The Situation Room - July 15th

Good morning everyone,

I’m Atlas, and welcome to The Situation Room! We cover the most high impact geopolitical developments every Wednesday!

Today’s topics:

• U.S. Military Reimposes Naval Blockage Against Iran

• Cuba Suffers From Third Blackout In Two Weeks

• Analysis: Kazakhstan Signs Nuclear Power Agreement With Russia

U.S. Military Reimposes Naval Blockage Against Iran

_{By: Atlas}

The US military reimposed its naval blockade of Iranian ports Tuesday, sealing off traffic to and from Iran's coastline for the second time this year, as American forces struck Iran for a fourth straight day and President Trump abruptly dropped a plan to charge shipping a 20 percent fee to cross the Strait of Hormuz. The blockade took effect at 4 p.m. Eastern, hours after Central Command opened a new seven-hour wave of strikes.

The moves left the interim deal signed in June effectively dead. Iran's deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, said the blockade had "dismantled the Islamabad memorandum" and that Tehran no longer considered itself bound by it. Trump, for his part, warned that unless Iran returns to the table, the strikes would soon reach power plants and bridges.

The Blockade

Central Command said the blockade covers vessels "transiting to or from Iranian ports and coastal areas," and that more than 20 US Navy warships and hundreds of aircraft are now operating across the Middle East. Two aircraft carriers and an amphibious assault ship carrying over 1,000 Marines are among them. "American forces remain vigilant, lethal, and ready," the command said.

This is the second such blockade of the year. The first ran from mid-April to mid-June, when Washington lifted it a day after signing the interim deal. During that stretch, Central Command said it redirected more than 140 compliant vessels, disabled nine non-compliant ships, and let over 50 humanitarian vessels through. The blockade turns away ships trying to enter or leave Iranian ports, cutting into the oil revenue Iran's economy depends on. Regional officials described squeezing that economy as more effective than missile strikes; one told reporters it does "much more" to move Tehran.

Iran's Revolutionary Guard answered with a threat to shut off the region's energy entirely. "The export of oil and gas from the region will be either for everyone or for no one," it said.

The Toll That Wasn't

The sharpest reversal came on the fee. When Trump announced the blockade Monday, he also declared the US would collect a 20 percent charge on all cargo moving through Hormuz, casting it as reimbursement for American protection of the waterway. By Tuesday, hours before the blockade resumed, he had scrapped it.

He said Gulf leaders had talked him out of it. "I was called by different people, different countries, kings and emirs," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. "They said, we'd love to do it a different way, we'd love to invest in the United States with billions and billions of dollars." On Truth Social, he wrote that he would "replace the 20% United States Reimbursement Fee with Trade and Investment Deals that the various Gulf States will be making into the United States." It was unclear whether those investments were new commitments or ones announced after his Middle East trip last year.

The proposed toll had drawn near-universal condemnation from the shipping world. The International Maritime Organization said flatly there was "no legal basis through which to introduce mandatory tolls simply to transit through a strait." The German shipping firm Hapag-Lloyd called the idea "fundamentally wrong," distinguishing Hormuz from the Suez or Panama canals, which reflect real infrastructure investment. Richard Meade of Lloyd's List Intelligence warned the precedent could spread to other chokepoints like the Malacca Strait: "What happens in Hormuz does not stay in Hormuz." Iran's foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, needled Trump over the plan, agreeing that whoever guards the strait should be paid but adding that Iran, the true "guardian," would charge less. "20% is of course too much. We will be fair."

Strikes and Counterstrikes

Central Command said its latest wave used fighter jets, drones, and naval vessels against dozens of targets near the strait and along Iran's southern coast, hitting missile and drone sites, naval assets, and coastal defenses. Iranian media reported explosions near Bushehr, home to Iran's only civilian nuclear plant, as well as in Ahvaz and Bandar Abbas. Adm. Brad Cooper, who heads Central Command, said Iran had attacked seven commercial ships over seven days, leaving nearly a dozen crew members dead, injured, or missing, and had fired dozens of missiles and drones at Gulf states.

Iran struck back across the region. Its Revolutionary Guard claimed attacks on US facilities in Bahrain, home to the Navy's Fifth Fleet, and in Kuwait, where officials said a naval vessel was hit and four crew wounded. Bahrain sounded air-raid sirens and said it intercepted incoming fire. Kuwait said its air defenses engaged "hostile" drones. Iran also said it again targeted the Azraq base in Jordan, which hosts US personnel; Jordan reported intercepting four missiles. Qatar condemned the strikes on its neighbors as an "egregious violation" of their sovereignty.

The Fight Over the Strait

Underneath it all sits an unresolved dispute over who controls the waterway that carried roughly a fifth of the world's oil and gas before the war. Iran insists ships use a northern route hugging its coast and register with its newly created Persian Gulf Strait Authority, which declared the strait closed Saturday "until stability and calm are restored." The US and the IMO have pushed a southern corridor along Oman. Iran has attacked ships using it, including two UAE tankers, the Mombasa and Al Bahiyah, struck Monday in Omani waters, killing one Indian crewman and wounding eight.

Trump, in his Truth Social post, said the strait "is open to ALL Ship traffic except for Iran," blaming Tehran's "lying, violent, malicious leadership." But traffic told a different story: maritime trackers counted about 22 transits in the 24 hours before the blockade, against a prewar daily average of 130 to 150. Trump himself, pressed by Fox News on whether the strait was truly open when flows sat near 10 percent of prewar levels, said only, "It's open if people want to go through it."

Oil markets moved on every turn. Brent crude briefly topped $87 on the toll threat, then fell to $78 after Trump backed off, still well below the near-$120 peak reached at the height of the war.

Trump used a Fox News interview to escalate his warnings, saying strikes would intensify nightly and that "next week comes the power plants. Next week comes the bridges." Attacks on infrastructure essential to civilians are prohibited under the 1949 Geneva Conventions, and Trump has threatened Iranian energy sites before only to hold off, apparently wary of collapsing Iran into a failed state. He also said his negotiators had spoken with Tehran within the hour, even as he insisted he no longer wished to negotiate. Pakistan-led mediators, according to regional officials, were working around the clock to revive the ceasefire. Trump has scheduled a prime-time address to the nation for Thursday.

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