Fantasy Foreign Policy
An accounting of the US and Israeli defeat by Iran has begun within honest US military circles. Chas Freeman and Pepe Escobar provided keen international political analyses.
[The Grand Musalla (mu = place, salla = (of) prayer), Tehran, 2026-07-06. Source Press TV.
“We must rise”, is the phrase for Khamenei’s mourning. The associated action is a raised clenched hand (thumb outward, as opposed to crossed for a fist), embracing ‘rise’ and unity . The colour red is associated with martyrdom and a demand for justice in Shia Islam.
Press TV estimates the gathering to be the largest public event in Iran’s history. Thus, it demonstrated the incompetence of US/Israeli “intelligence” officials who assessed that a short war would topple the government of the Islamic Republic.]
Published: 2026-07-06
Preface
In discussion with US Army Colonel Daniel Davis and US Army Special Forces Warrant Officer Joe Kent, US Army Colonel Douglas Macgregor asked:
Can we all agree that Iran and its military power defeated American military power?
[Warrior Diplomacy, see sources, offset 01:07:00]
Davis and Kent agreed. Denying reality is deadly for a soldier.
Defeat in Depth
Iran’s Press TV published a detailed compilation of satellite imagery and analysis of the damage with which Iran had:
systematically dismantled the backbone of America’s military infrastructure across the Persian Gulf
[Press TV, emphasis mine]
The 4,400 word article provides analysis and imagery for 13 destroyed or heavily degraded US bases in the Gulf region. The imagery confirms the precision of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ [IRGC] targeting, differentiating it from high altitude “carpet bombing”.
[An example of the satellite imagery from the Press TV article.]
The importance of precision was emphasized by Prof. Ted Postol’s in his analysis of weaponry Iran used to retaliate against Israel. His conclusion was that drones were more powerful than ballistic missiles because they are so precise. Precision raises the probability that a target is destroyed and thus an objective achieved. The imagery also demonstrated that the US bases had no effective defence against the IRGC’s weaponry. Attempting to reuse these bases would be suicidal.
The admission of defeat by the three officers, combined with this understanding that the US regional bases are either destroyed or that it is suicidal to use them leads one to the obvious conclusion that US military efficacy in the region is seriously degraded. Discussions of the US re-starting an overt military campaign against Iran are disingenuous. The home of the US 5th fleet and the offices of CENTCOM can be found back in the US.
The US could not defend its bases in the region. It cannot have protected Israel’s either.
The Unsinkable Child Murdering Aircraft Carrier
On May 28th JFeed republished an article in English from the Israeli media. It complained that the US airforce was “occupying” Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport. The US military was consuming 70% of the civilian airport’s capacity.
This demonstrated the level of damage which Iran had inflicted upon Israeli military airfields because it forced the US military to use Ben Gurion.
[A snapshot of an archived copy of the JFeed publication.]
Prof. Postol identified an additional element in the efficacy of Iran’s attacks against US and Israeli targets. From his analysis of social media posted (public) mobile phone video recordings of attacks on Israel he reliably concluded that the PAC-2 and PAC-3 missiles fired by the US Patriot “defence” system missed at least 97% of Iranian ballistic missiles in the videos. There is no effective missile defence against manoeuvrable hypersonic missiles.
Claims of 90% efficacy by the US Military Industrial Complex’s contractors are a fraud which Postol would like to help any interested Congressional representative expose. He has publicly offered to help in any capacity. The 97% rate of failure he discovered reveals the damage suffered by Israel’s military installations.
The surface components of US and Israeli military installations within range of the IRGC’s weaponry are either destroyed or vulnerable to destruction and there is nothing either can do about it.
4 Weeks Ago
Since US President Trump signed the 2026-06-17 Memorandum with Iran, US officials have played a pantomime of public misdirection, dutifully reproduced by US corporate media. For a sonorous and erudite summary of the real state of affairs one can listen to former US Assistant Secretary of Defence Chas Freeman with Prof. Pascal Lottaz on Neutrality Studies (see sources).
