The White Empire (America, Israel, whatever) is doing the old treaty with White people shit, which is using them to violate. The entire history of 'America' is treaty violations like this, that is how 'America' was created. So it was with the Oslo Accords, trying to create an ersatz 'Israel' out of Palestine. If you're signing a treaty with White Empire, ignore the ink and look at the page. The ink fades and the White Empire surrounds you, like the white of a page.

Iran, however, is not in the same straits. They surround the Strait of Hormuz, whatever any piece of paper says, and they still fire at any ship that strays. The whole imperial trick is controlling facts on the ground while pretending like control is on a page, but now the script has been flipped on them. While White markets trade based on a paper MOU, Iran has physical control of the Strait of Hormuz. 'America' is moving imaginary markets in Iran is moving real crude. So forget the black ink and even the white page. What's moving on blue?

White Position

On June 30th, the NYTimes (citing Kpler) said "Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz bounced back on Monday after a weekend slowdown prompted by a flare-up in strikes between Iran and United States. According to data from Kpler, a maritime tracking firm, 40 ships transited the waterway, up from 24 the previous day and 39 on Saturday." I believe this is what's called a 'dead cat bounce' or a 'sucker rally'. As Raymond F. DeVoe Jr said in 1986, "If you threw a dead cat off a 50-story building, it might bounce when it hit the sidewalk. But don't confuse that bounce with renewed life. It is still a dead cat."

If you zoom out to a similar but not same metric (via Michael McDonough's Bloomberg) you can see the dead cat bounce that is the MOU. If you take the MOU literally, that was Empire hitting the ground that Iran now controlled. The White markets confused this with 'renewed life', immediately lowering prices, but there was only a brief dead cat bounce in supply. America has since clowned around again and the cat is heading to ground again. It may bounce a few times here and there, but the trajectory is clear. Here's the same graph a few days later, so you can see that things haven't improved.

As Monty Python said about the dead parrot that is White control of the Persian Gulf,

 'E's not pinin'! 'E's passed on! This parrot is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E's expired and gone to meet 'is maker! 'E's a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed 'im to the perch 'e'd be pushing up the daisies! 'Is metabolic processes are now 'istory! 'E's off the twig! 'E's kicked the bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-PARROT!!

'America' is trying to nail the ex-parrot that is expatriate control of the Middle East to its blown up perch and it doesn't work. They can move markets, sure, but they can't move crude. They can manipulate media, sure, but physical reality has the last word. The pantomime that is Trump saying some dumb shit, the media smartening it up, and the markets reacting like something actually happened is looking increasingly pantsless now. The Empire has no clothes, the parrot is dead, the dead cat is nearing its last bounce.

What makes things worse is that they're making things worse. By using morons, media, and markets to manipulate prices down they are increasing demand while supply is still down, and still has a four-month hole to plug, and many years of reconstruction to be done. I only did Economics 101 and I honestly should not have paid attention. All the money seems to be in ignoring the basics, like low supply + high demand = higher prices. White economists are just fawning courtiers, all their analysts and traders are just entrail pickers, and if the mad king says 'jump' they just say 'how high'. The White Empire is really trying to rule by fiat over a finite commodity. Let's see how that goes.

To cover up the Empire's lack of clothes, 'America' is pumping sludge and old boots out of their Cushing storage and their Strategic Petroleum Reserves are stressing the salt mines below. They are at or near the operational minimums for many pumping and transport facilities and, instead of rationing or behaving rationally, they are increasing demand to score points politically. The strait is open! We're winning! Everything is fine! This works suprisingly well until it unsurprisingly doesn't. You can bullshit for a while, but every bull has horns.

I've only done personal shipping, but even I understand that delivery takes months. So even if the Strait was fully open (it's not), it would take months for the supply crunch to uncrunch. Today's prices are not reflecting anything but Trump's Narcissism. The only thing that prevented imperial (and unfortunately, thus, global) economic collapse already was China stabilizing the world economy. People used to say that capitalism was superior because markets were good at processing information, but I have yet to see it. The capitalist 'markets' are not pricing this in and are instead depending on invisible communism. The White markets are acting like the problem is solved (it's not) and that it's solved right now (certainly not). They're smoking the joint before they rolled it because they're high on their own demand. Trump's saying "I'm king of the world!" and holding the White markets over the bow of the Titanic, with the iceberg already in the rear view. How many mixed metaphors is that, three? I'll stop now.

