I hope this post will not be unduly scattered or incomplete, and hope that readers will step up to fill in any gaps or address ambiguities. I have been not as deep into new news flow as I normally am due to having a big plate of real world matters to address.
But this conflict is also in a bizarre phase. The combination of Trump’s worsening white matter disease plus key members of his team doubling down on the one activity in which they are somewhat competent, propaganda, has resulted in them even more losing the plot in what matters: minimizing the cost to the US of backing out of this massive exercise in self harm.
Now admittedly, it’s likely that the reduction in kinetic action by both the US and Iran to verbal and some actual skirmishes over vessels moving in and out of the Strait of Hormuz and beyond is merely a placeholder as the US and Israel ready forces to Do Something. But what?
The momentary TACO after another episode of Trump threatening devastation if Iran did not bend to his will, here showing up in Islamabad to capitulate, has been greeted with undue relief. Yes, Trump has not walked over the ledge of damaging Iranian infrastructure in a way that leads Iran to wreck oil production across the Middle East, which in short order would end what passes for modern civilization. But as many many many commentators have discussed, Trump has no viable military options. The US is critically low on key weapons. We’ve posted details from studies with in-depth figures on US and Israel stocks which showed some key categories set to be disastrously depleted in short order. More analyses reinforce that conclusion:
US has used almost 70 to 80 percent of its defensive missiles in the 40-day war with Iran. Now they are facing a shortage of these defensive missiles; if war breaks out again, they cannot sustain it for long. pic.twitter.com/eez7RbLF0K
— Iran Exclusive (@24_70xu) April 24, 2026
And remember, it’s not just defensive weapons but also precision offensive missiles. And those matter a lot because, contrary to PR, the US has been cautious about flying planes into Iran and so is relying heavily on what are called standoff weapons, as opposed to much lower tech gravity bombs.
Its navy is too small and also has the wrong mix of ships to bust a blockade or run convoys….and even if successful, convoys would not restore transit levels to the old normal. The deadly strangulation of essential inputs would continue, just at a slower rate.
Simplicius focuses on naval (un)readiness in his new post, US Secretary of Navy Resigns (Or Is Fired) Just as Third Carrier Group Arrives In Iran Theater. I am going to skip over his discussion of the ouster of Navy Secretary John Phelan, which Nat discussed in detail yesterday. IMHO, this show of Hegseth’s pique falls mainly into the “I can’t even” category,” save for confirming rank-and-file concerns that there are no adults in charge. Key bits:
In fact, it appears the US Navy is growing quite concerned, given the latest testimony from the head of IndoPacom Admiral Samuel Paparo this week….
It says it could take up to six years for the US to replenish the spent munitions, and that’s if US doesn’t squander another major portion of them, which it may very well do if Trump resumes military actions as many now predict he will.
At the same time, estimates regarding Iran’s remaining military capabilities continue gradually sliding upward, as predicted. Trump had claimed Iran’s airforce was “completely destroyed”, but CBS now reports that “two-thirds of Iran’s air force is still believed to be operational”..\
Amongst his statements:
Adm. Paparo said: “I don’t have enough amphibious ships. We don’t have enough surface destroyers. We certainly don’t have enough attack submarines, and our trajectory is on the wrong side.”
WSJ now reports that the Iran war has snuffed out hopes of US standing any chance in helping Taiwan during a hypothetical Chinese intervention….
It says it could take up to six years for the US to replenish the spent munitions, and that’s if US doesn’t squander another major portion of them, which it may very well do if Trump resumes military actions as many now predict he will.
At the same time, estimates regarding Iran’s remaining military capabilities continue gradually sliding upward, as predicted. Trump had claimed Iran’s airforce was “completely destroyed”, but CBS now reports that “two-thirds of Iran’s air force is still believed to be operational”:…
The real number is much higher, as the US has not attrited anything more than old wrecked airframes that were being used for spare parts, while the real planes were moved into underground and other hardened storages east of the country, or simply used Ukraine’s tactic of lofting during cruise missile strikes on airbases then setting back down afterwards.
The US is pursuing worthy targets or alternatively, ones it thought it could master:
The US Navy tried to steal a cargo of rice.
Disgusting https://t.co/ML5YjVBun6
— Seyed Mohammad Marandi (@s_m_marandi) April 23, 2026
More from Simplicius:
As of this writing the USS Bush carrier group is said to have arrived in the region:
Aircraft carrier USS George H.W Bush (CVN-77) has arrived in the U.S. CENTCOM AOR
This brings the total number of U.S. aircraft carriers deployed in the region to three:
• USS Abraham Lincoln in the Arabian Sea
• USS Gerald R. Ford in the Red Sea
• USS George H.W. Bush in… https://t.co/y72c6GCKK3 pic.twitter.com/UHhnlrGLp6
— Egypt's Intel Observer (@EGYOSINT) April 23, 2026
Recall this is the carrier that was forced to trail its rust around the southern cape of Africa because it was too terrified of being converted to a bathysphere by the Houthis of Bab al-Mandab…
Many believe that once USS Bush arrives, Trump will be primed to unleash another round of futile strikes. It’s obvious that Trump is still desperate for an off-ramp and the only way he’d launch another major attack is to get out of dodge with a cheap bit of “victory” theater: “See, now we’ve OBLITERATED all their power plants and have decisively won the war, now we’re going home!”
Now Trump and Israel may hope for a more successfully executed stunt, to achieve the sort of splashy success sought in the botched and very costly attempt to seize Iran’s enriched uranium. That resulted in the biggest loss of aircraft in a single incident since the Vietnam War. Maybe the US somehow fights its way into one of Iran’s (very many) underground missile cities, takes selfies, and blows it up on the way out? But even if the US scores a son-of-Caracas special forces show of prowess, anything that does not get the Strait open is just more noise before the defeat.
Some also believe that after rumors of the military defying Trump seeking to ready a nuclear strike…
🇺🇸BREAKING: During an emergency White House meeting, President Trump reportedly attempted to access the nuclear codes but was blocked by General Dan Caine, according to former CIA analyst Larry Johnson.
pic.twitter.com/5aqKarHlCU— Defence Journal (@Defence_Journl) April 21, 2026
…that Trump has gotten religion:
🇮🇷🇺🇸 Trump:
“No I wouldn’t use it. A nuclear weapon should never be allowed to be used by anybody.”pic.twitter.com/nTxTZDXUlT https://t.co/qiiZ36ABfA
— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) April 23, 2026
Given that Trump is fabulously mercurial, I take his statement above as mood of the day. However, a possible tell that tactical nukes are not being considered now is the very large (by current US standards) number of soldiers being moved into theaters. Readying that much conventional force seems at odds with a nuclear deployment.
I can’t prove it, but I sense that Trump and his team have retreated so far into their narrative bubble, where they are enjoying considerable success, that they are dangerously out of touch with real stakes and real events. Trump has managed to make this TACO look like something other than a failure in mainstream media accounts. Yet more paralysis is not neutral for the US. It is a loss. As we have harped on repeatedly, the damage from supply shortfalls compounds with their duration. And as Professor Mohammed Marandi has pointed out, the Gulf is just about to enter its very hot period, making ground operations impossibly difficult.
For instance, for some time, Trump has been ringing the changes of the claim that no one is in charge in Iran because he wiped them out. This also serves as an excuse for why negotiations have failed: the US cannot find the new person in authority to whom to talk. The variant du jour:
Iran is having a hard time figuring out who their leader is! The infighting is between the “Hardliners,” who have been losing BADLY on the battlefield, and the “Moderates,” who are not very moderate at all (but gaining respect!), is CRAZY!
Weirdly, this patter seems to have gotten under the skin of Iran-sympathetic independent commentators. In the last day or so, both Mohammed Marandi and Alastair Crooke were quizzed at some length about Iran authority structures and how they were coming up with negotiating positions. Again, forgive me for not running it down, but some suggested that this line of talk was a psyop directed at Iran.
NO NO NO! That could be a side bennie in the unlikely event that anyone in Iran fell for it.
The real main object is investors, which includes higher-end retail (as in PMC) and pundits and media outlets they trust. The super elevated stock market and bizarre complacency in paper oil prices are based on the false premises that 1. The war will end pretty soon and the shipments thought the Strait will move as quickly as practicable to old normal levels and 2. Supply shocks will be on the order of Covid, as in short term, so that any swoon would be yet another buying opportunity.
So [talk of] Iran being fractured at the top = government weakness = Iran concessions = war over soon = we get richer faster!
Similarly, ceasefire in most inattentive or constitutionally bullish investors’ minds is tantamount to an end to war. Pop the champagne corks! This is why Trump fixates on them. The bar to achieving them is not insurmountable, and they produce wonderfully big Pavlovian response from Mr. Market.
As disgraceful is the appalling way the financial press has been shamelessly skweing its coverage to the most optimistic take possible. For instance, almost without exception when Trump Makes Up New Shit, usually of the “Iran agreed to X” sort, Bloomberg will immediately give it a banner headline. When Iran issues a formal denial, which has not just been reported on say Fars or an official Twitter account but also on Aljazeera, Bloomberg will keep up the old Trump/market positive spin up in its banner headline and will delay reporting the Iran downer for hours.
So as not to enable Trump manipulation, I am skipping over the three week ceasefire Trump announced between Israel and Lebanon. As those who pay attention know, Israel does not adhere to them unless it wants a wee break to rest and refit. And in keeping:
BREAKING: UN envoy to Israel bucks Trump’s ceasefire, says extending the Lebanon ceasefire is “not guaranteed.”
— Douglas Macgregor (@DougAMacgregor) April 24, 2026
Forgive me for a short entry, but yours truly hit a jet lag air pocket plus there actually is not a huge amount of new news on this beat.
It seems the “three week ceasefire” announcement hasn’t, so far, made any great deal of positive influence on paper Brent prices or European stocks. This is because Mr. Market complacency starts and ends in the US, so we will see when Friday starts in US markets how it goes. My bet is in yee-haw! Good times back again in Friday!
Paper oil prices are WAY below physical + Iran has been correctly pointing out that the continued blockade is now the pressing ceasefire violation, as opposed to whether the Lebanon ceasefire is bona fide.
The ceasefire and other “Iran is weak” patter helps preserve oil at generally crazy low level v. the givens (even with noise in that range) and crazy high equity prices.
China is warning its subjects to leave Iran now as it did before the first attacks, looks like they expect action after the stock market closes. US and Israel want to use the 3 weeks ceasefire there to completely suborn Lebanon during so-called negotiations and the Houthis and Saudi’s have been meeting under UN auspices for peace talks, not looking good for Hezbollah unless the attacks resume, maybe the left hand really doesn’t know what the right hand is doing.
I’ve never really believed there was so much pent up demand for US Treasuries from foreign countries, and whatever there was must’ve been squashed by indications and merely seeing things unfold so spectacularly by our Lie-dership.
Lutnick is typical, we sold 1,000 of these!
…when only 1 was actually sold
What do you sell in a hurry that everybody wants in lieu of anything denominated in your currency?
The not so barbarous relic, it appears.
From the interview in the Oval Office, Trump said “time is on my side, if there production gets shut in, it will cause irreparable damage to their oil field and he’ll only be able to get 50-60% of it back”
I am not an oil engineer and have no knowledge if that’s true or not. The point is, Trump seems to believe it and this might continue along with a ceasefire thinking he is doing Iran damage all while compounding the mess he is in with the Strait being closed.
Bit of an explanation on how this works.
To extract oil these days you drill multiple holes down to the layer that has the oil. Just doing nothing will slowly cause the oil from the layer to seep into the holes. Add a pumpjack if you want to speed up the process or there is not enough pressure from the layer to get the oil to rise to the surface. Older fields do not have enough pressure anymore so they need the jacks and usually a bit extra. The extra consists of drilling holes to bottom of the layer with oil then inject fluids in under pressure, this displaces the oil which eventually ends up in the extraction holes. The downside of this is that you need to keep extracting the oil to relieve the pressure buildup from the fluids injected, it take months after the fluid injection stops to reduce the pressure buildup enough to prevent the fracturing of field if you do not remove oil.
That is where the loss of recoverable oil that Trump mentions comes from. Due to the pressure buildup while effectively putting a cork in the pressure relieve points the oil will start looking for other weak spots in the layer it is in and flow that way to reduce the pressure. That lowers the amount of oil in the current boundaries of the field while also lowering the amount that can be recovered due to permanently reduced pressure and increased locations where oil can flow through if the pressure is increased.
As usual Trump ignores a few things to to create the illusion he is harming his victim:
It is not just Iran but all of the Middle East that is suffering the same problem.
Reduced revenue is a problem for a decade or more away, not now.
Iran is used to receiving little to no oil revenues (compared to what it is getting now).
Iran is about the only nation in the Middle East that can still export through Hormuz (with just ~7% of ships being intercepted by US). And the nations that have significant bypasses only have those because Iran didn’t want to make irreconcilable enemies of its neighbors (yet).
The supply crunch is now,.
The supply crunch is not only oil.
Yeah its pretty crazy how Trump started saying this and nobody in the media (unless I missed it) has pointed out that all these same issues are going to be suffered by every other Gulf oil producer as well.
