Image is of a destroyed American AWACS plane in Saudi Arabia, of which there is a very limited supply and each of which is enormously expensive both monetarily and in terms of components. Iran hit this with a precision drone strike that likely cost ~$20,000.
I don’t have much to add from the last megathread description. This isn’t to say that nothing has happened or has changed since then - decades are still happening in weeks - but the general flow of the war is remaining the same. Trump sometimes threatens to open the Strait with troops and flatten Iran to rubble, and other times threatens that he’s gonna back off and let other countries handle it if they really want little trifles like “fuel” and “energy” so much. Iran continues to strike across the Middle East. The West continues to bomb civilian infrastructure due to their relative inability to affect the missile cities. In all: things are generally getting worse for America and the Zionists.
April is the month where the last ships that left Hormuz before it was closed will arrive around the world, so the last month of economic turmoil has been a mere prelude to what’s going to occur in the near-future. The silver lining is that Iran appears to be formalizing the new state of affairs in Hormuz, creating a rial-based toll to allow passage between a pair of Iranian-controlled islands where they can be monitored, meaning that, as long as the US doesn’t do something exceptionally stupid, the global energy crisis may “only” last a couple years instead of simply being the new reality from now on. Some countries have already agreed to this arrangement, and others will inevitably follow despite their consternation as their economies increasingly suffer.
Last week’s thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
Please check out the RedAtlas!
The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on the Zionists’ destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia’s youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
I feel like we need a pinned comment or something reminding people to remain calm and not just be a doomer about everything. People were dooming about nukes, then they were dooming about the ceasefire, now many of those same people are dooming about the ceasefire being broken, something many of us thought would happen. If you truly, honestly believe that things are so hopeless, that the US and Israel are truly undefeatable titans who cannot ever be stopped, then why are you even on here? Why are you even a communist if you clearly think communism won’t win and the US will reign forever? A revolution isn’t a dinner party, and neither is a war. A war isn’t a fucking video game, and neither is a revolution. If you’re suffering from a bout of doomerism, go outside, touch grass, build community, talk to your neighbours, spend less time online, join an org, especially join an org if you’re all doom and gloom.
Doomerism isn’t proper analysis, it’s depression disguised as analysis. It does nothing but encourage inaction in you and others, it’s wrecker shit, don’t be a wrecker, you’re better than that.
https://xcancel.com/unusual_whales/status/2041867909140770893
“The UK must accept it is no longer a global power,” per FT
News from November 1956 just dropped.
https://xcancel.com/AryJeay/status/2041968968748167439
A lot of anger among Iranians tonight for ceasefire violation in Lebanon. I was at one of the night gatherings and this guy told me: “We don’t want this cursed ceasefire if our brothers & sisters in Lebanon are being slaughtered. They stood by us, now we should stand by them.”
really hoping the reformist faction completely loses support and gets ran out of the country at this point
https://xcancel.com/AryJeay/status/2041941054438433271
Not a single reformist got a small scratch during this all out war. None of them.
True. A yellow taxi driver, yesterday, told me that if you want to stay alive in Iran, there are 2 places where you’ll be 100% safe: Hassan Rouhani’s home and Zarif’s home 😂
https://xcancel.com/ChristopherHale/status/2041959904823366074 https://archive.ph/DHY8k
NEW: A stunning new report claims that the Pentagon summoned Pope Leo XIV’s top American diplomat and threatened him after the U.S.-born pontiff gave his January state-of-the-world address. Leo used the address to denounce a world ruled by “a diplomacy based on force” and “zeal for war.” In January, behind closed doors at the Pentagon, Under Secretary of War for Policy Elbridge Colby summoned Cardinal Christophe Pierre — Pope Leo XIV’s then-ambassador to the United States — and delivered a lecture.
westerners really love their lectures
America, Colby and his colleagues told the cardinal, has the military power to do whatever it wants in the world. The Catholic Church had better take its side. As tempers rose, one U.S. official reached for a fourteenth-century weapon and invoked the Avignon Papacy, the period when the French Crown used military force to bend the bishop of Rome to its will. That scene, broken this week by Mattia Ferraresi in an extraordinary piece of journalism for The Free Press, may be the most remarkable moment in the long and knotted history of the American republic’s relationship with the Catholic Church. In the speech that enraged Pete Hegseth and top Pentagon officials, Pope Leo XIV said: “A diplomacy that promotes dialogue and seeks consensus among all parties is being replaced by a diplomacy based on force.” “War is back in vogue, and a zeal for war is spreading. “The principle established after the Second World War, which prohibited nations from using force to violate the borders of others, has been completely undermined.”
