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The US has declared ‘space superiority’ over Iran. What does that mean?

Iran’s nascent space program was destroyed. It’s still using other nations’ space intel.

April 2, 2026, Thomas Novelly, https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2026/04/us-has-declared-space-superiority-over-iran-what-does-mean/412605/?oref=defense_one_breaking_nl&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Defense%20One%20Breaking%20News:%20April%202%2C%202026:%20%26quot%3BNew%20from…%26quot%3B&utm_content=Final&utm_term=newsletter_d1_alert

The U.S. military declared space superiority over Iran this week, but defense experts question what that means given the country’s inchoate military space program and heavy reliance on space-based intelligence from other nations.

Adm. Brad Cooper, the head of U.S. Central Command, said Tuesday that the U.S. had established control of the space domain during Operation Epic Fury. It was nearly a month after CENTCOM had announced “Iran’s equivalent of Space Command” was destroyed, which harmed the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ ability to coordinate retaliatory strikes.

“Our Space Force has given us the ultimate high ground, delivering space superiority, which has been a critical enabler to this fight,” Cooper said in a Tuesday video.


It’s not clear if the country is still actively jamming or spoofing U.S. assets, and it’s highly unlikely that the U.S. Space Force has physically destroyed the country’s handful of satellites. Navy Capt. Tim Hawkins, a CENTCOM spokesperson, said he could not discuss details about space operations “due to classification.” Given Iran’s rudimentary space capabilities, defense experts question what has changed to prompt the military to declare space superiority.

“It isn’t stopping them from using space assets,” Victoria Samson, the Secure World Foundation’s chief director of space security and stability, said of the U.S. declaring space superiority.  “There’s just a lot of question marks … In regards to how they use space as a national security enabler, I don’t know that they’ve really stopped it, because they weren’t using it other than for imagery analysis.” 

Iran is reportedly relying on China and Russia’s intelligence and commercial space-based imagery to target U.S. assets throughout the region. A U.S. official told Defense One that Iran’s use of another country’s space-based data doesn’t mean the service lacks control of the space domain.

“Just because the Iranians are receiving space-based intelligence doesn’t negate that we have space superiority,” the official said.

Since 2005, the country has launched a total of 26 satellites, only 13 of which were still operational, according to the American Enterprise Institute’s space data navigator tool. Three of those are registered to the IRGC. The U.S., by comparison, has upwards of 500 operational military and intelligence satellites. 

Gen. Chance Saltzman, the Space Force’s top uniformed officer, acknowledged “it wasn’t really a fair fight,” but said destroying Iran’s space capabilities gave the military an upper hand in communications and air operations within CENTCOM. 

“You have space superiority if you can use space the way you want, and the adversary cannot use space the way they want, and I think those are the conditions that we’ve met in this particular instance,” Saltzman said during a Mitchell Institute event Wednesday.

The term “space superiority” was first publicized in a 1980s Air Force manual. A 2004 service document likened the idea to air superiority and said the two are “crucial first steps in any military operation.” Last year, the Space Force published a warfighting doctrine that said the service’s “formative purpose” is to achieve space superiority.  

“Space superiority is the degree of control that allows forces to operate at a time and place of their choosing without prohibitive interference from space or counterspace threats, while also denying the same to an adversary,” the Space Force’s doctrine reads.

Some defense experts see the recent declaration of space superiority as a way for the service to highlight its warfighting rebrand in recent years. 

“It’s a weird thing to say. I think it’s more a matter of floating the ‘Space Force as a warfighting’ thing,” Samson said.

Kari Bingen, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and director of the Aerospace Security Project, said it’s not surprising to see the Space Force becoming more integrated into operations, given adversaries’ desire to target command, control, communications, and intelligence capabilities.

“Between Venezuela and Operation Epic Fury, these have been opportunities for the Space Force to better integrate space effects into a joint military campaign,” Bingen said. “We’ve long treated space as this special and different capability set. The physics are different, but to make it truly useful to the joint force, it needs to be fully integrated into planning and operations.” 

Saltzman said guardians had been forward deployed to support Operation Epic Fury and continue to launch space effects in combat zones “despite being under attack from an adversary.” He also said some guardians are supporting the operation stateside out of Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina and CENTCOM headquarters in Florida.

“I won’t go into a lot of the operational details, as you might imagine, but you don’t have to think too hard to understand what it is the Guardians are bringing to the fight,” Saltzman said. “All of the missions that we always do—missile warning, satellite communications. The links are vital. Over-the-horizon communications is as important now as it ever has been. We create disruption for an adversary.”

April 7, 2026 Posted by | Iran, space travel, USA | Leave a comment

‘This Arrogant Enemy’: Israel’s Colonial Reversion to the Noose

 April 1, 2026 SCHEERPOST,  Zarefah Baroud for Thinking Palestine

“Israel is also confronted by something older than Israel itself: namely, the willingness and ability of the Palestinian people to mobilize and resist in the face of state-sanctioned death.”

The authorities cuffed the nationalist detainees, leading them to their death at the gallows, scaffolding and rope that had borne witness to the final moments of dozens of nationalists like them. As they approached the noose with grace and a sacred conviction, they declared their final tribute to the beloved homeland: “Filasteen ‘Arabiyya!” (“Palestine is Arab”), and issued a final, unflinching indictment of her oppressors.

The families and communities of the martyrs gather outside Sijn Akka, dressed in white and adorned with henna as if they were attending a wedding, receiving the martyr’s body among eruptions of ululations and celebratory songs.

This is not a romantic tale, but rather the tradition adopted by Palestinians throughout the British Mandate for Palestine, a colonial regime that saw to the systematic annihilation of an entire generation of Palestinian nationalists.

The Spectacle of the Noose

While this scene played out on many occasions throughout the British Mandate for Palestine, it could conceivably happen tomorrow, if proposals put forward by Itamar Ben Gvir, Israel’s Minister of National Security, are approved by the Israeli Knesset. If this comes to pass, the “death penalty bill” — an amendment to the current Israeli penal code – will result in the execution of those who have allegedly killed Israelis for nationalist purposes (or, more reductively and disingenuously, for “anti-Semitic” reasons).

Further, recent reports have confirmed that the Knesset’s proposed legislation draft will no longer perform the death penalty via lethal injection but rather transform the execution of Palestinian detainees into a colonial spectacle. In other words, the original mode of colonial execution would be restored as the chosen method of capital punishment par excellence.

If approved, hanging will once more become a colonial spectacle, which is enacted, in the sterile and removed wording of the National Security Committee, with the aim of “cut[ting] off terrorism at its root and creat[ing] a heavy deterrent.”

It is critical that, as we discuss this pending policy, which Abdel Nasser Farawna characterizes as improbable (though not impossible), we recognize that the extrajudicial execution of prisoners has always been Israel Prison Service (IPS) policy.

Ben-Gvir has put forward his proposal at a time (the period since October 7, 2023) when the Israeli authorities have murdered detainees at an unprecedented rate. In April 2023, the Palestinian Commission for Detainees and Ex-Detainees estimated 236 Palestinians had been killed in Israeli custody after 1967, a period of 56 years. In the post-October 7 period, in contrast, almost one hundred Palestinians have died in custody, a killing rate around 10 times the historical average.