> Forgive me for a short entry, but yours truly hit a jet lag air pocket plus there actually is not a huge amount of new news on this beat.
Nothing to forgive, Yves. I’m happy things have quieted down a bit.
Regarding the USA’s big resupply into the region, some opined that means those weapons will be used. Idk. Maybe they don’t want to leave their guns with empty mags. The story goes that the USA shot off half its total stock of cruise and AD missiles. Maybe they just don’t want to leave the remaining stock sitting in warehouses. And, like you said, what would the USA resume shooting them for?
The thing about Trump wanting to use nukes… it seemed to me that Larry Johnson misunderstood and amplified a tweet from a sh:tposter/comedian.
Johnson was very clear. It was a trusted source of his, NOT a tweet. My SWAG is it was Barnes who is friends with Vance. It’s also consistent with the video of Kaine leaving the WH with his head down, and that civilization destruction did not fall on Iran and Trump TACOs again. Psyop? Makes no sense. Lie by his source? Maybe. Someone is trying to leak to box Trump further into NOT nuking Iran. Probably. Larry knows a thing or two about source evaluation.
Does he? He was relying on Candace a lot while he was talking about Kirk’s murder.
Excellent point.
I investigated this https://www.ianwelsh.net/did-gen-caine-defy-a-presidential-order-saturday-night-and-deny-him-the-nuclear-codes/ and concluded that Kerry Burgess @KerryBurgess makes stuff up for Twitter for fun and attention. It got into some tabloids. When I saw Johnson discussing it with, who was it now, Dan Davis, JNap?, they were mostly interpreting the body language of Cane leaving a WH meeting on a Saturday from about 1 second of video. I did not take it seriously.
If the Trumpies are having narrative success it’s only because our appallingly bad MSM are allowing them to have it. If you look at the daily RSS feed for the NY Times it’s a series of trivial stories with a few Iran stories scattered in. You’d never know we are facing the financial equivalent of the MAD 1960s and the Cuban missile crisis (as Michael Hudson is detailing in recent interviews and of course coverage here). To some of us who aren’t so money oriented this doesn’t seem as threatening as Cold War nukes, but of course we Americans will get the least of it whereas poor countries will get the worst.
Right now I am imagining a bunch of very senior Chinese generals sitting out on a verandah, popping some beers open and reflecting that life can be good. They will say that the war in the Ukraine has drained the weapons stocks of nearly all the NATO nations and what advanced weaponry the US had left has been mostly used up against Iran on behalf of the most ungrateful nation in the world. China is now safe from an American war for years and Taiwan knows it too. Bonus points for Trump and his team decimating the upper command levels of the US military like Stalin did to his generals before the German invasion. Yes, life can be very good sometimes.
What we really need now is the shipping news – up to date mapping updates like Dima does for Ukraine would be cool. I’ll check out what Sal Mercogliano has to say.
Yesterday and the day before US MSM had permission to say that the US blockade of Iran ports is largely ineffective, that Iran’s control and toll of SoH traffic is effective, and significant numbers of ships were transiting.
This status might provide a basis for a move towards resuming Persian Gulf shipping while Trump trumpets his blockade, the Trumpsters brag, and everyone else (including Iran) is like, “Yeah, sounds good Donny,” while trying to resume trade.
Objectivity on shipping should be available. I tried interpreting the raw data myself but didn’t really understand.
Sal just published a video on naval logistics with respect to present operations near-ish Hormuz.
https://youtu.be/tsDvoEj1xgY?si=Xi8DpHy-ZGf2kQUE
Upbeat as usual about America’s war fighting capacity but to my layman’s ear, things seem awfully fragile as in there doesn’t seem to be enough supply ships. Unsustainable, even, now that there are 3 carrier groups to provision. That doesn’t even get into whether or not they have stuff to deliver. All those carriers means lots of planes that need lots of jet fuel.
Sal mentioned in passing that most supply ships cannot keep up with a carrier groups travelling at full speed. IIRC one of the difficulties in hitting a carrier etc with a missile is that they move so fast they can basically move out of the way. If supply ships are slower, are they easier to hit? Perhaps even easier the floating supply bases that are being used to help manage the long distances between Diego Garcia and the carriers.
Would be a real shame if the Iranians took out America’s ability to supply its war machine. Along with the empire running out of bullets, things look grim for greatest military in history.
Thanks, Will. That seems to be all about navy logistics. What I’m curious about is commercial traffic, i.e. tankers and cargo. To answer the question: exactly how open or closed is the SoH? the list of commercial ships entering and exiting each day should do.
