🌐 Bomb Oman?

Thanks to everyone who voted yesterday. I genuinely didn’t expect this result. I thought “Coordinated off-ramp” would get dismissed as “fringe tinfoil” stuff. Instead, 27% of you chose it.

And that’s a pretty good segue into our first story, because there’s an argument that Trump’s apparent tilt toward North Korea, at South Korea’s expense, could be shooting himself in the foot:

North Korea supplies Russia → Russia supplies Iran → Iran is at war with the US → ?

This chain is where we’re starting today. 👇

Russia is shipping explosives, ammunition, and drone components to Iran across the Caspian Sea, helping Iran rebuild weapons stocks depleted in its war with the US and Israel.

• Why is this route important? Because US forces can’t patrol the landlocked Caspian.

• But Ukraine can reach it. Ukraine struck vessels carrying Iran-linked military cargo in the Caspian in July, while Iran said a separate Ukrainian attack killed one sailor.

• Context. Iran reportedly lost roughly 60% of its drone arsenal earlier in the fighting, while Russia has spent years improving Iranian-designed Shahed drones. Now, Russia’s sharing advances back with Iran.

President Trump is now threatening to bomb Oman. He warned:

“If Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the shit out of them.”

It should be noted that Oman is a close US security partner with deep defense ties. It’s also one of the US’s main intermediaries with Iran.

But what I am not hearing people talk about is the fact that Trump’s threat isn’t exactly new. His administration has been warning Oman for months.

Oman is stuck directly in the middle of this war.

• It shares the Strait of Hormuz with Iran.

• It has long mediated between the US and Iran.

• It is currently negotiating with Iran over restoring commercial shipping through a waterway that carried ~20% of global oil and LNG supplies before the war.

However, Oman’s recent proposal includes a Gulf-backed plan that would allow “voluntary shipping fees.”

Yes. “Voluntary.”

This idea likely didn’t sit too well with the US. Given that the Trump administration had repeatedly warned Oman not to facilitate Iran’s push for tolls, Trump’s latest threat isn’t exactly coming out of nowhere.

The timing of his threat is also interesting because the 60-day US-Iran MOU technically expired on Monday.

Quick rundown:

• The MOU was signed in June.

• It called for an end to fighting, the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.

• It gave both sides 60 days to negotiate a a broader final deal, including Iran’s nuclear program.

• But it was more-or-less scrapped in July when Trump declared it “over” and Iran declared it “suspended” a week later, as the two broke ceasefire.

And Trump now says he won’t extend it.

President Trump says North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has responded to his outreach, but didn’t reveal what Kim told him.

He said on Monday, “I understand him. He understands me.”

• Yesterday, we covered Trump’s order to substantially cut US-South Korea military drills while touting his “very good relationship” with Kim.

• Some believe a reunion is plausible. However, Kim’s position has changed dramatically. North Korea has expanded its nuclear arsenal and grown much closer to Russia since their last summit.

US envoy Jared Kushner warned Hamas that if it fails to follow through on promised disarmament, Israel could gain stronger US backing to “finish the job.”

Kushner said Hamas told him “all the right things” in Cairo, but the US now wants action, including weapons removal and tunnel closures.

Current situation:

• Israel, meanwhile, refuses further withdrawal or Gaza reconstruction until Hamas is fully disarmed.

• However, Hamas wants disarmament and Israeli withdrawal to happen in parallel.