USA is not even content with attacking one country at a time.

Now there is also the blockade of Cuba that intercepts their imports of oil and has created serious problems there with food and services. This cannot be considered as anything else as an act of war, even if a war is not declared.

Besides the blockade, USA has also threatened with an attack. With the harm done indiscriminately to most Cuban citizens by the blockade, it is even harder for USA to pretend that they are the good guys, while they use their might to attack without any justification a country too weak to present any kind of danger for USA.

You're only saying that because this is only 3 weeks old. Things are going to get a lot worse. If this ended tomorrow, the direct impact will be felt for years before we go back to "normal". And the geopolitical changes are going to be seismic.

First, it's been exposed that the US cannot defend Israel despite spending $1 trillion a year on "defense", billions if not trillions on missile defence and the presence of multiple carrier groups in the region. This alone rewrites regional geopolitics in the coming decades.

Second, the US has exerted influence on the region with a security guarantee that's like NATO on steroids. It's a protection racket (like NATO). We give despotic regimes weapons and we dictate policy, get bases in the region and get the use of terriotiral waters and airspace for whatever we want, basically. But by starting this war of choice, we've shown that there's no security guarantee at all for the Gulf states.

Now, these states will continue to align with the US for purely selfish reasons. For example, Saudi Arabia will do so to maintain the House of Saud, the royal family's control of the country. Many Saudis would prefer this not to be the case but were Saudi Arabia to break from the US, the regime would inevitably fall (IMHO). So they can't abandon the US. But this will only go so far as some of these regimes may fall anyway in a prolonged conflict (eg Bahrain).

Third, the military options here are dire. Militarily, the Strait cannot be reopened. The only military options are retreat or escalation. