Iran has announced free passage for all vessels other than Israel and the US, which amounts to unconditional surrender with bluster to pretend it is not unconditional surrender.
For this means Iran has agreed to endure any punishment that the US dishes out, and not do anything effective to hurt the US back.
Details of what is needed for the US to stop punishing to be furtively filled in later. Unconditional surrender on the installment plan.
I thought that Trump lacked information about Iranian will, and so was just shooting in the dark. But he would not be a great deal maker if he could not sniff out his opponent. I badly underestimated him. His deal making ability remains as great as when he was young.
The leadership class of Iran is cynical and corrupt. They do not really take their state religion all that seriously. So when Trump demonstrated will and ability to take out the top line leadership, the second line leadership chickened out. Which I should have predicted, and Trump actually did predict.
If they had not chickened out, then things would have been really bad for Trump, for Maga, and for America. Trump and Maga promised no wars. OK, we lost six men, one very expensive radar station, and spent a whole lot of missiles, but six men plus quick victory is close enough to no wars to pass.
Allegedly, Iran was attempting mine the straits, which would have blocked passage to all ships, including their own, but every ship and every port facility involved in the mining operation was allegedly instantly destroyed and every person involved in the operation was allegedly instantly killed. Which would not necessarily have prevented them from blocking the straits but foreshadowed the blocking operation being difficult, expensive, dangerous, and uncertain.
Im not sure its true yet but if true yes he won.
I predicted that they would not have any chance of successfully mining the straits BTW mining requires your minelayers being undetected and this isn’t WW2 clearly they could see any strange boats entering the straits and then boom…
That announcement is dated March 6, 2026.
I have read of attacks after that date, e.g. Thailand-flagged ship Mayuree Naree on March 11, 2026.
You can lookup other sources (Jim’s link seems to have changed from when he 1st posted it) it was announced again today. Tankers in that region never have US or Israeli flags (apparently most common flags are Panama, Marshall Islands and Liberia) and virtually never go directly to the US anyway (almost always Asia or Europe, sometimes India).
There will be a time lag for the details and insurance situation to get sorted out if this is true but IF it is true the war is effectively over.