A November 2025 report produced by Physicians for Human Rights Israel suggests that this may actually be a substantial under-estimate, by virtue of the (at least) 14,000 Gazans who are still missing, presumed to be dead or abducted at the time of writing…………………………………………………………………. https://scheerpost.com/2026/04/01/this-arrogant-enemy-israels-colonial-reversion-to-the-noose/

April 7, 2026 Posted by | Atrocities, Israel | Leave a comment

NuScale’s ENTRA1 “Veterans” Had Zero Nuclear Projects — Investors Lost 70%: Levi & Korsinsky, LLP

Promise vs. Reality: The NuScale Power ENTRA1 Partnership Performance Gap

March 30, 2026 Source: Levi & Korsinsky, LLP

NEW YORK, March 30, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — “Companies that make specific promises to investors about future performance have an obligation to disclose known risks to those projections. The contrast between what NuScale told the market about ENTRA1 and what analysts independently confirmed raises substantial questions about the accuracy of those representations,” stated Joseph E. Levi, Esq., managing partner of Levi & Korsinsky, LLP.

A securities class action has been filed on behalf of purchasers of NuScale Power Corporation (NYSE: SMR) stock between May 13, 2025 and November 6, 2025. …..

NuScale shares fell from a Class Period high above $57 to just $17, a decline exceeding 70%, after the gap between defendants’ representations and reality came to light. The lead plaintiff deadline is April 20, 2026.

The Promise

Throughout the Class Period, the Company portrayed ENTRA1 Energy LLC as a formidable commercialization engine for its small modular reactor technology. Official press materials and SEC filings described ENTRA1 as:

  • An “independent global energy production platform”
  • A “one-stop-shop” and “single hub” for financing, development, execution, and management of nuclear power plants
  • An entity “led by an executive team of energy, infrastructure, and finance sector veterans”
  • A partner with “experience in delivering large-scale power infrastructure”
  • A “developer” of power plants that would “own and operate” energy facilities
  • An entity whose experience was “exactly what is required” to commercialize NuScale’s reactors

The Reality

After NuScale disclosed a $495 million payment to ENTRA1 and analysts pressed for details on the November 6, 2025 earnings call, a starkly different picture emerged, the lawsuit contends:

  • ENTRA1 had never built, financed, or operated any significant project during its entire operating history
  • Independent analyst research identified just 3 employees and 1 investor at ENTRA1
  • The “experience” defendants referenced belonged to principals of a separate entity, not ENTRA1 itself
  • ENTRA1 would not actually build power plants but instead “coordinate projects” and “bring in partners”
  • Guggenheim Securities described ENTRA1 as “a 3-year old company that has never built, financed or operated anything”
  • ENTRA1 appeared to be organized primarily to support a single individual

The Numbers: Promised vs. Actual

What Was Promised | What Was Revealed

  • “Independent global energy production platform” | Entity with 3 employees, no completed projects
  • “Experience in delivering large-scale power infrastructure” | Experience belonged to principals of a different entity
  • ENTRA1 “develops, finances, owns and operates” plants | ENTRA1 would “coordinate projects” and “bring in partners”

  • A “differentiator” justifying exclusive global rights | Analysts found “no information regarding the company’s history, management team, size or capitalization”
  • $35M-$55M per NPM contribution payments to a proven partner | $495 million paid to an untested entity, with potential obligations exceeding $3 billion

What the Lawsuit Alleges About the Gap

The action asserts that defendants knew or recklessly disregarded that their representations about ENTRA1 were materially false and misleading. By attributing the experience of a separate entity’s principals to ENTRA1 itself, and by describing ENTRA1 as a developer and operator when it lacked any track record, defendants allegedly created an artificial perception of commercialization readiness that inflated NuScale’s stock price……………………………………………………………….. https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2026/03/30/3264986/0/en/NuScale-s-ENTRA1-Veterans-Had-Zero-Nuclear-Projects-Investors-Lost-70-Levi-Korsinsky-LLP.html

April 7, 2026 Posted by | Legal, USA | Leave a comment

What Happens When a Nuclear Site Is Hit?

2 April 26, https://www.wired.com/story/heres-what-can-happen-when-the-us-bombs-irans-nuclear-sites/

As US and Israeli strikes continue on Iran’s nuclear facilities, the real danger isn’t the explosion, but what happens if critical safety systems fail—and how that risk could spread across the Gulf.

Into the second month of the US-Iran war, the conflict in the Gulf continues to escalate—airstrikes widening, oil markets reacting, and pressure mounting around the Strait of Hormuz. But beyond the immediate security and economic concerns, another question is quietly taking shape: What actually happens if a nuclear site is hit?

That is the problem with Nuclear Power. It’s a target. There are no do overs if it goes wrong. The IAEA spends a lot of time trying to mitigate atomic problems but they can’t stop those who want to do bad things. When I think about how Chernobyl was handled by the Russians, I think would our government do what they did?
Deny and hide the truth from the public? I’m not sure I’m not willing to place a bet on nuclear but I know many are.

April 7, 2026 Posted by | weapons and war | Leave a comment

Back to Pentagon on Good Friday

Friday, April 03, 2026,  Bruce K. Gagnon, https://space4peace.blogspot.com/2026/04/back-to-pentagon-on-good-friday.html

Sixteen activists got up early this morning and took the subway to the Pentagon where we held a 90 minute vigil as military and civilian employees walked, drove, biked and rode buses by our Good Friday peace vigil.

Yesterday Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth fired Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George, removing the Army’s top officer in the latest shake-up of military leadership amid the war in Iran. This was most likely done because Gen. George dared to question the US Iran war strategy on some level. George is the 24th general or admiral Hegseth has removed indicating that all is not well inside the ‘war department’.

I made a point this morning of asking any Army personnel who passed me by why their ‘boss had been fired’. One officer stopped and said to me, “I don’t why why he was fired. I only met him once and he was a good man”.

During our time on the street, now kept at a distance from the Pentagon in comparison to where we were arrested last Friday when 27 of us got deep into the bowels of the war-making institution, we got lots of ‘good mornings’, kind nods, and some words of encouragement as folks passed us by. Even a four-star general gave me a nice nod.

My sense is that there is much quiet unsettlement inside the Trump war machine these days. It felt good to be outside offering support to those on the inside who might have a good heart and good sense of which there must be many amongst the 30,000 who work at the Pentagon.

In related news Stars & Stripes military publication is reporting this morning that “A search and rescue effort was underway on Friday afternoon to locate two crew members of a U.S. fighter jet [F-15] that was shot down in Iran”. 

NBC News: Two U.S. military helicopters participating in search and rescue operations were hit by Iranian fire but appear to have made it back to base. We also learned that a Pentagon A-10 Warthog plane “crashed” today in the Persian Gulf region — according to The New York Times. The plane was likely hit by Iranian air defenses, but US is concealing it to save face with saying it “crashed” — crashed how? 

Trump has just requested $1.5 trillion from Congress for ‘defense’ in the 2027 fiscal year – the largest sum in the country’s recent history. Trump explains the sharp increase in spending by the ongoing war with Iran and the need to replenish depleted weapons stocks.

Trump and Hegseth are burning taxpayer dollars like they are nothing.

April 7, 2026 Posted by | opposition to nuclear | Leave a comment

US scientists are escaping to Norway because of Trump’s anti-climate agenda, minister says.

.At least 23 research scientists have left the US for
Norway in the wake of Trump returning to office, including to six
pioneering climate programmes. In the first year of Trump’s second term,
the US government cut thousands of jobs at federal science agencies,
slashed grant money for universities and effectively ended
government-backed research into the climate crisis, notably with the
announcement last December that the Colorado-based National Center for
Atmospheric Research would close.

