Having lost every first-stringer and more or less every second-tier player too, the regime in Tehran’s unable, even, to agree on a negotiating position for another round of peace talks in Islamabad.
That was Donald Trump’s message on Tuesday afternoon, when he announced an indefinite extension to a ceasefire that was set to expire within hours.
“The Government of Iran is seriously fractured, and not unexpectedly so,” he said. “Upon the request of Field Marshal Asim Munir,” the US will hold off on any further attacks “until such time as [Iran’s] leaders and representatives can come up with a unified proposal.”
This was predictable. As discussed here late Monday, Iran’s in the hands of a military triumvirate comprised of IRGC commander Ahmad Vahidi, Ali Abdollahi (who runs the umbrella agency responsible for making sure Iran’s “regular” army is on the same page as the Guards) and Bagher Ghalibaf.
By appearances anyway, Vahidi wants to hold out. For what, I don’t know. Munir met with both Abdollahi and Ghalibaf in Tehran last week, presumably to gauge their interest in another round of mediated talks in Pakistan.
The fact that Munir spent Sunday and Monday preparing Islamabad for high-level negotiations — conducting security sweeps on the venue, roping off sections of the city and so on — plainly suggests the Iranians intended to send a delegation. But Vahidi, likely irritable at Trump’s blockade, might be holding things up.
On Tuesday, helicopter-borne Navy SEALs boarded a sanctioned tanker carrying Iranian oil in the Indian Ocean, according to the Pentagon. It was the second enforcement action in three days.
Trump said the US will “continue the Blockade and, in all other respects, remain ready and able” militarily while Iran figures out what direction it wants to go.
In a statement, the Pentagon said the US Navy will “deny illicit actors and their vessels freedom of maneuver in the maritime domain.” Stripped of the formal lingo, that means Trump’s going to prevent Iran from selling its oil not with sanctions (which don’t always work very well), but with brute force.
My recommendation to the Guards is to walk away while you still have legs. Whether the formal US proposal’s agreeable to the obstinate remnants of the regime, I can assure you the informal version is the best deal the IRGC can hope to get at this juncture.
Earlier Tuesday, multiple reports confirmed that JD Vance was postponing his trip to Pakistan not necessarily because the peace process had fallen apart, but rather because Iran didn’t respond to Trump’s latest offer.
Simply put — and if readers will pardon the mildly profane colloquialism — Iran can’t get its sh-t together because nobody’s really in charge anymore. This was always a risk, and when Ali Larijani was assassinated, the risk became acute.
Ghalibaf’s quite obviously the acting head of state, but despite his impeccable IRGC credentials and unassailable hardliner bona fides, he may be having trouble convincing Vahidi it’s not worth it. Not worth going back to open warfare with two vastly superior militaries, one of which is bent on total regime change, the other reluctantly considering a carpet-bombing campaign targeting the nation’s critical infrastructure.
As long as Trump and Israel aren’t actively bombing Iran, the optics of the IRGC resuming attacks on Tehran’s Gulf neighbors are very bad. Ghalibaf hinted Tuesday at “new cards” Iran might play on the battlefield to counter the blockade but frankly, I don’t think they have any. Cards.
This is where you have to ask, again, whether Mojtaba Khamenei’s actually alive or alive enough to make decisions. Because if Iran’s telling the truth about his status — i.e., he’s fine and still in charge — there shouldn’t be any ambiguity around the regime’s negotiating position unless he’s just taking his sweet time deliberating at the considerable risk of stumbling the country back to war.
It’s more likely, I think, that Ghalibaf, acting in his current capacity (i.e., as a member of the country’s legislature), isn’t able to tell Vahidi and/or Abdollahi to stand down.
As for when this might be resolved, Trump admitted he hasn’t the faintest. The ceasefire’s extended “until such time as their proposal is submitted, and discussions are concluded, one way or the other.”
