"Esfandiary, of Bloomberg Economics, said Iran “theoretically knew” it had leverage over the strait but was uncertain how significant the impact would be if it acted on those threats. Now, she added, Tehran “has discovered the impact.” The thing that mystifies me is that U. S. war planners "theoretically knew" this, too; at least, I would assume. The whole war strikes me as the current administration finding out the hard way why previous administrations all the way back to Reagan didn't commit to warfare against Iran, even if they wanted to. "FAFO", as the kids say, I guess. OTOH, I do have theory floating around in my head that someone got one of the letters wrong and confused Iran with Iraq: "we kicked their ass before, we'll do it again!" "Uh, different and much better-armed country, sir." Or, as has been famously said, "Don't confuse me with the facts." [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_Landgrebe
Havoc
What like a cent per Meg
2OEH8eoCRo0
Well...you said you were tired of US hegemony. Enjoy!
seydor
Iran is basically trolling the US with the superpowers it accidentally acquired after being attacked
gpt5
While folks here are quick to jump to blaming the US for this, it's also worth noting that the US is the one that has been enforcing international order so far. So it gives us a bit of a glimpse of what would the world would look like with a more isolationist US, or a multipolar world.
toast0
FYI the article is viewable on CNN lite: https://lite.cnn.com/2026/05/17/middleeast/iran-hormuz-under...
properbrew
And what's to stop them increasing the fees at any time for "protection"?
francisofascii
Sounds like rent-seeking economics at the International level
hqrag
Iran still didn't get the memo that the closure is precisely what the U.S. wants. Get Japan, South Korean and others on U.S. natural resources to control them like the EU. Why Russia goes along with it is debatable. Maybe they hope that the EU buys again from them, maybe that whole scenario was discussed in Alaska between orange man and Putin. Who knows. We only get lies and the real plans unfold years after. The EU should however stop guessing what goes on between the dictators in secret and simply pursue its own interests.
DoctorOetker
What makes Iran believe unilateral fees on subsea internet cables would be paid? If they start paying in this case, the rest of the world is going to start demanding unilateral fees from the operators. If operators are going to pay up anyhow, they might prefer chipping in for NATO support than publically rewarding such behavior... "chipping in" could range from symbolic to substantial, as the alternative would be facing a never-ending stream of unilateral fees worldwide, in fact even all unaffected operators of internet cables are hereby motivated to organize a collective crowd-funding for military support of these cables: the future affected party could otherwise be themselves!
nazgulsenpai
This is just so incredibly embarrassing. We're now negotiating to end a war with a country we have claimed to have defeated like 500 times now, over terms that will not even just return the region to the pre-war status quo, but (most likely) giving them more power than they had when the first bombs were dropped. Not to mention shattering the illusion that the US can somehow protect the gulf states, along with most of our bases in the region and 13 US lives. Even if the US somehow recovers the enriched uranium they now claim was the motive, why would Iran not want to build nukes now? It would be suicidal not to. (I say this with no sympathy to the Iranian government, just looking at reality.)
anonymousiam
It's pretty unlikely that this will happen. The government of Iran has made a lot of unreasonable demands, but has very little power to back them up.
Related Discussions
Found 5 related stories in 73.4ms across 8,303 title embeddings via pgvector HNSW
Discussion Highlights (12 comments)
mikestew
"Esfandiary, of Bloomberg Economics, said Iran “theoretically knew” it had leverage over the strait but was uncertain how significant the impact would be if it acted on those threats. Now, she added, Tehran “has discovered the impact.” The thing that mystifies me is that U. S. war planners "theoretically knew" this, too; at least, I would assume. The whole war strikes me as the current administration finding out the hard way why previous administrations all the way back to Reagan didn't commit to warfare against Iran, even if they wanted to. "FAFO", as the kids say, I guess. OTOH, I do have theory floating around in my head that someone got one of the letters wrong and confused Iran with Iraq: "we kicked their ass before, we'll do it again!" "Uh, different and much better-armed country, sir." Or, as has been famously said, "Don't confuse me with the facts." [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_Landgrebe
Havoc
What like a cent per Meg
2OEH8eoCRo0
Well...you said you were tired of US hegemony. Enjoy!
seydor
Iran is basically trolling the US with the superpowers it accidentally acquired after being attacked
gpt5
While folks here are quick to jump to blaming the US for this, it's also worth noting that the US is the one that has been enforcing international order so far. So it gives us a bit of a glimpse of what would the world would look like with a more isolationist US, or a multipolar world.
toast0
FYI the article is viewable on CNN lite: https://lite.cnn.com/2026/05/17/middleeast/iran-hormuz-under...
properbrew
And what's to stop them increasing the fees at any time for "protection"?
francisofascii
Sounds like rent-seeking economics at the International level
hqrag
Iran still didn't get the memo that the closure is precisely what the U.S. wants. Get Japan, South Korean and others on U.S. natural resources to control them like the EU. Why Russia goes along with it is debatable. Maybe they hope that the EU buys again from them, maybe that whole scenario was discussed in Alaska between orange man and Putin. Who knows. We only get lies and the real plans unfold years after. The EU should however stop guessing what goes on between the dictators in secret and simply pursue its own interests.
DoctorOetker
What makes Iran believe unilateral fees on subsea internet cables would be paid? If they start paying in this case, the rest of the world is going to start demanding unilateral fees from the operators. If operators are going to pay up anyhow, they might prefer chipping in for NATO support than publically rewarding such behavior... "chipping in" could range from symbolic to substantial, as the alternative would be facing a never-ending stream of unilateral fees worldwide, in fact even all unaffected operators of internet cables are hereby motivated to organize a collective crowd-funding for military support of these cables: the future affected party could otherwise be themselves!
nazgulsenpai
This is just so incredibly embarrassing. We're now negotiating to end a war with a country we have claimed to have defeated like 500 times now, over terms that will not even just return the region to the pre-war status quo, but (most likely) giving them more power than they had when the first bombs were dropped. Not to mention shattering the illusion that the US can somehow protect the gulf states, along with most of our bases in the region and 13 US lives. Even if the US somehow recovers the enriched uranium they now claim was the motive, why would Iran not want to build nukes now? It would be suicidal not to. (I say this with no sympathy to the Iranian government, just looking at reality.)
anonymousiam
It's pretty unlikely that this will happen. The government of Iran has made a lot of unreasonable demands, but has very little power to back them up.