Pete Hegseth’s pastor and mentor says the United States should ban public Masses, Marian processions, and Corpus Christi devotions. Hegseth invited the anti-Catholic preacher to lead a prayer service at the Pentagon on February 14. For the first time in modern history, the Pentagon offered no Good Friday services for Catholics this year. While Catholics don’t celebrate Mass on Good Friday, they do venerate the cross of Jesus Christ and receive the Eucharist. Earlier this year, Pete Hegseth invited his pastor to speak at the Pentagon. That pastor has called for banning public expressions of Catholicism in the United States.
UPDATE: Letters from Leo can now independently confirm that the meeting took place — and that the Vatican was so alarmed by the Pentagon’s tactics that Pope Leo XIV shelved plans to visit the United States later this year. Many in the Vatican saw the Pentagon’s reference to an Avignon papacy as a threat to use military force against the Holy See.
An informed source told Tasnim News that Iran will withdraw from the ceasefire if Tel Aviv continues attacking Lebanon:
At this point it seems the entity is actively seeking to get bombed.
I know their strategy is to have the US destroy Iran, but surely they must be aware that they will get pounded increasingly hard by Iran since they are smaller and smaller interceptor inventories.
When does this become a suicidal strategy?
https://xcancel.com/PauloMacro/status/2041959446696382488
There’s a 310MW fire at Abqaiq right now - nbd (and before you say gas flares, those run 10-20MW)
What’s there?
oh nothing, just Saudi Aramco’s largest oil processing and crude stabilization facility with nameplate processing capacity of 7mmbpd … you know… the largest single crude processing center in the world.
This is the same thing the Houthies hit in 2019, which made oil spike ~20%. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abqaiq–Khurais_attack
This was probably the worst day of the war for us Lebanese. The scenes in Beirut today are just brutal, and it’s even worse in Sour and the rest of the abandoned South. Our government is nothing more than a Zionist tool against the Shia of Lebanon, and I can’t help but feeling backstabbed by the shortsightedness and naivety of Iranian negotiators. What is the value of a ceasefire that doesn’t lift the burden of the most vulnerable and wartorn part of the Axis of Resistance? God help us
Traders place large $950 million bet on oil price falling hours ahead of ceasefire
it’s all insider trading, isn’t it?
Interesting: Canadian media reporting on the attacks in Lebanon take a different tone than what we’re used to. No passive voice, mainly focusing on innocent civilians being injured, and discusses how the pager attacks were largely useless against targetting Hezbollah and mainly hurt civilians
Could this be a shift from western support of Israel to the government’s recognizing that Israel is beginning to threaten the stability of the western system?
⭕️ White House Claims Iran’s 10-Point Plan Was “Thrown in the Garbage” — Lebanon Not Part of Deal
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed Wednesday that Iran’s original 10-point proposal was “fundamentally unserious, unacceptable and completely discarded” – and was “literally thrown in the garbage by President Trump and his negotiating team.”
Leavitt claimed that as the deadline neared, Tehran submitted a separate, condensed 10-point proposal that Washington evaluated as a more reasonable and entirely different plan, and that it is this version – not the original plan Iran published and Iranian state media circulated – that serves as the basis for the ceasefire.
Leavitt also stated that “Lebanon is not part of the ceasefire,” adding that the position “has been relayed to all parties involved.” Trump separately told PBS that Israel’s continued strikes on Hezbollah were “part of the deal – everyone knows that. That’s a separate skirmish.”
The claims directly contradict Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who brokered the truce and declared an “immediate ceasefire everywhere including Lebanon and elsewhere, EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY.”
Trump threatens 50% tariffs on countries supplying Iran with weapons - Al Jazeera update
Trump says imports from countries supplying Iran with military weapons will face immediate 50 percent tariffs with no exemptions, threatening the new duties just hours after agreeing to a two-week ceasefire with Tehran.
