
Jim Bianco|Apr 26, 2026 22:13
Note that the US response to Ghalibaf's threats below is that Iran is three days away from "tank top," as Trump said this morning on Fox News.
This means they are running out of oil storage (because they cannot ship due to the US blockade), and shutting down oil production is extremely damaging (true).
This will prompt Iran to race to the negotiating table to secure a peace deal on US terms, keeping its oil business intact and its main source of income functioning.
However, Iran has one more "card" to play: dump 2 million barrels/day into the Persian Gulf, creating an ecological disaster?
Would they do this? See what Ghalibaf threatened below, remembering he was the "moderate" that JD Vance was negotiating with in Pakistan two weeks ago.
If Iran actually did this, would this pressure the US to call off the Blockade to get tankers in to stop the environmental damage?
Remember, they are in a war for their very survival. What wouldn't they do?
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Ghalibaf threats:
BEM(unplayed), this is the Bob el Mandeb, the chokepoint at the southern end of the Red Sea that the Houthis have been attacking for three years. He is suggesting that the Houthis are waiting for "a go" from Iran to stop shipping through it by launching drones.
+Pipelines(unplayed), this is a threat to attack the pipelines in the Middle East, like the Saudi East-West Petroline, which carries up to 7M barrels/day to Yanbu (in the Red Sea), and/or the UAE's Habshan–Fujairah Pipeline that bypasses the Strait of Hormuz to the Fujairah port in the Gulf of Oman.
Finally
More Price Adj (to come): he is betting that the longer this drags on, the higher crude oil/gasoline prices go, and American consumers will demand the US "just pack up and go home," and Iran wins.
He suggests this here ... Add summer vacation to the right unless they want to cancel it for the US!
(He means Americans have a "right" to a summer vacation unless they want to cancel it so Trump can win this war.)
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