More than 10,000 doctorate-level experts
in science and other fields have now left federal government employment,
according to one analysis, leading to fears of a scientific brain drain
from the US. Research minister Sigrun Gjerløw Aasland told The Independent
that several American scientists had joined research institutes in her
country over the past year, many of which are prioritising pioneering
climate research in the Arctic.

Last summer, the centre-left Norwegian
government announced a 100m kroner (£7.8m) programme to attract
international researchers. So far, 27 scientists have come to Norway under
the programme, including 23 from the US.

 Independent 1st April 2026, https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/trump-climate-arctic-norway-scientists-b2938958.html

April 7, 2026 Posted by | climate change, USA | Leave a comment

A ‘small’ nuclear war would still be global catastrophe

There is no such thing as a small nuclear war. Even a limited exchange of tactical weapons could kill 90 million people – far more than died in WWII – in the first few hours,

April 2, 2026, Julian Cribb, https://johnmenadue.com/post/2026/04/a-small-nuclear-war-would-still-be-global-catastrophe/

There is no such thing as a “small” nuclear war. Even limited use would trigger mass death, famine and global collapse.

As West Asia stumbles towards a ‘small nuclear war’, it is time to evaluate the consequences for the entirety of humanity and the Planet.

A small nuclear war, by definition, is one involving the use of so-called tactical or battlefield nukes, low yield weapons (1000-50,000 tonnes of TNT equivalent) designed chiefly for a military objective, delivered as aerial bombs, shells, small missiles, torpedoes, mines etc. It does not involve the use of ICBMs, MIRVs, “city busters” and large-scale strategic weapons.

For comparison, the weapons that levelled Hiroshima and Nagasaki had yields of 15,000 and 21,000 tonnes respectively, which today would probably rate them as tactical weapons.

However, with practically all of the world’s nuclear treaties and restraints crumbling, it is now almost inevitable that one regime or another will experiment with the smaller nukes and seek to regularise their use, primarily as a means of terrorising their opponents. Only 74 of 197 nations have signed the Treaty to Prohibit Nuclear Weapons. None of the nuclear-armed states or their close allies have signed.

Informed commentators on the Israel-USA-Iran conflict consider the use of nukes, probably by Israel in the first instance, to be increasingly likely as the war goes against them and both Trump and Netanyahu fight to stay out of jail. Israeli Ministers have previously uttered threats to employ nuclear force, though they were later silenced by Netanyahu.

US official documents indicate the America has been preparing for a limited nuclear war for over seven years. Trump has refused to rule out use of nukes, and military observers suspect the US already has them in the West Asian theatre. He has also declared his intent to restart nuclear testing. Authoritative commentators are asking whether Trump is mentally ill – and the world’s most potent nuclear arsenal in the hands of a madman.

Compounding the danger is the frequent use of nuclear threats by Russian leader Vladimir Putin along with Russia’s recent warning that the West Asia conflict could go nuclear.

Observers also consider that the Israeli nuclear threat and its assassination of the chief Iranian opponent to nuclear weapons, Ayatollah Khamenei, makes it far more likely that the new Iranian regime will accelerate plans to build atomic bombs, in the hope of deterring an attack. So one outcome of the war will be a nuclear-armed Iran – the opposite of its professed intention. This will, in turn, spark new regional arms races, with at least seven countries, and probably more, seeking to acquire the civilisation-ending weaponry.

Thus, whether or not the Israel-USA-Iran conflict goes nuclear, it may still prove to be the pebble that starts the landslide to global nuclear holocaust.

A ‘small’ war

There is no such thing as a small nuclear war. Even a limited exchange of tactical weapons could kill 90 million people – far more than died in WWII – in the first few hours, according to modelling by Princeton University. The study refers to the European context, but its message has far wider application.

In the context of dozens of nuclear armed nations – many controlled by men of questionable sanity – the doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction, which has kept the nuclear peace for 80 years, lapses into irrelevance. Little now prevents nations from committing suicide in their crazed desire to eliminate those they deem as foes.

Furthermore, any ‘small nuclear war’ can rapidly escalate into a far larger, global affair quite quickly and unpredictably. Unable to penetrate or understand their opponent’s motives, nations may choose to strike first and hardest, regardless of the ultimate cost to their own citizens. Indeed, this already appears a significant factor in the escalation of the West Asia conflict.

A current threat analysis made during the conflict finds that the threat of nuclear war to be higher than most periods of the Cold War, but not quite as high as its 1962 Cuban crisis and 1983 ‘Able Archer’ peaks, making it the third deadliest moment in human history since nukes were invented.

It is being stoked by the failure of arms control agreements, the increasingly pugnacious rhetoric of national leaders, and technical advances that could easily go wrong. Misinterpretation, miscalculation, political impulsiveness and an AI glitch have become primary triggers for an atomic war.

A nuclear explosion produces three instant killing mechanisms: a shockwave, a pulse of extreme heat, and a burst of deadly radiation. A very small 10kt weapon, detonated at ground level, causes severe shockwave damage up to 1km from the blast. The thermal pulse inflicts fatal burns and a firestorm up to 2kms. Flying debris kills or injures people several kms distant.

The radiation burst will kill unprotected people up to 1km away, and drifting fallout will create a potential death zone up to 10kms downwind. Larger weapons inflict proportionately greater death and destruction.

Those exposed to moderate doses of radiation develop acute radiation syndrome, which develops in stages: bone marrow is the first to fail, leading to uncontrolled infections and bleeding. Around half of those exposed to a moderate dose die within 60 days. At higher doses, the patient experiences severe vomiting, diarrhoea and internal haemorrhage. Death occurs within two agonising weeks, and no treatment can reverse it. At extreme doses, the heart and central nervous system collapse, and death occurs within three days. In a nuclear war, most radiation victims will receive little or no medical care.

Fallout from a nuclear strike contains particles with a half-life lasting from days to 30 years, so can go on killing for decades, without the need for new strikes. Gamma rays can travel long distances and penetrate most buildings unless they are sheathed in lead, thick concrete or rock. Long term effects include an epidemic of cancers, thyroid and immune system failure.

Globally, even a ‘small nuclear war’ could affect every country and every person, no matter how far away from the seat of the conflict, by means of the “nuclear winter”.

In a scientific paper published in 1983, Professor Brian Toon, Carl Sagan and colleagues calculated that the dust and smoke from a larger (5000 megaton) nuclear war would cut light to the Earth and reduce land temperatures to minus 15-25 degrees Celsius, destroying the entire world food harvest and causing universal starvation. It was this that persuaded Reagan and Gorbachev to pull back from the brink of catastrophe.

However, even a ‘small nuclear war’ of fifty or so tactical blasts would cover the Earth in a smoke cloud 30-100 kms deep within two weeks causing subzero temperatures for several years. The smoke would linger for years, possibly decades, ruining harvests everywhere. Between one and two billion people would die of starvation around the world. Everybody would go hungry. The world economy would collapse.

Iran’s deterrent

Three days before the US bombed the nuclear enrichment site at Fordow in 2025, a line of empty trucks was spotted by satellites at the facility. Intelligence assessment decided these were tasked to carry 408 kilos of highly enriched (60 per cent purity) uranium, part of a larger cache of 8.4 tonnes of uranium, to a place of greater safety.

If so, this leaves Iran with the capability to manufacture up to 14 atomic bombs or 300+ dirty bombs to deter a nuclear attack by Israel. It also has the ballistic and hypersonic missiles to deliver them, while Israel’s air defences are weakened. The radiation from a dirty bomb made from 60 per cent enriched uranium has a half-life of 740,000,000 years. While not deadly in the short term this could still render areas uninhabitable for the rest of history.

