ON Monday, US president Trump responded to the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the US and Iran as it reached the end of the 60 days, during which negotiations were supposed to take place on ending the unprovoked war launched on February 28. He told journalists he was ‘not in a hurry’ to end the war.
Trump followed this up on Tuesday when he posted a map on his Truth Social site of the Strait of Hormuz bearing the caption ‘New US Territory’.
This in turn followed Trump’s declaration last week that the Strait was ‘American territory’ following the ‘surrender’ of Iran.
This was not just the delusional ravings of a president facing defeat, and with no way out of a war started by the US and Israel.
Trump’s frustration at the inability of the US to achieve any of its objectives, notably the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20% of the world’s oil and gas depends on to transit, has reached boiling point.
His frustration was on show when this week he threatened to ‘bomb the sh-t’ out of Oman, a close ally of the US, after Iran announced it had reached agreement with Oman on a route for ships to travel through the Strait.
If Trump and the US ruling class think they can bully and threaten Iran into submission when all the bombs and missiles failed, then they are completely deluded.
In fact, the crisis caused by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz is set to massively escalate as the oil reserves in the US fall to the lowest level since 1982.
The Trump administration has so far managed to keep the price of petrol at the pumps to levels just about bearable to US workers, and keep the American economy from an inflationary crisis by releasing millions of barrels of crude oil stockpiled under the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR).
Last week, 5.3 million barrels were released in an attempt to keep oil prices down, bringing down the stockpile to 293.4 million barrels, a level last seen in the early 1980s.
This constant release has had little, if any, effect, in bringing down the price of oil.
Across the world the same picture is emerging of reserve oil supplies being drained in an attempt to hold back a massive increase in oil prices.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) reports that global stockpiles have fallen by 410 million barrels since the start of the imperialists war on Iran with the IEA warning: ‘The urgency of reopening the Strait has increased, as previously available inventory buffers are rapidly depleting.’
The prolonged closure of the Strait will push the cost of oil into the stratosphere and drive the world economies over the edge and into economic recession and collapse.
Trump and the entire US capitalist system is caught in a trap with no way out except, to either admit defeat at the hands of the Iranians, or escalate the war in a way that will engulf the Middle East and the entire world, including the prospect of Trump resorting to nuclear weapons in a final attempt to claim victory.
Meanwhile, the TUC is carrying on with its usual role of downplaying the severity of the crisis and adopting the position that this is just another blip in the capitalist system that workers will just have to put up, with the minor inconvenience of having their lives destroyed through recession and war.
The trade unions can no longer be allowed to stand by as the crisis rapidly comes to a head.
The working class must force its trade unions in the UK, US, Europe and across the world to immediately mobilise the strength of the working class in mass general strikes to bring down their capitalist governments, replacing them with workers governments and socialism.
Join the WRP and Young Socialists, build sections of the International Committee of the Fourth International to provide the leadership required for the victory of the world socialist revolution – there is no time to lose!
