Atlanta, GA
March 14, 2026
For the first time since Donald Trump declared a “state of emergency” six years ago, this weekend began with Friday the 13th and ends on the Ides of March. What could go wrong?
Yesterday afternoon, markets closed for the week. As my grandfather used to say when leaving four hours early to catch a flight at an airport twenty minutes away, “this is the part that makes me nervous.”
Desperate Moves
Weekends are when the Trump administration makes the most mischief. The president ordered his war with Iran on a Friday night. Airstrikes started early the next morning.
A few hours later, dignified by an unbuttoned collar and a baseball cap, he let us know what he’d done. That was the extent of the “debate” on whether Americans should die in another distant war.
A little later came word that strikes killed the Ayatollah and most of his family, and that almost two hundred Iranian schoolgirls were massacred by an American missile.
Iran retaliated later that day, destroying or degrading every U.S. base in the region. Four Americans were confirmed dead, with rumors that far more weren’t reported.
It seemed as if killing the Ayatollah was supposed to make the regime collapse. It didn’t. Iran’s decentralized command continued retaliating around the region, and effectively sealed the Strait of Hormuz.
The next week after the closing bell, the US targeted Iranian refineries and other energy infrastructure. Around Tehran fires ignited, smoke billowed, and skies darkened as “democracy” rained on ten million innocents who were purportedly being “saved”.
Crude prices spiked 30%, then retreated, before again cresting triple digits by the end of the week. The strait stayed closed, with Iran punishing uninvited vessels that attempted to pass.
Last night, we held our breath as the closing bell rang. Oil closed the week at about a hundred bucks a barrel. It would be much higher this morning if markets were open.
The U.S. bombed military assets on Kharg Island, Iran’s major oil port in the Persian Gulf. But the strikes (apparently) left oil infrastructure untouched. The administration likely did this on a Friday night so Trump could announce oil resources were spared and markets could digest the news before re-opening Monday.
This looks like a desperate move by an administration that assumed Iran would’ve relented by now. Will this make them? Or will it prompt the Iranians to attack oil and gas assets around the gulf?
We’ll see. But it’s probably best to top up our tanks.
Subsequent Order Effects
A few days of air strikes were supposed to be sufficient to win this war (whatever that means). US-Israeli air power would murder Iranian rulers, collapse the regime, and leave the country’s resources to Western scavengers.
But second-order effects (all of which were predictable and predicted) came quick. Yet they seem to have caught the architects of this “operation” off-guard.
Iran retaliated by damaging or destroying every U.S. base in the area. Mossad may also have contributed to the mischief, waving false flags to widen the war.
Watch for similar spook shenanigans or genuine blowback in the United States (some of which has already occurred in Austin, New York, and Michigan) to stoke fear, exact vengeance, or encourage belligerence within the U.S.
What about subsequent-order effects?
The region obviously provides ample oil, with about 15% of global supply now sealed behind the strait. The longer it is, the higher the price. Everyone knows this.
But they’re also discovering that the Gulf conveys about half the urea and sulfur the world needs. These are essential fertilizers and components to grow corn, soybeans, and wheat. What happens to food supplies and cost if the Hormuz valve stays shut?
We may already be finding out. Rationing and price controls are underway in Asia. “Work from home orders” (sounds disconcertingly familiar) have gone out to “preserve energy”.
How long till “emergency” war measures and clampdowns make their way to an unsuspecting West? When will price and capital controls, fuel and food rationing, and movement monitoring begin?
Since covid, this has become easier. Digital currency facilitates spending restrictions. Over the objection of Thomas Massie (who, instructively, Trump despises) Congress passed legislation to allow “kill switches” that disable vehicles. Corralling frightened Americans wouldn’t be hard.
On the war front, Marines are being sent to the Middle East. Rumors of a draft have resurfaced (the administration hasn’t denied that this could occur), and the NDAA passed late last year includes a provision that automatically enrolls all 18-26 year-old men into “Selective Service”… a bureaucratic euphemism for “potential conscription”.
Martial contagion may also infect America’s financial circulatory system. If Gulf countries can’t sell oil, they won’t receive dollars to recycle into U.S. Treasuries. This is the essence of the petrodollar deal that’s persisted half a century, and has helped prop assets, restrain interest rates, and control rising prices.
The Arab states price their oil in dollars in exchange for U.S. “protection”. After absorbing strikes the last two weeks while the U.S. pulled resources to defend Israel (leaving even its own bases exposed), how eager will Gulf nations be to preserve this arrangement? And how much will anyone trust American “diplomats” after the US twice killed Iranians with whom they were “negotiating”?
Rising Wave
If the First World War was the dumbest overseas intervention in American history, the debacle in Iran may be the most disgraceful. It was also among the most unnecessary and avoidable. As it continues to escalate and spiral, enticing regional rivals and more distant powers, it could become the most catastrophic.
Why would an American administration so incorrigibly idiotic? Cui bono?
Not the American people. Already drowning in debt, wallowing in crime, and enduring relentless decay of their urban centers and abandoned towns, the last thing they needed was another worthless war… especially against a formidable foe willing to fight to the death.
Maybe U.S. government was embarrassed that Tehran is nicer than most American cities, so it decided to bomb it till it looks like Baltimore? Or is it simply doing Israel’s bidding (the Secretary of State already admitted as much) while enabling the ongoing reset of a dying world order?
Whatever the intent, this administration sunk to the level of Imperial Japan at Pearl Harbor… except the Japanese at least had the decency to renounce negotiations before launching its attack. And Japan didn’t target the US president or the Shiite equivalent of a pope.
The US and Israelis did both. The killing of the Ayatollah took out not only the ruler of Iran, but religious leader of more than 100 million Shia Muslims. Replacing him is his son, who may be irked that his wife and infant daughter were murdered in the hit that claimed his father.
What would happen if he announced a holy war that unleashed millions of Muslims against the West (which has already allowed many of them in)? After what’s happened, why wouldn’t he? Irresponsible US and Israeli leaders use apocalyptic rhetoric to suggest this is a religious war. The new Ayatollah may be happy to oblige them.
Something ominous is in the air, which is getting heavier as tensions rise and attacks escalate. It’s a familiar feeling, but not a welcome one. Like six years ago, it seems as if the world we’ve known will be washed away, with few sensing the coming wave.
That’s the part that should make all of us nervous.
JD
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Your concluding comment reflects my feelings and those of untold millions more:
"Something ominous is in the air, which is getting heavier as tensions rise and attacks escalate....it seems as if the world we’ve known will be washed away with few sensing the coming wave."
Mr Breen, You ask and state some good comments. I am reading a book again called Solving the Mystery of Babylon The Great by Edward Hendrie. You may have read it or not . If not purchase it as I again am having My eyes opened more and more as to the current "regimes" in this world. May Not like some of the content, but that is what reading is about also.