Michael Carlin Official

The Islamic Republic’s strategy for closing the Strait of Hormuz has been defeated and rendered useless - and a regime insider is now admitting it. Ehsan Hosseini says the UAE has defeated the strategy by turning tanker attacks into an affordable cost of a highly profitable oil trade. Hosseini is a former journalist for the regime-controlled Fars News Agency and now heads the energy outlet Khate Energy. The regime’s old plan was simple: attack tankers, make insurance unaffordable, stop shipping and force the world to negotiate. But the market adapted. According to Hosseini, the UAE buys Persian Gulf oil at discounts of around $30 per barrel and transports it through the southern route near Oman in organized convoys. He claims the UAE has made roughly $70 billion from this system. The margins are now so large that sinking one or two tankers does not stop the operation. The loss is absorbed as a cost of doing business while the remaining ships keep moving. The UAE also has protected shipping networks, enormous financial reserves and a pipeline to Fujairah that allows substantial volumes to bypass Hormuz entirely. The Islamic Republic has none of these advantages. Its own oil exports remain strangled, its alternative pipeline capacity is limited and its economy cannot absorb comparable losses. To actually close Hormuz now, the regime would need sustained attacks on protected convoys, extensive mining and direct confrontation with the United States and Persian Gulf states. That would invite devastating retaliation against its remaining launchers, ports and military infrastructure. The Islamic Republic tried to hold global energy supplies hostage. Instead, it forced its neighbours to adapt, allowed the UAE to profit from the danger and left Iran trapped behind the chokepoint it tried to weaponize.

President Trump has publicly sidelined JD Vance from the Iran file and declared that the United States no longer needs a deal with the Islamic Republic. While redirecting Vance toward domestic corruption and crime, Trump delivered a blunt rejection of the diplomatic track his vice president had led: “We don’t need a deal with Iran. Those days have long since passed. We’ve got their money, Hundreds of Billions of Dollars, and we’ve got their Strait!” The message is unmistakable. Vance was not a peripheral participant in the Iran file. He was the administration’s highest-ranking negotiator, principal advocate and public face for diplomacy with the Islamic Republic. Vance and Trump digitally signed the June MOU, while Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf signed for the Islamic Republic. Trump appointed Vance to lead the American negotiating team. Vance directly engaged Ghalibaf during the diplomatic process and later led the American delegation at negotiations in Switzerland mediated by Qatar and Pakistan. He became the agreement’s chief public defender through White House briefings, interviews and diplomatic meetings. Vance argued that the United States would “win either way,” that the Islamic Republic would receive nothing without changing its behaviour and that the proposed framework was stronger than the JCPOA. The MOU created a 60-day window for a final agreement. It called for an end to hostilities, commercial passage through the Strait of Hormuz and negotiations over the regime’s nuclear program. But it deferred the most difficult questions—including the future of enrichment and the highly enriched uranium stockpile—while beginning to relieve American economic and military pressure. Vance remained active in the diplomatic track after the MOU collapsed. He worked through Qatari and Pakistani channels and, in late October, sent Mohsen Rezaei a letter proposing a direct meeting to restart negotiations and prevent another major escalation. Reports said Vance was considering meeting the Islamic Republic’s security chief personally, with Qatar discussed as a possible venue. Rezaei acknowledged receiving the letter but said he did not respond. Trump has now redirected Vance toward domestic politics while declaring that further negotiations with the Islamic Republic are unnecessary. The move follows growing tension between them over the Iran war. After Republicans lost both chambers of Congress, Vance publicly declared that “the reason we lost is the war.” He argued that voters wanted the conflict ended and described previous advice favouring a diplomatic resolution as “sound.” Trump acknowledged that the war contributed to the losses but said he would make the same decision again because the Islamic Republic could not be permitted to obtain a nuclear weapon. The disagreement went beyond electoral analysis. The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump had privately questioned whether the June MOU Vance helped negotiate was a costly mistake that gave the Islamic Republic time to regroup and resume earning oil revenue before the American blockade was restored. The White House denied that Trump regretted the agreement. That MOU temporarily relieved pressure on the regime without securing lasting nuclear concessions. Iranian oil exports surged, the Islamic Republic collected billions of dollars and the IRGC later resumed attacks on commercial shipping. The arrangement collapsed, but the regime kept the revenue and breathing room it had gained. Trump had joked in June that he would take credit if the agreement succeeded and blame Vance if it failed. That joke now carries greater political weight. Vance defended the diplomatic approach, blamed the war for the Republican defeat and appeared prepared to pursue another round of talks. Trump has responded by removing him from the public Iran track and declaring that American leverage has made a deal unnecessary.