Whether this would deter a US or Israeli attack, given the unhinged state of their leadership and the moral cowardice of their governments, is not certain.

A wise course would be not to force Iran into such an escalation. But where is there wisdom in any of this?

April 6, 2026 Posted by | weapons and war | 1 Comment

US negotiator in 2015 Iran nuclear deal says Donald Trump ‘delusional’ on nuclear and regime change.

By Paul Johnson, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-04-03/us-negotiator-in-iran-nuclear-deal-says-trump-delusional/106527524

In short:

Donald Trump’s claims about regime change and Iran’s nuclear threat have been called into question.

Former US special envoy to Iran Robert Malley described Mr Trump’s address to the nation this week as “delusional”.

He raised concerns the US would be committing war crimes if it followed through on Mr Trump’s threats.

US President Donald Trump is “delusional” and “seeking to deceive his audience” when it comes to what he claims is the success of the Iran war.

Those are the words of Robert Malley, who in 2015, under the Obama administration, was one of the lead negotiators on the Iran nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Action Plan.

When Mr Trump addressed the United States on Thursday with a speech full of bluster and bravado, he made claims of dismantling a regime, destroying Iran’s alleged nuclear capabilities and ruining the Islamic Republic’s navy and air force.

Mr Trump also blamed the previous Biden administration for leaving the United States “dead and crippled”.

Mr Malley, who served under Mr Biden as special envoy for Iran, spoke to 7.30 in the wake of Mr Trump’s comments on the war — a war that, despite being successful in killing previous supreme ruler Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and several regime leaders, has caused global economic pain.

That pain has been caused by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) choking the shipping, particularly of oil, through the Strait of Hormuz.

The war was started under the premise of what Mr Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said was an imminent nuclear threat posed by Iran.

Where are ceasefire talks up to?

On Thursday, the US president said the deal that Mr Malley worked on under Barack Obama was a “disaster”.

Mr Malley told 7.30 the remarks made by the president about the Iranian nuclear threat were not true, especially in light of Mr Trump’s 2025 declaration that the US had decimated Iran’s nuclear capabilities through a series of strikes in June that year.

“There is simply no truth to that,” Mr Malley told 7.30.

“It’s extraordinary how he’s now saying that after he claimed that he’d obliterated Iran’s nuclear program less than a year ago.

“He’s now saying that they still were at the doorstep of acquiring a nuclear weapon, which he claims they would’ve used immediately.

“There’s not a single fragment of that claim that is accurate.”

Malley questions regime change

He also rubbished Mr Trump’s repeated claims that the war in Iran had resulted in regime change, something Australia’s own prime minister, Anthony Albanese, would not do on 7.30 on Monday night.

The regime change Mr Trump is claiming to have enacted is replacing former supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei with his son, Mojtaba Khamenei.

The change may also lead to an increased role for the IRGC.

Mr Malley said, if anything, this might now be a more hardline Iranian regime that has a renewed reason for prejudice against the US.

“Nobody sees any truth in that,” Mr Malley said when asked about Mr Trump’s assertions about regime change in Tehran.

“Much of the prior Iranian leadership has been killed, but the people who are now in power are, if anything, more radical, more hardline, more determined to confront the United States.”

“The notion that this is a more … rational, more pragmatic regime … this is just him projecting to try to justify the fact that his war was a success and, whenever it ends, to be able to say that he achieved sort of, as a side benefit, a regime change that he claims he was never seeking.

“Every word in that statement of his is just delusional and seeking to deceive his audience.”

Concerns about war crimes

Among the major parts of Mr Trump’s speech were further threats against Iran.

In particular, Mr Trump said the US assault would step up over the next few weeks.

“We are going to hit them extremely hard over the next two to three weeks,” Mr Trump said.

“We’re going to bring them back to the Stone Ages, where they belong.”

Mr Malley, a seasoned diplomat, said that rhetoric was very concerning and should not be normalised.

“Just listening to him, [it is disturbing] how normalised it’s become to have a president threaten to commit war crimes, which is what bringing Iran back to the Stone Age would be, on behalf of an unlawful war,” he told 7.30.

“He seems to be driven by this notion that if the US has the capability to do something militarily, it can do it and it will do it if he thinks that Iran is not capitulating or is not responding to his every demand.

“I think we should pause a bit and think the most powerful man on Earth has just threatened to destroy not a government, not military sites, but a country on behalf of a war that he still is not able to justify.”

Mr Trump has also been struggling to justify the economic cost.

The US has unleashed billions of dollars’ worth of weaponry in what some have said is a war for oil but it has not been able to free up the Strait of Hormuz.

Mr Malley says for Iran, despite its major losses, that will be a key takeaway.

“The one thing that the gift, if you will, that this war has offered Iran, which is they’ve discovered that if they want, they have this mastery of the Strait of Hormuz,” he said.

“They always had it implicitly in a latent form. Now they have it physically, practically, and you don’t need that much to be able to discourage ships or discourage insurance companies from insuring anyone who wants to go through the strait without Iranian consent.”

April 6, 2026 Posted by | PERSONAL STORIES | Leave a comment

What to Know About the ‘Massive’ Military Bunker Beneath Trump’s Ballroom

President Trump has been talking about the emergency facility beneath what was once the East Wing, details of which are usually kept secret, as he tries to justify his renovation.

By Luke Broadwater, https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/02/us/politics/trump-ballroom-military-bunker.html?campaign_id=190&emc=edit_ufn_20260403&instance_id=173568&nl=from-the-times&regi_id=60047519&segment_id=217713&user_id=432fc0d0ad6543e820e2dfcd39f76c35April 2, 2026

While most public attention has focused on the aboveground portion of President Trump’s planned $400 million ballroom, what is underneath could prove to be the more complex and expensive portion of the project.

Work crews have been digging in the earth for weeks, ripping out the Presidential Emergency Operations Center, or PEOC, to build something bigger, better and deeper underground.

The PEOC, which was built during World War II to protect the president and other top officials in the event of an emergency, was where Vice President Dick Cheney was hustled after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, later to be joined by President George W. Bush and his national security teams. Mr. Trump was rushed there, too, during protests over the death of George Floyd in 2020.

The bunker is beneath what was once the East Wing, which Mr. Trump tore down last year to make way for his ballroom.

Details of the underground facility are usually shrouded in secrecy. But as Mr. Trump’s ballroom faces legal challenges, he has been talking more openly about the bunker. He argues that the two are linked, which makes building the ballroom a matter of security.

Here is what we know about the PEOC.

A ‘Massive’ Military Complex

Speaking on Sunday to reporters on Air Force One, Mr. Trump said that he envisioned his 90,000-square-foot ballroom as a “shed” for the underground project.

“The military is building a massive complex under the ballroom, and that’s under construction, and we’re doing very well,” Mr. Trump said.


In Mr. Trump’s telling, the bunker will have bomb shelters and “very major medical facilities,” including a hospital. It will have the latest secure communication methods and defenses against bioweapons.

He said the ballroom would protect the underground facility from drones, bullets and other attacks. “It’s high-grade bulletproof glass. So all of the windows are bulletproof,” Mr. Trump said.

Last week, speaking about the ballroom project during a cabinet meeting, the president said that “the military wanted it more than anybody.”

Mr. Trump has said the security features make his project even more important — a point he made again this week after a judge halted the project, saying it required congressional approval.

