Iran War?

[jimmy olsen]

 
https://vxtwitter.com/glcarlstrom/status/2031615977310347439?s=20

During the "tanker war" in the 1980s, America escorted an average of one convoy through the Strait of Hormuz each week.

"At that pace it would take two and a half years to get all 320 or so vessels currently stranded in the Gulf out of there. Even resuming three-quarters of Hormuz sailings would still prevent nearly 4m b/d of oil from getting to global markets."

"Jeff Currie of Carlyle, a private-equity firm, says the cost of a single escort would exceed the value of the cargo it is meant to protect."

[OttoVonBismarck]

The thing is you can massively degrade Iran's entire country, but not meaningfully reopen the Strait. These tanker ships generally won't move without insurance, and the insurance has been pulled. Sure, the U.S. could do what Trump said and insure ships on a case by case basis--many still will decline, not wanting to actually lose their vessel and crews. Some will likely go along--like Tim posts though it will be nothing more than a trickle.

The core problem, and again--we've talked about this since literally Reagan's presidency, is it takes very little to make the Strait too dangerous for commercial shipping.

If you were half smart--and if you were you wouldn't be DJT, you'd start by not promising to address the oil prices. The cost of war with Iran is the Strait being shut down, in ages past when we had known costs of a war the move is to tell people they need to accept this as their patriotic duty etc etc, and simply deal with it. It's foolhardy to do the Trump schtick where you try to claim every problem is short term and easily solved. Trump's mind is very short term, but reality isn't.

For all we know Iran may have decided to keep the Strait closed until the U.S. makes concessions to Iran at this point--they could demand we give them money to rebuild all the damage we've caused for example.

This is a great example of the issue Tom Nichols mentioned in his excellent Atlantic article. We've done well operationally (e.g. blowing stuff up), but we lack any strategy, nor have we even identified how successful operations could execute such a strategy. Nichols points out that Trump and Hegseth really want everyone to pat them on the back over how good we've blown stuff up, but no one ever doubted we could do that. What was doubted is "what would that achieve and what would it cost?" It's very clear Kegstand Pete and Low IQ Donald never considered these questions.

All of this is well trod ground and has been discussed ad nauseum in the national security world for decades. The reason no prior President has poked the bear in Iran like this is there's no easy out. The only true way to force Iran to change its behavior is by occupying Iran. No one has ever wanted to do that because it's a Vietnam (or worse) level commitment that will drain our resources, be massively politically unpopular, cost thousands to tens of thousands of dead American soldiers, lock America's strategic interests into a Muslim shithole for decades undermining our capacities in more important areas etc. It's a loser idea.

On top of all that--the economic sanctions were basically working to undermine Iran. There was no reason, and the administration has yet to put together any strong counter argument to this--there was no reason to start this war in the first place. Iran's nuclear program was currently dormant, their government was at its weakest point in 40 years and due to their severe economic issues, we likely had a very long timeline before Iran was likely to "start trouble" again on its own initiative.

But we kicked the bee hive, so now we've started trouble.

[grumbler]

https://vxtwitter.com/glcarlstrom/status/2031615977310347439?s=20

During the "tanker war" in the 1980s, America escorted an average of one convoy through the Strait of Hormuz each week.

"At that pace it would take two and a half years to get all 320 or so vessels currently stranded in the Gulf out of there. Even resuming three-quarters of Hormuz sailings would still prevent nearly 4m b/d of oil from getting to global markets."

"Jeff Currie of Carlyle, a private-equity firm, says the cost of a single escort would exceed the value of the cargo it is meant to protect."

What a moronic series of statements. On the convoys, the rate at which ships get out is driven by the size of the convoys. The "two and a half years" calculation assumed that the convoys are all less than three ships on average.

The cost of an escort compared to the value of the escorted cargo isn't meaningful. In WW2, convoys were routinely escorted by ships worth more than the cargo in the merchant hulls (in particular, every convoy to the USSR)

[mongers]

Really the trump position isn't so far fetched, it just relies on the Iranians demonstrating the same level of competency that the British showed against Scharnhorstand and Gneisenau in 1942, each and everyday henceforth.

[Sheilbh]

Why Escalation Favours Iran - article in Foreign Affairs

Nothing too controversial for folks here, I don't think, but a good summary of the strategic situation.