Trump signed the MoU, ostensibly committing the US to a series of measures to demonstrate its trustworthiness, for two reasons. The first is the military defeat outlined above. The second is that at that point the US was “4 weeks” away from depleting its own “sour crude” oil reserves which it would need to produce kerosene (aviation fuel) and diesel fuel. That “4 weeks” expires in a few days.
Deliveries from the Gulf to the US take 4 - 5 weeks to arrive. Thereafter the oil needs to be refined and then delivered to distribution points (gas stations, airports). Summed, there is an approximate 2 month delay between export from the Gulf to US use.
Nuclear powered ships do just fine without aviation fuel. Military aircraft do not. US military aircraft have mostly been flown back to the US before a lack of fuel stranded them in the Gulf region.
Fantasy Foreign Policy
The past 4 months (March to June, inclusive) of deprivation of 20% of the world’s supply of these fuels have drained almost all but China’s reserves of them. The global economy is now operating on a razor thin fuel reserve margin. The cause is the US war of aggression which it lost against Iran. The remedy is for the US to stop provoking Iran and to begin delivering on its commitments.
Trump 2.0 is running the clock down, looking for an escape from the embarrassment of having to return to Iran funds it stole in 1979 and thereafter. Trump 2.0 is also hoping Iran wont charge a fee of transit for the strait. The Trump regime is, to quote Freeman, playing “Fantasy Foreign Policy”
Having lost the war, the US cannot compel Iran to release its control on the Strait of Hormuz. Iran will charge an administrative fee to recover funds as compensation for the illegal US and Israeli war of aggression. The US or Europe clamouring about differences in fees is hot air. The same is true about any non-Iranian military presence in the Gulf or Strait. The French clearing mines in the strait? Go bake baguettes.
The fee structure is an important point of pressure for Iran to apply in obtaining financial redress for the war. Iran’s government cares about Chinese and Russian approval of their policy for the Persian Gulf Strait Authority (PGSA). The rest of the world will pay up as charged.
The scale of fees for that policy will be a bargaining point in the actual negotiations which are under way.
Negotiations versus Mediation
Former ambassador Freeman made a clear distinction between negotiation and mediation. The current interaction between the US and Iran is mediation, by Pakistan and/or Qatar. It is, currently, symbolic. Iran will engage in negotiation, as opposed to mediation, after the US has met its commitments from the MoU, not before. All talk to the contrary is spin. The Iranian team involved in the mediation were even reprimanded by the Iranian Council of Experts for wandering too close to “negotiation” with a non-contrite US.
The real discussions are between the Gulf monarchies, Pakistan, Yemen (Ansar Allah), Turkey, Egypt and Iran, as outlined in Pepe Escobar’s most recent article. Their purpose is the establishment of a new security architecture.
Pakistan is playing a strong role. It is providing the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia with security (Army, Navy and Airforce). Its contingent can be expanded to 80,000 from the existing 8,000 personnel.
Iran has been judicious with its retribution on the Gulf monarchies which provided assistance to the US and Israel. Iran’s targets were US bases, not national ones, unless a monarchy persisted in supporting the aggressors. This has resulted in a split, with the Kingdom and Qatar wishing to make peace based on a new security structure and Bahrain, the UAE and Kuwait wriggling in discomfort at the new insecure reality.
Saudi recognizes that a restart of the war will be to the detriment of the entire region. Iran is serious. It will destroy the energy infrastructure of the monarchies if they support it being attacked again. Iran has proven that it can do this in a heartbeat. Saudi has vowed its determination to avoid this through the construction of the new security architecture.
This will require a new leaf in non-interference across the region. The Arabs have to learn to resist proxying or being proxied in their own backyard. This is no small task. Many a hatchet has to be buried, with the persecution of Ansar Allah in Yemen being but a beginning.
In the end, the issue is Palestine. It is unavoidable.
The Poison of Genocide
Freeman also provided a US political survey, from New York, to Maine, Colorado, and California, of recent electoral victories for candidates declaring that they do not take AIPAC money (Zionist funding). He noted that this represents a divide between the political elite (Uniparty) and the electorate. It will manifest in the upcoming November midterms.