“Unless and until Congress blesses this project through statutory authorization, construction has to stop!” wrote Judge Richard J. Leon of Federal District Court in Washington, a George W. Bush appointee.

Mr. Trump ordered an appeal, but he pointed to a section of Judge Leon’s order that allowed “construction necessary to ensure the safety and security of the White House” to continue

“We have biodefense all over,” Mr. Trump told reporters in the Oval Office this week. “We have secure telecommunications and communications all over. We have bomb shelters that we’re building. We have a hospital and very major medical facilities that we’re building. We have all of these things. So that’s called: I’m allowed to continue building.”

The Secret Service

The Secret Service has twice filed documents in court attesting to the necessity of finishing the ballroom project.

Matthew C. Quinn, deputy director of the Secret Service, wrote in December and again in January that any halt in the project could put lives in danger.

Mr. Quinn said that the agency was working with a contractor on security upgrades but that the underground work was not finished.

“Accordingly, any pause in construction, even temporarily, would leave the contractor’s obligation unfulfilled in this regard and consequently hamper the Secret Service’s ability to meet its statutory obligations and protective mission,” Mr. Quinn wrote.

He offered to brief the judge privately about the security upgrades underway. The Trump administration also filed some documents about the project under seal in federal court.

Judge Leon appeared to mostly reject those arguments.

“While I take seriously the government’s concerns regarding the safety and security of the White House grounds and the president himself, the existence of a ‘large hole’ beside the White House is, of course, a problem of the president’s own making!” he wrote.

Joshua Fisher, director for management and administration in the White House, told the National Capital Planning Commission in January that he could not share all the administration’s plans for the project.

“There are some things regarding this project that are, frankly, of top-secret nature that we are currently working on,” he said.

There are still many unanswered questions about the project, including which branch or branches of the military are involved, the costs of construction and maintenance, and many other details.

Asked about the underground portion of the project on Monday, Karoline Leavitt, the White House spokeswoman, was equally closemouthed.

“The military is making some upgrades to their facilities here at the White House, and I’m not privy to provide any more details on that,” she said.

Luke Broadwater covers the White House for The Times.

April 6, 2026 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Chernobyl at 40: The World’s Worst Nuclear Power Accident and Where It Stands Now

Alice Marchuk, Jack Goras, and Aaron Larson, Wednesday, April 1, 2026

 At 1:23 a.m. local time on April 26, 1986, a sudden and
uncontrollable power surge destroyed Unit 4 of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power
Plant, located about 130 kilometers (km, 81 miles) north of Kyiv and just
20 km (12.5 miles) south of the Belarusian border. The explosion—followed
by fires that burned for 10 days—released up to 5% of the radioactive
reactor core into the atmosphere, scattering contamination across Belarus,
Ukraine, Russia, and much of Europe

. It remains the only accident in the
history of commercial nuclear power reactors where radiation-related
fatalities occurred, and its consequences—human, environmental,
political, and technical—continue to reverberate four decades later.

The 40th anniversary arrives at a moment when the Chernobyl site is anything
but a static memorial. Decommissioning of the plant’s three undamaged
reactors is underway. A massive dry spent fuel storage facility—the
largest of its kind in the world—is in the midst of a multi-year fuel
transfer campaign. And the New Safe Confinement (NSC, Figure 1), the
enormous arch-shaped structure that took more than a decade to design and
build, sustained significant damage from a drone strike in February 2025,
raising urgent questions about the long-term security of the site in a
country still at war.

 Power Magazine 1st April 2026, https://www.powermag.com/chernobyl-at-40-the-worlds-worst-nuclear-power-accident-and-where-it-stands-now/

April 6, 2026 Posted by | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Trump’s Divine War: How Christian Nationalists Are Running U.S. Policy in Iran and at Home

April 3, 2026 , ScheerPost Staff, https://scheerpost.com/2026/04/03/trumps-divine-war-how-christian-nationalists-are-running-u-s-policy-in-iran-and-at-home/

As the Trump administration deepens U.S. military involvement in Iran alongside Israel, a new The Intercept briefing examines a dimension of the conflict often overlooked in mainstream war coverage: the growing influence of Christian nationalist ideology inside American foreign policy. In this episode, investigative journalist Sarah Posner joins host Jessica Washington to unpack how apocalyptic theology, evangelical political networks, and religious-right power structures are shaping decisions from the Pentagon to the campaign trail.

At the center of the discussion is Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, whose public prayers for “overwhelming violence” and rhetoric about divine mission reveal how sections of the modern Christian right increasingly frame military conflict not simply as geopolitics, but as spiritual warfare. Posner argues that this worldview goes beyond symbolic religious language: it reflects a deeper ideological belief that biblical authority supersedes international law, civilian protections, and traditional diplomatic constraints.The conversation also traces the role of influential evangelical figures such as John Hagee, whose decades-long advocacy for confrontation with Iran ties directly into end-times prophecy and Christian Zionist doctrine. Far from fringe theology, these ideas continue to shape large sections of Trump’s political base, reinforcing a foreign policy culture where war, prophecy, and domestic nationalism increasingly intersect.

Beyond Iran, the episode links these religious currents to broader domestic agendas—from anti-LGBTQ legislation to voting restrictions and immigration policy—showing how the same ideological infrastructure behind foreign intervention is also driving a wider effort to redefine American law, citizenship, and family life. The result is a portrait of a political movement that sees no separation between spiritual destiny, military power, and state authority.

What began as another presidential justification for war has rapidly opened a broader debate about the forces driving American power abroad. In its latest briefing, The Intercept turns attention away from battlefield headlines and toward a political current that has long operated beneath the surface of U.S. foreign policy: the growing fusion of Christian nationalist ideology, apocalyptic belief, and state power inside the second Donald Trump administration.

The episode arrives as Washington’s military partnership with Israel in its confrontation with Iran enters a more dangerous phase, with rising oil instability, domestic political backlash, and widening fractures inside both major parties. Yet the discussion presented by host Jessica Washington and investigative journalist Sarah Posner argues that strategic calculations alone do not explain the intensity of current rhetoric coming from senior U.S. officials. Instead, they suggest that parts of the administration increasingly frame war through a theological lens—one in which military action is not only justified politically, but sanctified spiritually.

That argument becomes most visible in the conduct of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, whose recent public prayer at the Pentagon asking for “overwhelming violence” against enemies drew renewed scrutiny. For Posner, the significance lies not merely in religious language but in the specific worldview behind it. Hegseth’s association with the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches reflects a current of Christian Reconstructionism that views biblical authority as the supreme legal framework governing both personal and public life. Under that framework, war can become more than a strategic instrument—it becomes part of a divine obligation to defend and expand what adherents see as a Christian nation.

The discussion carefully distinguishes this ideological current from more familiar evangelical support for Israel. Figures such as John Hagee, founder of Christians United for Israel, have spent decades promoting confrontation with Iran through a different theological narrative: one rooted in end-times prophecy, biblical signs, and the expectation that conflict in the Middle East may accelerate events leading to the return of Jesus. While Hegseth’s rhetoric reflects dominionist ideas about establishing God’s authority through state power, Hagee’s message speaks to a broader evangelical audience that sees Israel’s wars through prophetic fulfillment.

What makes the moment politically significant is that these belief systems are no longer confined to pulpits, television ministries, or religious conferences. According to Posner, they now intersect directly with executive power, military messaging, and legislative agendas. Trump’s long alliance with white evangelical leadership has often been described by mainstream media as transactional—religious conservatives deliver votes, and Trump delivers judges. But the interview argues that the relationship has matured into something far deeper: an ideological partnership in which both sides reinforce one another’s vision of national restoration, civilizational conflict, and cultural authority.