I want to test the hypothesis that the USA is pretending to blockade SoH to save face but actually letting lots of ships through because several reasons.
The CSG in the Red Sea is going to be supported via the Med. Not really an issue relative to the NAS where you have two CSG plus the ARG to support.
We used to have a fleet of CH-46 helos to do VERTREP, and those helos had pretty good lift capability. I don’t know what the thinking was of getting rid of them.
Aside from the high volume/cube things like fuel you also have the need for things like repair parts. CVNs have C-2 logistics aircraft (COD). Not sure if they have the range to get to Diego Garcia though. But that won’t help with things like aircraft engines.
Ships in general dont move very fast at all. Many years ago I was on a guided missile frigate(FFG). The top rated speed was around 30 knots but we rarely went that fast. Generally speaking 20-22 knots was the speed we usually travelled at. I imagine there is a huge fuel difference between 20 knots and 30 knots.
Carriers technically may be able to go slightly faster than 30 knots and since they are nuclear powered they dont worry about fuel. However the rest of the battle group does so they usually stay in the 20ish knot range as well.
I doubt the speed of any warship makes much difference as far as making it harder to hit.
I think the biggest logistics problem right now is that much of the US logistics in the area require the strait of Hormuz to be open. There are bases in the Gulf that would usually be used to supply the Navy that are pretty much out of service for the foreseeable future.
I think the US empire has been like a private credit fund, hiding a declining value by not marking assets to market. Or a private complex with two funds: one military and one economic, with highly correlated holdings. A lot of effort is being expended to avoid a re-pricing.
Our military industry is massively funded but has a microscopic ROI. We can’t build ships anymore, at scale or at all. We don’t produce air defense missiles fast enough to actually use them, and our missile defense technology is vintage 1980s. We build very expensive fighters and very expensive submarines…armed with missiles from the 1980s. Our $13B aircraft carrier can’t operate in a modern contested context.
Our economy relies on asset inflation and recently the massive hyping of AI, backed by constant propaganda.
When the assets are re-priced it will be traumatic.
Well, that’s my opinion man.
Michael Hudson related that the USA is a Ponzi scheme, and one of the hallmarks of it, that as it is going on details are hidden away and one can’t figure out what makes them tick.
The penultimate Ponzi scheme for yours truly was Bruce McNall, a dealer in ancient Greek and Roman coins by trade, who ended up owning a Hollywood movie studio, the LA Kings, the Toronto Argonauts, a top rank thoroughbred stable, and a bunch of other entities…
The coin biz was a nice way to make bank, but all the money was in US coins, dealers in ancient coins tended to be tweedy jacket wearing types who eked out an ok living, for them it was much more about the history entwined with aged round metal discs, and adjacent lore.
Nobody in the coin biz could figure out just how a numismatist could do this, a mystery that made no sense until the walls came down in the guise of brand name banks that had lent him vast oodles of money that were getting cold feet over the collateral they were promised.
One story I heard was McNall’s minions scooping up all the commons baseball cards they could find in LA/OC from card stores at 2 Cents, which was double the usual 1 Cent wholesale value, and thus they bought common cards by the millions in just a few days time, as one of those aforementioned banks wanted to see the sports memorabilia they had lent $40 million on, in the flesh.
They rented a warehouse and piled the closed boxes full of commons to the ceiling, and apparently the vast number of nothings wowed the auditors and held off the wolf for awhile.
Another one I heard was one of the banks had loaned $25 million on ‘rare stamps’ and there aren’t many stamp dealers with storefronts, and one of them in LA was requested to do a fair wholesale appraisal of the collateral, and they got up to $17k…
At about this point the banks came down on him, empire gone in a jiffy and everything made sense of what was going on that was previously a mystery.
The same will happen with the USA… stock up on popcorn, which exhibits an approx 666% inflation rate after sufficient heating is applied.
That story about McNall’s minions scooping up all the commons baseball cards reminded me of a story from WW2. Rommel had just captured a city in North Africa and knew that there would be allied spies in that city. So he had his tanks parade down the main street of the city in victory. But as they reached the end of that street, they sped around the city and went down that street again giving Rommel the appearance of having plenty of tanks.
I would never presume to argue with Professor Hudson. He’s forgotten more about economics than I’ll ever know. I’ve shared his take on the real objective of the Ukraine war (Germany) widely among my circle.That said, I think private credit is a more apt analogy. The US has real resources. Our wealth is greatly overstated but there is significant residual value. A better example of a Ponzi, I think, is Europe.
