and Israeli boots on the ground to be achieved. Every President including Trump in his first term have deemed that too high a price to pay. So if your not willing to meat out the above actual solution your left with a kind of containment strategy which can have two aspects - either containment via an inspection regime/sanction relief or you can have containment via periodically mowing the lawn with massive military commitments. Guess its a case of picking your poison - no solutions only trade offs as they say. Dont forget the Houthis too.....like Hamas and Hezbollah Trump told us he was going destroy them.....yet all are still around....indeed Trump did a deal with the Houthis in the end after trying to bomb them out of existence as it was hopeless task to defeat them (another $2000 drone vs $4m missile boondoggle that ended up costing the US taxpayer a cool tres comas). These groups seem so weak and barbic relative to us but every President has to seem to learn the hard way that for all our military gadgetary and 'discombobulators' American military power can only get you so far. Second term Trump is learning that lesson slowly but he seems to be a slow learner, the Houthis should have been a perfect lesson in the limits of military power. Must be very annoying to think your the most powerful man in the world with the greatest military tech costing your trillions and to find out you can't beat a bunch of religious lunatic knuckle draggers driving around in Toyota Hilux's in the desert but that's what the evidence says. Life's a bitch. "Trump announces deal to stop bombing Houthis, end shipping attacks" - https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-says-us-will-stop-bombing-houthis-after-agreement-struck-2025-05-06/ "Houthis say US 'backed down' and Israel not covered by ceasefire" - https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cglxl67g28no

Where are nukes @73 Reds? Cause if Iran had em they’d be using them right now. You can’t re-write history the JCPOA contained Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Captain Chaos ripped up the deal with no day after plan….i guess Captain Chaos is around long enough where his own turd policy decisions come back to haunt him (the curse of the second term separated by a ‘time out’ I guess!!!). Right now he could be focused on all the good things in his agenda instead he’s got himself bogged down in the Middle East of all places blowing up countless $2000 drones with $4m missiles and he is meant to be the business President

High bar @cubsfan - hope it’s all as easy and as inevitable as Trump would have us believe

Yeah listen I agree - I guess what Obama Biden would say in their defense is that a JCPOA deal ensured a no nuclear Iran as imperfect as it was and that really the hope always was that the Islamic revolution would collapse from within in time…..because to collapse it by force (ground invasion) would be too high a price to pay. Let’s call it Door A vs Door B. Trump has gone for Door C…..smash Iran around a bit and see what happens…worth a shot I guess….but like you the sense that Trump is free-styling this with no congressional or public support must give the Islamic Regime leaders left praying in their bunkers great comfort….time is on their side and what’s required more than new drones is their resolve to hang on weeks, maybe months and they win which is say the Islamic revolution continues bruised and battered sure but still in charge.

Give me a break - the guy has been declaring fake PR victories of all kinds (business, personal, political) his whole public life why would he stop now. This isn’t psycho analyze it’s pattern recognition True. Iran’s nuclear threat will be greatly diminished in the short run. Its nuclear desires likely greatly increased over the medium to long term. It’s a win with a small w and a problem for a future administration to deal with.

Yep - the money to be made in this scenario is easy IMO.........Trump will wake someday in the next couple of weeks most likely after some incremental market/oil price pain, maybe after some cool video emerges of the US blowing something up inside Iran and decide ok today would be a very good day to declare the 'war' is 'won'....not won in any logical traditional strategic sense, not won in the sense that Iran regime is gone or actually replaced.... but won in a Trumpian way.....won in the way he 'won' the 2020 Presidential election....won in the sense that Donald has decided in his mind that there is enough there, there to sell a win to his supporters first and the American people second and then as is his way he wont stop talking about about how he won the war in Iran till he leaves office and there is nobody left to listen to him.

Yep...when you get down to it that's the bar......Trump said it out loud at the start of the war, his minions tied themselves in knots for days pretending the objective was something else. Which tells you all you need to know about the probabilities assigned to achieving that by the Pentagon. Trump is PR crafty - his decapitation definition version of regime change is like no other (see Venezuela). The issue for Trump the 'regime change' snake oil salesman is that Bibi/israel will loudly call bullshit on bullshit regime change. He's got himself and the world into a right little pickle here has our dear leader Captain Chaos - for the US to 'win' we have to do the improbable and overthrow the Iranian revolutionary regime from the air, for the Iranian revolutionary regime to beat the US and 'win' the war all they have to do is survive. As John Mearsheimer pointed out in a recent podcast - the US won every battle of note in Vietnam but ultimately lost the war. Entirely possible here the US will achieve every conceivable and gloat worthy military objective (air dominance, Iran navy destroyed, nuclear/ballistic missiles facilities obliterated! ) but at the end of the day the Iranian's will win the war simply because the Islamic Republic of Iran will continue long after the US aircraft carriers have gone home. We are not in a forever war (yet) but make no mistake about it THIS has all the ingredients of one!