That framework also helps explain why debates over Iran cannot be separated from domestic policy. The same religious infrastructure influencing foreign policy is also deeply involved in campaigns against abortion rights, transgender rights, immigration protections, and secular legal norms. Posner points to new policy blueprints emerging from The Heritage Foundation, where “natural family” doctrine and anti-LGBTQ language form part of a broader project to reorder public life according to conservative Christian definitions of family, gender, and citizenship.

The conversation also highlights an important tension emerging inside Trump’s own coalition. While evangelical support for Israel remains strong, some Catholic and nationalist figures on the populist right have begun openly questioning Israeli influence in American politics and criticizing the war with Iran. Yet even this fracture is unstable. Posner notes that some of the loudest anti-war voices on the far right often blend legitimate foreign policy criticism with conspiratorial or openly antisemitic narratives, creating a volatile ideological split rather than a coherent anti-interventionist bloc.

Underlying all of this is a warning about infrastructure. The Christian right’s political power, Posner argues, was not built overnight and does not operate election to election. Over decades, it developed legal institutions, media ecosystems, activist training networks, educational pipelines, and political organizations capable of shaping courts, legislation, and public discourse across generations. From judicial appointments to school boards to foreign policy framing, the movement works through a layered system designed for permanence rather than short-term victory.

In that sense, the Iran war becomes more than a foreign crisis. It becomes another window into how religious nationalism increasingly shapes the language of American power—where military force, prophecy, electoral politics, and cultural conflict are no longer separate debates but parts of a single ideological project.

For more from the Intercept Trump’s Holy War Abroad and at Home

Journalist Sarah Posner on how the Christian right’s end times views are shaping U.S. foreign and domestic policies.

or listen to the full interview

April 6, 2026 Posted by | Religion and ethics, USA | Leave a comment

Kucinich Statement on President Trump’s Address on Iran

“The President’s address to the nation was a tone-deaf sale pitch for more war, delivered on the first night of Passover.” — Dennis J. Kucinich

Dennis Kucinich, Apr 02, 2026, https://kucinichreport.substack.com/p/kucinich-statement-on-president-trumps?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1441588&post_id=192938298&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=4ds0bd&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

Former Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich (1997 to 2013) challenged three administrations, Clinton (Serbia), Bush (Iraq), and Obama (Libya), over unauthorized military action under the War Powers Resolution, led Congressional opposition to the Iraq War, and delivered 155 speeches in Congress warning against war with Iran.

“The President’s address to the nation was a tone-deaf sale pitch for more war, delivered on the first night of Passover.

Civilian and military casualties are mounting across the region. Lives are being extinguished while triumphalist and violent rhetoric is offered as justification. War is being escalated in the name of peace, a contradiction that demands moral clarity, not political acceptance.

Each life lost carries equal value. No nation’s suffering is expendable. No people exist as collateral.

Iran is not an abstraction, nor just a target on a map. It is one of the great cradles of civilization, a society whose cultural and intellectual contributions long predate the rise of the modern West. To speak casually of bombing such a nation ‘back to the Stone Age’ reveals a colonial mindset that dehumanizes others and diminishes our own humanity in the process.

The extensive bombing of Iran by the United States and Israel, along with Iran’s counterstrikes, is already taking innocent lives. The global economy is destabilizing as a result.

Energy markets are being disrupted. Oil and gas production is constrained. Fertilizer supply chains are impaired. Critical materials are being cut off.

These consequences will be felt worldwide. Yet the deeper crisis is not economic, it is moral.

We have seen this before. The repeated invocation of a nuclear threat echoes the false claims of ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’ used to justify the invasion of Iraq. That war cost thousands of American lives, the lives of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, and trillions of dollars, while leaving a legacy of instability and grief that endures to this day.

If the President truly sought to prevent a nuclear Iran, he would not have abandoned the JCPOA, an agreement that placed verifiable limits on Iran’s nuclear program. Instead, we are presented with a cycle of escalation that defies logic and invites catastrophe.

Political rhetoric is becoming increasingly radical and dangerous. This is not a question of partisan politics. It is a question of conscience with very real global and domestic consequences.

The American people are not called to accept this. They are called to stand against it.

Members of Congress must have the courage to exercise their constitutional authority and rein this in.

War framed as strength is destruction. Violence presented as necessity is gratuitous violence, with consequences already accelerating destabilizing shifts in the global order.

Congress must act. The Constitution vests in Congress the authority to bring this, and any war, to an end through the power of the purse.

The American people must immediately contact their representatives and demand a NO vote on any supplemental funding that would continue this war. Congress must VOTE NO.”

April 6, 2026 Posted by | Religion and ethics, USA | Leave a comment

It Takes Years To Refuel A Nuclear Submarine – Here’s Why

By Chris Smith , BGR 10th March 2026

You probably charge your phone daily, while your car needs gas or a battery top-up every few days. But you don’t have to take the device or vehicle apart when you connect it to power or fill up the tank. Refueling a nuclear submarine, on the other hand, is a complicated process that takes years, just like refueling a nuclear aircraft carrier………………………

The ERO process is slow because it’s designed that way for safety reasons. The nuclear submarine has to be brought into a facility that’s capable of handling nuclear material throughout the replacement process, to ensure the safety of everyone involved in the repairs and the sailors who will crew the ship once the refueling process is done. The nuclear core remains radioactive during refueling, so radiation must be contained and the nuclear waste must be stored securely.

The submarine is brought to a dry dock for the ERO process, where engineers go through a rigorous procedure to defuel the ship and refuel it. The reactors are shut down and cooled before removing the old reactor core and installing its replacement. The actual removal of the spent core involves cutting through the submarine’s hull with hand tools, as the reactors aren’t easily accessible. These operations are performed under strict ventilation and filtration protocols to prevent radiation contamination. The old core is transported off-site for secure storage, as the nuclear material remains active. The new core is installed, and then the reactor is reassembled and the submarine is resealed. These procedures require precision and numerous inspections, as there’s no room for error. The structural integrity of the hull is key for allowing the submarine to operate at depth.

……………………………………… How much does refueling a submarine cost?

Like nuclear aircraft carriers, nuclear-powered surface ships undergo extensive RCOH processes — and they’re not cheap or quick. For example, it cost $2.8 billion to refuel and retrofit the USS George Washington aircraft carrier, and the process took even longer than anticipated. In May 2023, the U.S. Navy announced that the George Washington completed its RCOH process after 69 months

……………………………………………..
https://www.bgr.com/2117046/why-nuclear-submarine-takes-years-to-refuel/

April 6, 2026 Posted by | weapons and war | Leave a comment

Trump’s Non-Address: The Strait of Trump and the Vandalism of Global Order

2 April 2026 David Tyler AIM Extra, https://theaimn.net/trumps-non-address-the-strait-of-trump-and-the-vandalism-of-global-order/

In reply to Bernard Keane, Crikey, The Regime Change we Need? Remove Trump in Washington, 2 April 2026

Bernard Keane puts it neatly: Donald Trump is either a toddler who has tired of his own game and flings away his toys, or a vandal who wrecks other people’s toys for sport. But after this week, even that framing feels too kind. On April 1, 2026 (April Fools’ Day, no less) Trump did not simply toss his toys aside. He ascended his playpen throne like a bored demiurge, surveyed a world too small to matter, and declared the Strait of Hormuz someone else’s problem.