“A Country supplying Military Weapons to Iran will be immediately tariffed, on any and all goods sold to the United States of America, 50%, effective immediately, There will be no exclusions or exemptions! President DJT,” Trump wrote on social media, without naming any countries. China and Russia have helped Iran build military capacity to counter US and Israeli pressure, supplying missiles, air defence systems and dual-use technologies intended to bolster deterrence.
Both Beijing and Moscow have denied supplying any weapons recently, although allegations against Russia have persisted.
Iran said they targeted the Saudi East-West (Yanbu) pipeline that bypasses Hormuz. There is a big fire, the speculation is that they hit the main pumping station. Even if a less important part of the pipeline was hit (or even just oil storage next to the pipeline), you would expect this to be major news everywhere, that pipeline is the only real big bypass of Hormuz and it is working at 100% capacity right now. Instead, there is almost nothing. The censorship regime during this war is crazy.
Saudi Arabia’s oil pipeline to the Red Sea was hit by a drone attack on Wednesday afternoon, according to a person familiar with the matter. The damage is still being assessed, the person said. Saudi Aramco declined to comment. The East-West pipeline has served as a vital lifeline to getting Saudi oil to global markets after the Strait of Hormuz was effectively closed by the conflict in the Middle East.
[edit] Ummm, let me be clear, Iran targeted the location hours before the ceasefire, in anticipation of major US/Israel strikes on their energy grid.
Interesting gcc related thread from xitter by:
Iyad El-Baghdadi is a Palestinian writer, activist and entrepreneur, and founder/president of the Kawaakibi Foundation and its website The Arab
Works in the oil markets via Oslo, Norway His book
Overall assessment of the war
- Conflict is on an escalation/attrition path with no realistic short‑term off‑ramp.
- Iran sees the situation as existential and therefore cannot de‑escalate without serious guarantees; it still has not used the full spectrum of its capabilities (e.g. regular army/shadow navy, maximum Houthi disruption, sustained strikes on Gulf civilian targets).
- Israel will not stop on its own; the US political/military leadership is structurally and personally incapable of absorbing the “L” and stepping back.
- Likely timeline: this war phase runs at least to end of the year, potentially longer, with conditions changing non‑linearly (step‑changes/phase shifts) rather than gradually.
Understanding attrition
- Attrition is not “week 1 scaled up”; it has thresholds.
- Think of a wrecking ball hitting a building
- First hit: a lot of dust and broken windows, but the building still stands.
- Second hit: still standing, more visible damage; people think “okay, just more of the same.”
- Third hit: the load‑bearing structure finally gives way and the entire building collapses into rubble, and at that point you cannot go back.
- The war is now moving from the “first/second hit” phase toward these structural thresholds in energy markets, air defense capacity, and social psychology.
Threshold 1: Energy markets and prices
- Physical supply from the Gulf is shrinking faster than financial markets have priced in; current prices still reflect “normality + risk premium,” not a structural supply shock.
- Expectation: in ~weeks 6–10 of the war, oil and jet fuel prices are likely to spike sharply (working assumption: prices roughly doubling)
- Key point: you cannot “print molecules”; financial engineering cannot solve a physical shortage of energy.
Early signals already visible:
- EU discussing or beginning rationing measures.
- Egypt introducing curfews to cut energy use.
- Thailand/Philippines and others starting “energy emergency” narratives and micro‑measures (e.g. turning off elevators, pushing stair use, night-time restrictions).
Consequences of a real spike:
- Flight cancellations and route reductions; even if you have a ticket, flights may not operate because every leg loses money.
- Supply chains seize: higher transport costs push up food and basic goods; for some routes, it’s not just “expensive” but literally “not available.”
- Countries highly dependent on imported energy and imported food are exposed: they have money, but may not be able to physically buy what isn’t there or can’t be shipped safely
Threshold 2: Interceptor (air defense) depletion
- Iranian drones and missiles are cheap to produce and can be sent in high volumes; interceptors are expensive, slow to manufacture, and produced in small numbers.
- The US, “the biggest economy in the world”, can only produce on the order of tens (not hundreds) of certain interceptors per month.
- Every wave of Iranian/Houthi projectiles drains the finite global interceptor stockpile; it takes months (or longer) to rebuild.
Early sign:
- Signs UAE & Israel already rationing interceptors: Only intercepting what they consider “priority” threats (e.g. specific ballistic missiles, key infrastructure).
- Letting other projectiles go through or accepting some level of damage.