You gotta wonder if Ghalibaf is secretly hoping that someone, external to Iran, takes out Vahidi.
Yeah, if that’s in fact what’s really going on, I’d sell him out to Mossad. Of course, Mossad doubtlessly knows where he is anyway. If he is indeed the sticking point, I don’t see any upside for anyone on any side to keeping him around. Yes, he was the second head of the Quds (Soleimani’s predecessor), and he’s a dedicated lifer (“Thank you for your service, Ahmad”) but he’s hardly somebody worth sacrificing another round or three with the US and the IDF over. Ghalibaf’s more than adequate as an IRGC-aligned hardliner. It’s not exactly as if anyone’s suggesting power be handed to Masoud Pezeshkian here. If Ghalibaf’s not hardline enough, then this is going to be a tough slog.
I’m planning to rewatch The Godfather. It’s been a long time since I watched the trilogy and there might be some interesting similarities to what’s currently going on in Iran, that I’ve forgotten about.
“It’s the smart move. Tessio was always smarter. . . . But I’m gonna wait.”
I am surprised Esmail Qaani is still around. Does he have any sway with the “new regime”?
Now that i think about it, he is probably disgraced following the security failures around Hezbollah’s demise and the assassination of Haniyeh in Tehran. That guy is quite good as evading death though. He seems to slip through the cracks.
If i were Bibi, in such scenario, i would order Mossad to take out Ghalibaf instead. Collapse the talks and resume the bombing runs.
On the assumption that Bibi would rather see a failed state in Iran than keeping the regime in place.
How long will it take for the Navy’s blockade to apply as much pressure to Iran’s leadership than was being applied by bombs and missile during air campaign? Iran has been quite resistant to economic pressure, there have been years when its oil exports were choked down very low, the regime still resisted.
How long will it take for Iran’s hold on the SoH to apply more pressure to the US than Trump wants to endure? Absent major demand destruction, physical oil shortages and its impact on refined/petrochem prices will continue spreading around the globe at the speed of a VLCC tanker.
It seems to me that while the US/Israel’s main weapons are military, Iran’s main weapon in this conflict is economic. The economic weapon takes time to gather steam. The last loaded tanker has to arrive, local storage be used, floating storage consumed, reserves released, substitution . . . we are 50 days into the war, much of those buffers are running thin, and even the US may soon be reminded that its oil is freely traded and globally transportable.
I don’t see how the war settles into a long ceasefire + blockade + closed SoH. Not even for a couple months. I think that in relatively short order, the US will have to resume the war (in some way different from what it was doing). Or the US will have to ban oil/refined exports and shrug at the ROW (not a good idea but they might think it is). Or Ghalibaf or someone like him has to get control of the regime from the hardest-liners (is that even possible?)
Spent today going through earnings reports. Seeing managements inserting war/macro caution into the outlook, reiterating but not raising FY26 guidance, and stocks not reacting so well. Culp at GE even said he hopes we’re not going into a GFC like thing, or words to that effect. MMM is raising prices across the board on top of the normal April price increase. It’s just one day and managements are taking the opportunity to lower expectations, but I think this is going to be the pattern for 1Q, at least away from AI-land, and significantly worse ex-US.
I spent a little bit of time trying to ballpark how much GDP the blockade might cost Iran. Pct of GDP from exports, pct of exports via SoH, pct of SoH exports potentially blocked, etc. Came up with maybe -20%. Then worse, given US/Israel bombing. Maybe -35%? Well it’s more of a WAG than an estimate, but Depressionistic anyhow. But hasn’t Iran suffered worse in the 1990s and 2010s? Yet the regime held on.
Recent articles have clearly laid out well-reasoned arguments why the U.S. and Iran should take their respective wins at this juncture.
How about Israel/Netanyahu?
What should he do under current circumstances to maximize his chances of achieving his goals? My impression is he really wants to take this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ensure Iran’s uranium + missiles eliminated and Hezbollah disarmed.