“I don’t think about it, to be honest,” he said, shrugging off the worst energy disruption since 1973. “When we leave, the strait will automatically open.”

Then, as allies scrambled amid fuel rationing and power blackouts, he told them to build up some delayed courage, go to the Strait, and just TAKE IT. The United States, he added, won’t be there to help you anymore.

The Non-Address Address

Trump’s prime-time speech was a masterclass in anticlimax: twenty minutes of reassurance for war-weary Americans, tough talk for the cameras, and nothing (absolutely nothing) of substance. Markets listened more closely than his cabinet. Stock futures dropped as he finished speaking, reversing two days of recovery on Wall Street. Oil prices jumped nearly four percent, as traders read the address not as a signal of resolution but as confirmation that the war would drag on, and the chaos with it.

If George W. Bush was America’s Miscommunicator-in-Chief, selling a fabricated WMD case for Iraq with at least the semblance of a plan, Trump is the World’s Biggest Liar, segueing effortlessly from babbling stream-of-consciousness to flashes of leadership genius such as “We’ll see what happens.” Bush, at least, believed his own lies long enough to commit to them. Trump improvises his from one press conference to the next, and the nuclear question is the most damning proof.

One day, the Florida Golfer-in-Chief insists thwarting Iran’s nuclear capabilities is the central justification for the war, the reason thirteen American service members have died. The next, he tells Reuters he isn’t remotely concerned about Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium: “That’s so far underground, I don’t care about that.” And the day before that, he had declared in the Oval Office: “They will have no nuclear weapon, and that goal has been attained. They will not have nuclear weapons” only to immediately hint that some future president might need to revisit the issue a long time from now.

Three contradictory positions in forty-eight hours.

This is not policy. It is improvised theatre, with live ammunition and a body count.

Regime Change as Absurdist Comedy

Trump’s regime change claim is its own genre of farce. Having repeatedly said he never sought regime change, he declares mid-speech that he had achieved it anyway. “We never said regime change, but regime change has occurred because of all of their original leaders’ death (they’re all dead),” he said. The new group is less radical and much more reasonable.

The more reasonable leader he has in mind? The incoming Iranian Parliament Speaker, a former Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander responsible for brutal crackdowns on student protesters. This, apparently, is Trump’s definition of moderation.

And then there is the Artemis detail. In the hours before his war talk, Trump had been flooding Truth Social with posts about the Artemis II moon launch: “We are WINNING, in Space, on Earth, and everywhere in between. Economically, Militarily, and now, BEYOND THE STARS.” Seriously? The rocket lifted off at 6:30pm Eastern. The war talk followed three hours later. Did Trump himself know which was the main event? It doesn’t matter. The moon shot is to remind Americans, however briefly, of a time when the United States did something that looked like victory.

“We are on track to complete all of America’s military objectives shortly, very shortly,” he lies. He has never spelled them out. “We are going to hit them extremely hard. Over the next two to three weeks, we’re going to bring them back to the Stone Ages, where they belong. In the meantime, discussions are ongoing.”

Trump abuses US allies for not rushing to the aid of a United States in irretrievable decline, presided over by the Commander-in-Chief of indecision, degeneration and the mass murder of innocent civilians. The war machine, having run out of clean military targets, is now forced to obliterate hospitals, schools, ambulances and power stations. Three thousand five hundred and nineteen Iranian civilians are confirmed dead at last count (a figure the administration has not disputed and shows no sign of mourning).

This is no toddler in tantrum. It is the deity of dereliction, smashing the stage props of the world he once claimed to command, calling the wreckage proof of his own omnipotence. As Yanis Varoufakis reminds us, the problem is not that Trump has no Plan B. Trump has never had a Plan A.

The Strait of Trump: A Trap of His Own Making

The Iran war is Trump’s masterpiece of self-sabotage. Shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, through which about a fifth of global seaborne oil trade normally flows, has been effectively shut since Iran closed it following the US-Israeli strikes of February 28. Trump launched the war. Iran played its one trump card. Now, top administration officials have privately acknowledged they cannot both achieve their military objectives quickly and vow to reopen the strait within the same timeline.

The result is a global energy crisis of the administration’s own manufacture, with US crude oil settling above $100 per barrel for the first time since July 2022.

Trump’s response? He took to Truth Social to tell allies to build up some delayed courage, go to the Strait, and just TAKE IT, adding: “You’ll have to start learning how to fight for yourself. The U.S.A. won’t be there to help you anymore.”

This from the man who started the war, walked away from the consequences and is now billing the victims for the ambulance.

Saudi Arabia: The Humiliation and the Handshake

On March 27, five days before his April 1 address, Trump stood on a stage built with Saudi money at the Future Investment Initiative Priority summit in Miami (a Saudi sovereign wealth fund event attended by 1,500 delegates, including the kingdom’s most senior economic policymakers). There, he told the assembled room that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman didn’t think he would be “kissing my arse.” He then added, for good measure: “He better be nice to me.”

The remark was no slip. It was a public declaration of hierarchy, delivered on Saudi-branded turf, using Saudi hospitality as the backdrop for MBS’s ritual humiliation. The Saudi Royal Court and state media issued no response. In Riyadh, silence is the dignified face of fury.

What Trump apparently does not grasp (or does not care about) is that in the Gulf, face is not a sentiment. It is a strategic currency. And the cost of losing it gets paid in procurement contracts.

Saudi Arabia had already been diversifying its arms suppliers before Trump’s FII performance, but the trajectory has accelerated sharply since the Iran war began. Since February 28, Riyadh has signed, accelerated or activated arms agreements with at least seven nations (the United States, China, South Korea, Turkey, Ukraine, the United Kingdom and France) spending an estimated $20 billion in the first quarter of 2026 alone. That’s roughly equal to the kingdom’s entire 2024 defence budget, compressed into weeks.

Turkey has been among the principal beneficiaries. Saudi Arabian Military Industries has signed MOUs with Baykar, the Turkish drone company whose Bayraktar TB2 became famous in Ukraine and Nagorno-Karabakh, and with the defence electronics firm ASELSAN. The flagship deal, for 60 Bayraktar Akinci unmanned combat aerial vehicles worth an estimated $2 billion, includes a local production line inside Saudi Arabia, with projections that more than 70 percent of components will be manufactured in the kingdom by the end of the year. Riyadh is also in discussions to join Turkey’s Kaan next-generation fighter jet program.

No American defence contractor has come close to matching those technology transfer terms.

This does not mean Saudi Arabia is abandoning American weapons systems: Patriot batteries and THAAD interceptors are not something you swap out during a shooting war. But the direction of travel is unmistakable. The oil-for-security compact that has governed the US-Gulf relationship since Franklin Roosevelt met King Abdulaziz on the USS Quincy in 1945 is being quietly dismantled, contract by contract, MOU by MOU, one Ankara handshake at a time. Trump’s genius for the crass remark or the totally inappropriate public insult is accelerating a process that will outlast him indefinitely.

The Strait of Trump? The Toxic-Narcissicist-in-Chief briefly floats renaming the Strait of Hormuz after himself, calling for Iran to open up the “Strait of Trump, I mean, Hormuz,” adding that there are no accidents with him. On that last point, at least, he may be telling the truth. “Trump of Hormuz,” however,  may be how future historians will remember him.