As stocks fall further:
- States will face “Sophie’s choice” defense decisions: protect the main airport or the refinery; the tourist attraction or the presidential palace.
- Once enough high‑impact strikes get through, the political and economic psychology in these countries may break sharply (see Threshold 3).
Threshold 3: Social and political psychology
- Based on personal contacts, regular people in the Gulf, especially the UAE, are in a mix of deep anxiety and denial:
- Many hope the war will “cool down” and that daily life and jobs will continue more or less as normal.
- Some are frozen, delaying decisions because they see no obvious safe alternative.
- This is partly rooted in a linear mindset: people expect week 10 to look like week 5 “but a bit worse,” not a fundamentally different world.
If (God forbid, may it never happen) a major mass‑casualty or high‑symbolic event occurs, or once shortages become concrete (food, fuel, flights), denial can flip to panic quickly:
- Capital controls (limits on moving money out) to stop capital flight.
- Exit visa regimes or de facto travel restrictions, making it impossible or very hard to leave even if you can pay.
- Racialized scapegoating or social breakdown as people compete over scarce resources.
Structural vulnerability:
- Gulf states import almost all their food; they have almost no agricultural resilience.
- They have systematically undermined potential regional partners (e.g. by helping destroy/cripple Sudan, Egypt, Syria, Libya, Yemen after the Arab Spring), leaving themselves with fewer capable neighbors to rely on.
- If Iran asserts de facto control over the Strait of Hormuz (alone or with Oman), Gulf monarchies become strategically hostage to Iran’s terms
Iran’s escalation ladder
- Iran has so far shown intentional control over escalation:
- Houthis/Yemen not fully unleashed (they have not yet tried to fully close the Red Sea).
- No systematic targeting of Gulf civilian targets on the scale they could potentially wage.
- Iranian regular army and shadow navy have not entered the war as full actors.
- Tehran calibrates its moves to match and slightly exceed US/Israeli escalation, not to blow everything up at once.
Likely end‑state Iran is working toward:
- De facto or formal control/co‑control over key maritime chokepoints (e.g. Strait of Hormuz).
- This becomes the simplest mechanism for “reparations”: long‑term control over tolls, flows, and leverage on Gulf exports without needing formal Western concessions.
US/Trump camp misreads:
- They underestimate Iranian naval capability because it doesn’t resemble US blue‑water doctrine.
- They assume one or two massive blows will “teach Iran a lesson” and force retreat
- In reality, Iran is structurally incentivized to keep pushing as long as its regime survives and as long as US/Israel continue
Country‑specific notes
UAE
- Most exposed Gulf state: highly globalised, heavily imported food/energy, tiny citizen base, large expatriate population.
- Talk in Abu Dhabi/Dubai circles about “joining” the war is strategically absurd; the UAE lacks the independent military capacity and would invite harsher retaliation.
If the UAE faces sustained hits, you get:
- Economic implosion, job losses, deflationary spiral (people leave → demand collapses → more layoffs → more departures).
- Potential social fragmentation and ugly racialization.
Qatar
- Better positioned than UAE (less aggressive posture, different alliances), but still structurally dependent on energy exports and imports for food.
Pakistan
- Already feeling the shock: recent ~120% jump in electricity prices; government discussing “smart lockdown”‑style measures to cut consumption.
- Political economy: Formal economy is small; a huge undocumented economy (smuggling from Iran/Afghanistan/Central Asia) underpins real life.
- Government can’t/won’t tax elites/real estate, so it leans heavily on fuel levies to show revenue to IMF, pushing pain onto ordinary people.
At the same time:
- Pakistan is agricultural and has large territory/population; nobody wants to destabilise it in this context.
- It’s emerging as a useful diplomatic actor (alongside Oman) in any potential de‑escalation path.
- Iran is already allowing Pakistani tankers and legal imports of Iranian goods, giving Pakistan some energy back door
Implications for friends & family in the region
- Those in Gulf states, especially UAE, face a narrowing window:
- As long as energy and flights “more or less work,” people can still move money, relocate, or at least plan.
- Once thresholds are crossed (energy spike, visible air‑defense failures, real panic), options collapse quickly - flights disappear, borders harden, capital controls appear.
Recommended bias is to over‑prepare rather than under‑react: better to be “alarmist but early” than trapped in denial when the phase shift comes.