Iran's Position

Iran is in a very different position. Possession is nine-tenths of the law, and they possess Hormuz by Iranternational Law. The Islamic Republic just has to stay in Iran whereas 'America' has nowhere to stay since its Persian Gulf bases have been obliterated. 'America' can skulk around the Indian Ocean and at its vassal's houses, but for how long, and at what cost? As I've said before, the battle for Hormuz has already been won by Iran. If you're not happy with the war you ordered, you have to order another.

What we have happening today is a tug-of-war to determine politically what has been established militarily. The MOU understood this, but 'America' just doesn't get it, so the tug of war goes on. 'America' tries pulling ships through some 'Omani' route (a White route in a turban) and Iran keeps pushing them back to the Iranian one, as agreed upon.

As you can see in this graph from Commodity Context, firstly there's the green route of the International Maritime Organization, just to get the seafarers out, we can ignore that for our purposes. The tug of war is between the Iranian corridor (dark blue) and 'Omani' route (yellow). You can see that 'America' started blocking Iranian transit when it blockaded the blockade, and then started trying to immediately violate the MOU by plying its own trade. Yellow, yellow, dirty fellow.

Now Iran has fired on the 'Omani' route, 'America' has fired back, Iran has fired at vestigial bases, you must know the routine by now. The result is ultimately the same, unless 'America' wants to crack open a whole new war. They can escort a few ships through at great cost, they can harry the Iran with some stand-off weapons, but none of this is restabilishes control of Hormuz. They can still control the news, but not geography. Iran is in Iran and 'America' is 10,000 kilometers away and literally has to move mountains to dislodge them. And with what place to put their lever? All their bases are blown.

The Empire has to somehow retake control of Hormuz with no bases, no basis, and a population that hates this, while the Islamic Republic just has to stay in Iran with underground bases, a deep moral basis, and a population that's highly motivated. The Iranian population has been out in the streets protesting for their government since day one and, if anything, they want more fire and less cease. I won't spend that much time on Iran because what does Iran really have to do here? Iran can just be Iran, let the Persian Gulf be the Persian Gulf, and wait for the carbon crusaders to skulk off.

Tale Of Two Transits

This is a tale of two transits. Iran is moving more oil out of Hormuz while the Empire is moving less oil than before. The Empire is moving markets while Iran moves missiles. Iran is controlling shipping while the Empire is bullshitting. The Empire is killing civilians in Lebanon and Palestine while Iran is killing time.

These situations are not the same. Iran was more sanctioned before the war, whereas now the White Empire is feeling the pain. Iran has gas and fertilizer while 'America' is literally scraping the bottom of the barrel. And 'America' is evil and Iran is good and everybody in the world knows it. Then there's the simple matter of geography, meaning what is America doing in the Persian Gulf anyways? Just looking at a map, they should leave. The 'Americans' themselves call this the 'tyranny of geography', which to everyone else is just nature healing.

The Empire's violation of treaties worked for centuries before because they held the land. But they do not hold Hormuz, and they couldn't even set foot in Iran, so this 'treaty' is different. Yes they violate, but it's too little, too late. Yes they have continued genociding civilians in Palestine and Lebanon, but what is this but a rear guard action after losing the main shipping lane? This slaughter only hardens the will of the Iranian people, creates resistance like Hezbollah, and triggers heroes like Yemen. There is no international law, but there is Iranternational Law, and possession is nine-tenths of it.

The entire ceasefire period has seen Iran cranking out crude (by some accounts double their pre-war usual), stacking more and more loot, and digging in even more. On the other hand, the dumbasses in Whiteystan have consumed more by manipulating prices down and are digging their own grave with both hands. The White Empire is loudly puffing out its chest while Iran quietly stacks its war chest, which path do you think is best? This is what you need to understand about the MOU. Not what's written on paper, but what moves through Hormuz.