Syria: The Jihadist Turned Plumber

The most arresting geopolitical diversion of the week did not come from Washington or Tehran but from Damascus. Syria’s post-Assad government (all spruced up and respectable, its budget nearly tripled to $10.5 billion, with energy infrastructure as its centrepiece) is formally pitching itself as the world’s energy saviour.

What was once Al Qaeda in Syria is now offering to reroute the Trans-Arabian Pipeline to its Mediterranean coast, proposing a new line capable of pumping up to four million barrels per day from northeastern Saudi Arabia to the Syrian ports of Baniyas or Latakia. There are also plans to extend a Qatari natural gas pipeline through Syria to Turkey and Europe.

The Tapline is not new. Built between 1947 and 1950 by Aramco as the world’s longest oil pipeline, it ran 1,214 kilometres from Saudi Arabia’s Abqaiq fields to Lebanon’s port of Sidon, crossing Jordan and Syria. It was designed to bypass the Suez Canal and operated for three decades until the Lebanese civil war shut it down in 1983. Now, the pipeline that Aramco built to bypass Suez is being pitched in 2026 to bypass the clogged Strait of Hormuz.

Washington is not indifferent. US Special Envoy Tom Barrack bragged at a recent energy forum that Syria could serve as an alternative to the Strait of Hormuz in the future through the construction of pipelines, noting that earlier Syrian infrastructure plans envisioned the country as a junction connecting the Arabian Gulf, Caspian Sea, Mediterranean and Black Sea. Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE are already moving. Saudi companies Taqa, Ades, Arabian Drilling and Arabian Geophysical and Surveying agreed in December to provide technical support, while the UAE’s Dana Gas entered a tentative deal with Syria’s state petroleum company. Overnight, the UK Prime Minister met Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa in Downing Street, discussing the need for a viable plan to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and agreeing to work with others to restore freedom of navigation.

But is it a real game changer? The obstacles are not trivial. Syria’s infrastructure is war-ravaged, sanctions are only partially lifted and the World Bank estimates reconstruction costs at $216 billion. Even the existing pipeline alternatives fall well short of replacing Hormuz. The combined capacity of existing bypass pipelines, including Saudi Arabia’s East-West line and the UAE’s Abu Dhabi Crude Oil Pipeline, amounts to around 9 million barrels per day against the 20 million that normally transit Hormuz. Syria’s offer, however real its potential, is measured in years and investment horizons, not weeks.

Yet the pitch reveals something Keane’s piece gestures toward without quite landing: Trump’s vandalism is reorganising the world’s geography of power in ways that will long outlast his presidency. When a reconstituted Syria, led by a former Al Qaeda jihadist turned pragmatic statesman, can walk into Downing Street and credibly offer Europe an energy lifeline that Brussels cannot refuse to consider, the old order is not declining. It is already dead.

The Tariff Rampage: Chaos as Policy

Trump’s tariffs and the uncertainty surrounding them have sent shockwaves through the global economy while failing to achieve a single stated aim. They do, however, represent the largest US tax hike since 1993, amounting to an average increase of $1,500 per US household in 2026. Moody’s Analytics Chief Economist Mark Zandi calls it plainly: “The US is pulling away from the world, and the rest of the world is now pulling away from the US.”

Zandi is right that tariffs are a tax on consumers. But he is wrong to say they simply ruin trade. What they do is change the nature of trade from an unregulated race to the bottom on labour and environmental costs to a managed system that, in theory, prioritises domestic stability. In practice, under this administration, they prioritise chaos.

Keane is correct to note that the United States Studies Centre crew at the Financial Review would rather Australians fear China than the country whose actions have inflicted the actual energy and economic shock. This is the ideological laundering operation that Pine Gap makes literal. While the Australian public buys the official line that it is only a big radar station, the centre is increasingly being used to provide the intelligence the United States requires to target infrastructure across Iran. Canberra, meanwhile, maintains the polite fiction that its involvement is purely defensive.

Regime Change in Washington? Wishful Thinking

What Keane’s argument finally arrives at (regime change in Washington) is commendable but wishful thinking. Calls for the 25th Amendment have been creeping into conservative as well as Democratic circles since the Iran war began, with prediction markets now putting the probability of its invocation at 33 percent, up from 15 percent at the start of the year. Democrats have introduced multiple impeachment resolutions, including seven articles covering obstruction of justice, abuse of trade powers, international aggression, bribery, corruption and tyranny. None will pass a Republican House.

What remains? The November midterms. The courts. Sustained popular pressure. And the growing reality that while Washington dithers and blusters, some of the world’s energy architecture is quietly rerouting itself through Damascus.

The Strait of Hormuz may not rename itself. But it may yet make itself irrelevant. That, ultimately, is the most damning verdict on what Trump and Netanyahu have wrought: not just that they broke the old order but that they handed the blueprint for the new one to Ahmad al-Sharaa.

Unless, of course, it is all a piece of diversionary theatre and a convenient way of getting back at Tehran that nobody in Washington quite planned for either.

In Part Two, we’ll explore how Australia’s alliance with the US is reshaping its own energy and security calculus and why Canberra’s silence on Iran may be its loudest statement yet.

This article was originally published on URBAN WRONSKI WRITES

April 6, 2026 Posted by | politics international | Leave a comment

Ukraine actively involved in US-Israeli aggression against Iran: Envoy to UN

Monday, 30 March 2026, https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/03/30/766089/Ukraine-actively-involved-in-US-Israeli-aggression-against-Iran–Envoy-to-UN-

A senior Iranian diplomat condemns Ukraine’s admission to the dispatch of “hundreds of experts” to the region to confront Iran, saying Kiev is actively participating in the military aggression launched by the United State and the Israeli regime against the Islamic Republic.

Iranian Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations Amir Saeid Iravani made the remark in a letter to Secretary General of the United Nations Antonio Guterres and president of the UN Security Council on Monday.

“Ukraine’s admission that it has dispatched ‘hundreds of experts’ to the region apparently to help some Persian Gulf governments to confront Iran is in its essence considered to be providing financial and operative support for an unlawful military aggression, led by the United States of America and the Israeli regime, against Iran, which began on February 28, 2026.”

He said Iran rejects all unfounded accusations leveled by the Ukrainian ambassador to the UN which are devoid of any credible evidence and have been made with the clear aim of diverting attention from the ongoing US-Israeli war of aggression against Iran’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Such allegations also intended to whitewash the horrific crimes committed by the US and Israel against civilians and non-military infrastructure, he said.

“Such interference is not accidental. It exposes active participation in and facilitation of the illegal use of force against a sovereign state and raises serious concerns within the framework of international law, including the principles governing state responsibility and the prohibition of aiding or abetting in the commission of internationally wrongful acts.”

“Ukraine’s illegal acts constitute participation in an act of aggression and violate the fundamental prohibition on the use of force enshrined in Article 2, paragraph 4, of the United Nations Charter,” he added.

Furthermore, the envoy reiterated, Ukraine’s attempt to justify or normalize the targeting of critical infrastructure is deeply concerning and inconsistent with fundamental principles of international humanitarian law.

Earlier on Monday, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei told reporters that linking the conflict in Ukraine to the current developments in West Asia, particularly after the US-Israel military aggression against Iran, is a “very catastrophic miscalculation.”

In response to a question about Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s offer to provide military assistance to the US allies in the region, Baghaei expressed hope that the countries in the region will be wise enough not to allow such a person, who exposed his country to a very destructive war over the past four years, to pursue his objectives.

April 6, 2026 Posted by | Iran, Israel, politics international, Ukraine, USA | Leave a comment

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