But to return the original focus: What we’re witnessing currently is the beginning of the re-pricing of our military that started with Operation Prosperity Garden. Might still be possible to get away with a partial mark down if we walk away now. If we try again, and fail, I think we’ll get a junk rating in the world’s eyes.
… stock up on popcorn, which exhibits an approx 666% inflation rate after sufficient heating is applied.
Agreed. Popcorn is definitely a beast….
I like the analogy.
Always delusional. Given our current performance militarily against Iran, what chance would there be against the Chinese, with scores more industrial capacity and a provider of US essentials, like pharmaceuticals? And no one ever explains why China would attack Taiwan militarily, and destroy valuable infrastructure, rather than blockade, in the first place.
The US obsession with Taiwan is as bizarre as the obsession with Iran.
Garland Nixon was mocking Mearsheimer on this point a couple of days ago. Paraphrasing: We should pivot to China after Iran? We’d get snuffed out in the first hour of conflict.
Americans don’t study history. They watch television. Mostly sports and games.
Their obsessions with Israel, Iran, Taiwan, China, “Ukraine,” and Russia!Russia!Russia! are all based on vague recollections of Grandpa’s blatherings about the early Cold War, reinforced by various fictional Hollywood hero/villain narratives. Acquiring knowledge beyond what they’ve been passively spoon-fed from childhood is simply too much work.
The recent visit between Xi Jinping and the leader of the Kuomintang tells me that it is the Taiwanese who will eventually choose reuinfication — because it’s been their own narrative all along and because it will soon make economic sense as well. Just the other day I tried to have a discussion with someone that ended when he began to lecture me about what “the Soviets” were doing to repress the peace-and-freedom-loving “Ukrainians.” I recently asked Google AI to help me find credible incidents of Iranian state-sponsored international terrorism in the past 46 years; there are effectively none. Iran’s only “terrorism” has been directed toward the militaries invading Lebanon, Iraq, and Afghanistan, by supplying defensive armaments to the resistance.
The [mis]leadership in America is obsessed with demonizing these “enemies” simply because it’s a way for the Military-Finance Complex to “make alotta money. It’s been working quite well for them.
For most people (not just Americans), “history” is just a mix of morality tales and self aggrandizing myths. I tend to be skeptical of most people who claim “they study history.”
I suspect that the “vague recollections” of Americans matter little except for military recruitment purposes.
The USA foreign policy is driven by those rising through the think tanks, state department, academic schools of government, CIA, NED, DEA, political lobbyists, politicians, and US military.
I’ll assert many employees of these groups do study history, but their economic fortunes depend on maintaining an acceptable, gainfully employed, narrative.
Far more USA people outside finance and the military are making a good living by, perhaps, willfully ignoring history.
I recently asked Google AI to help me find credible incidents of Iranian state-sponsored international terrorism in the past 46 years; there are effectively none.
Larry Johnson did a post on that yesterday (that is 2026-04-24 — the same day as your post) and essentially agrees with your findings.
https://sonar21.com/when-it-comes-to-using-proxies-the-us-far-surpasses-iran-as-a-sponsor-of-terrorism/
> The US obsession with Taiwan is as bizarre as the obsession with Iran.
Is there such a thing as “sore loser syndrome”?
Ask the Iranians and the Cubans.
Minor quibble with the graphs posted by Iran Exclusive.
The way they are setup it gives the suggestion that the missiles are delivered next year but they are multi year purchase agreements.
Current THAAD production is 96 per year with Lockheed planning to increase that ~400 per year in 2032. Same thing goes for the Patriot missiles. Current production rate 650 per year, and again Lockheed planning to increase this production rate to 2000 per year in 2032.
2032?! Will they work any better than Teragashima muskets by then?
By 2032? I could promise I’d be able to do a lot of things by 2032, and it would be a long time before I was proved a liar.
Would it be acceptable to deliberately violate this site’s “No AI” policy for the explicit purpose of research?
You see, I am curious to know if the crap spewed by Team Trump and regurgitated by MSM aligns with the AI-version of reality.. maybe this could possibly explain a few things.
I don’t touch AI so I have no idea how one could conduct this experiment.
This is what I want to hear Trump say in his best Eric Cartman voice.
https://youtu.be/cDWgs2cnga0?si=K_e0ohIWBdpF9MlW
Jet lag clobbers me. I hate it.
From today: Not insurmountable == surmountable
From several days ago: Not capable of agreement == agreement-incapable
Did something change? Is the Drumpf admin now agreement-capable?