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As I write this on the evening of March 31, the war in Iran, indeed the entire Middle East, enters its second month. Human suffering and the law of unintended consequences of war and conflict ripple throughout the region and across the globe.
The irony should not be lost in how the closure of a narrow strait in the Persian Gulf can test the resilience of an economy whose lifeblood is oil and natural gas. The region that accounts for one-fifth of global oil supply is on fire. A fire fed by oil. Tankers full of the stuff.
We’ve Won, But Not Enough
President Trump says, “We don’t need the Strait.” But he is mistaken. Gas prices are sharply up, and the stock market is sharply down. Kevin Hassett speaks of consumer pain. Industries from airlines to agriculture are absorbing an unexpected shock, and the administration lifts sanctions on Russian and, wait for it, Iranian oil. In a twist of logic, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent claims that releasing a purported $14 billion in sanctioned Iranian oil is playing “Jiu-Jitsu” with them. Do tell.
Trump’s actions and shifting all-caps narrative feel like quicksand. We are winning (indeed, won “in the first hour”), but we haven’t “won enough yet.” We need help, but we don’t. Negotiations are “going very well,” but if the Iranians don’t come around in 2 days, then 5 days, then 10 days, he’ll commit war crimes on Iran’s civilian population. You can only use the word “obliterate” so many times before it becomes meaningless.
It suggests Trump is aware of his folly and suddenly realizes that being “high on his supply” after capturing Maduro in Venezuela and commandeering its oil doesn’t translate into conflict in the Middle East and Iran, which had prepared for this battle for decades. Of course, suggesting self-awareness in Donald Trump is a bridge too far. I beg your pardon for such foolishness.
We have spent most of the past decade absorbing shocks to global security, supply chains, human health (both mental and physical), and a stable climate. Shocks to our sanity in an increasingly insane, unsafe, and chaotic world.
There’s No Strait of Hormuz Blocking the Sun or the Wind
I will leave to pundits the full ramifications of the U.S. and Israeli attack on Iran. I’m not naive enough to think that if we had begun transitioning away from fossil fuels decades ago, there would be no more wars. Of course, there would still be conflict, war, death, and suffering at scale. It seems to be the human condition.
But perhaps there wouldn’t be wars for oil, wars where poor planning, incompetence, and arrogance lead to crippling a global economy utterly dependent on the stuff for everything.
It doesn’t have to be this way, no matter how embedded we have become in a worldview that works less and less for the well-being of all its creatures, human and non-human.
We have broken it, now we own it. It’s best we get around to fixing it instead of blowing things up, literally and figuratively.