Israel has increased four-fold the budget for its Ministry of unTruth, signalling that it understands just how detested it has become, in the US and internationally.
An election in Israel must be held on or before October 27th. It looks likely that incumbent Prime Minister, Genocider-in-Chief Netanyahu, will be defeated and then end up in jail for corruption. It is also highly likely that his replacement will attempt to continue the policy of indiscriminate murder in Gaza, the West Bank and southern Lebanon, along with the annexation of southern Syria. Political opposition to these crimes may come from new Congressional representatives after the US midterms. It will not come from the population of Israel, which Freeman frankly diagnosed as psychotic.
How else can one describe a state which supports at over 70% a policy of the continuous murder of children?
The Power of Sacrifice
This week, martyred Imam Ali Khamenei is being mourned in Iran and abroad.
The courage of the people of Iran cannot be doubted. They marched defiantly across bridges as the US bombed them.
In a moment of astounding power, Iranian parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Ghalibaf wept, barely standing, in front of the coffins of Imam Khamenei and family, including a 14 month old grandchild, all murdered by the US and Israel.
Khamenei was imprisoned by the US installed Shah before the Islamic Revolution. He was consulted in his humble office by the revolutionary movement before and after the revolution. He remained in that same, plain office at the outset of the Ramadan war. When pleaded with to move to a safer place, he responded, “to which safe place will you take the other 93 million Iranians?”
Ghalibaf understands sacrifice. The people of Iran who saw him weep know it too. They were and are with him in a profound grief. The political power of that moment is incalculable.
Outside of Iran, beyond the emotional wasteland of Western political nihilism and greed, in the hearts of a humanity who know the beauty and innocence of a child, Iran and its people stand heroic in defiance against evil as they grieve in victory.
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Sources
Through lens of satellite imagery: How Irans precision strikes dismantled Americas Persian Gulf military network; Yousef Ramazani [Press TV]; Archive.today; 2026-07-01
Millions of Israelis Face Flight Cancellations as U.S. Military Occupies Ben Gurion Airport; JFeed; Archive.today; 2026-05-28
Iran Stands Firm on Hormuz as US Desperately Dangles Carrots to No Avail ; Simplicius; Simplicius’ Garden of Knowledge; 2026-07-04
Is the MoU cat dead, alive or in a coma?; Pepe Escobar; The Unz Review; 2026-07-04
Requiem for America on the Fourth of July; Chris Hedges; The Chris Hedges Report; 2026-07-03
Victorious Iran; YesXorNo; 2026-05-03
Safety By Love & Understanding; YesXorNo; 2024-04-20
Videos
Three Front War MADNESS: Washington Just Lost Everything; Prof. Lottaz interviews Amb. Chas Freeman; Neutrality Studies; 2026-07-05
Huge Crowds Gather At Imam Khamenei’s Funeral w/ Dimitri Lascaris; Reason2Resist with Dimitri Lascaris; Reason2Resist with Dimitri Lascaris; 2026-07-04
The US Military LOST against Iran?; Macgregor, Davis and Kent in discussion; Warrior Diplomacy [Macgregor]; 2026-07-04
Prof Ted Postal PROVES Patriot Intercept Rate of Iranian Missiles SINGLE DIGITS; Daniel Davis / Deep Dive; Daniel Davis / Deep Dive; 2026-06-29
KONSTANTINOVKA HAS FALLEN🎯 389 Ukrainian Drones Downed in Massive Failed Strike💥❌ MS 2026.07.04; Dima; Military Summary; 2026-07-04
Over in the other US war, Russia completed the capture of the city of Konstantinivka.
RUSSIA LEARNS FROM IRAN WAR /Alastair Crooke & Lt Col Daniel Davis; Daniel Davis / Deep Dive; Daniel Davis / Deep Dive; 2026-07-03
Crooke on the current propaganda “terrorist” campaign from Europe to suck the US back into an overt role in the lost war against Russia.
Copyleft: CC0