Yeah as noted, if you start with killing their head of state and lots of the senior leadership it leaves very little room to escalate. Iran are going step by step.

(I also can't help but think of the way the Iranian regime personally humiliated Carter in the hostage crisis.)

[DGuller]

https://vxtwitter.com/glcarlstrom/status/2031615977310347439?s=20

During the "tanker war" in the 1980s, America escorted an average of one convoy through the Strait of Hormuz each week.

"At that pace it would take two and a half years to get all 320 or so vessels currently stranded in the Gulf out of there. Even resuming three-quarters of Hormuz sailings would still prevent nearly 4m b/d of oil from getting to global markets."

"Jeff Currie of Carlyle, a private-equity firm, says the cost of a single escort would exceed the value of the cargo it is meant to protect."

What a moronic series of statements. On the convoys, the rate at which ships get out is driven by the size of the convoys. The "two and a half years" calculation assumed that the convoys are all less than three ships on average.

The cost of an escort compared to the value of the escorted cargo isn't meaningful. In WW2, convoys were routinely escorted by ships worth more than the cargo in the merchant hulls (in particular, every convoy to the USSR)

The last sentence would make sense if he were talking about the expenses.  If the mission to protect a tanker incurs more in expenses than the value of the tanker and the cargo, then it might be a relevant statement.  If he's talking about the value of the ships, then of course it's totally irrelevant comparison, unless you assume that 50% of the time the cargo and all the escorts will get sunk.

[Syt]

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-iran-sink-capture-ships-fun/

Trump said US military officials told him sinking Iranian ships is 'more fun' than capturing them

Claim:
President Donald Trump said U.S. military officials told him they had to sink Iranian ships rather than capture them because "it's more fun to sink them."


Context
Trump delivered the line in a joking tone, suggesting he may not have intended it to be taken literally.

Trump made the comment in a joking tone, suggesting he may not have intended it to be taken literally.

In March 2026, a number of social media posts shared a clip of U.S. President Donald Trump speaking about military action against Iranian ships. According the posts (archived), Trump said, "I said, 'Why don't we just capture the ship? We could use it. Why did we sink them?' He said, 'It's more fun to sink them.' They like sinking them better."

The claim was shared across multiple platforms, including X (archived), Reddit (archived) and Facebook (archived).

The quote about sinking Iranian ships being more fun than capturing them was correctly attributed to Trump. He said it as part of a March 9, 2026, speech at the Republican Members Issues Conference hosted by the Congressional Institute at the Trump National Doral resort in Miami.

The White House uploaded the speech to its YouTube account and put the video on its website. At 15:15 in the YouTube video, Trump talks about sinking Iran's ships (emphasis ours):

The Navy is gone. It's all lying at the bottom of the ocean, 46 ships. Can you believe it? In fact, I got a little upset with our people. I said, "What quality of ship?" "Excellent, sir. Top of the line." I said, "Why don't we just capture the ship? We could have used it. Why did we sink them?" They said, "It's more fun to sink them." I said [unclear]. They like sinking them better. They say it's safer to sink them. I guess it's probably true. But think of it, we knocked out 46 and actually took three and a half days.

Trump delivered the line in a joking tone, suggesting he may not have intended it to be taken literally. The anecdote drew some laughter from the Republican members of Congress in the audience.

Snopes emailed the White House for clarification on who, precisely, the "people" Trump referred to in the quote were. We will update this story if we receive an answer.

For further reading, Snopes has previously fact-checked other claims about Trump quotes and Iran

[Tamas]

Anyone remember the Board of Peace?

[The Brain]

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-iran-sink-capture-ships-fun/

The reasonable "They say it's safer to sink them. I guess it's probably true." is also in there.

[The Brain]

Anyone remember the Board of Peace?

Yes, the US friends list.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Do you mean this Board of Peace??

https://youtube.com/shorts/3rK7N_il7bo?si=PaWRGJKhv79fUVxO

[Syt]

Anyone remember the Board of Peace?

Yes, the US friends list.

More like Trump's Only Fans.

[Maladict]

So all of this, and he still has a decent chance of surviving the midterms? 

[OttoVonBismarck]

I mean the President always survives the midterms, this isn't parliament.

[The Brain]

Anyone remember the Board of Peace?

Yes, the US friends list.

More like Trump's Only Fans.

Two tomatoes.