Trump tried to calm markets yesterday with his statement about the war being complete. Since that's clearly not the case, he now has to throw everything at keeping the Strait open.

The fact is Iran has the means to keep the Strait closed for many months, which would mean a global recession and a bloodbath for the GOP in midterms and a disaster for Vance/Rubio in 2028.

Iran has a stockpile of tens of thousands of Shahed drones and can manufacture thousands more, every month. Lobbing more bombs at the country is will do little to change this dynamic, especially when the timeline to avoid economic catastrophe is mere months.

For years now, people have celebrated Trump's diplomatic routine of hitting a country hard, threatening them with total destruction, then quickly reaching a mediated solution that secures concessions before things spin out of control. But this time may be different. Trump has

1. Killed the man Iranians consider the head of their religion

2. Overseen the bombing of a school that killed 160+ children

3. Negotiated in bad faith to buy time for a sneak attack with Israel

4. Demanded unconditional surrender and threatened destruction of the Iranian nation

The US thought the Iran regime would be weakened internally the more it was attacked externally, but after these humiliations, the legitimacy of Khamenei's successors rests on them delivering a victory.

Iran has no choice but to impose real pain on the US and establish deterrence, because the US has shown this cycle will repeat again and again until it becomes too costly to be considered by another administration.

This operation is going to be looked back on as a complete disaster.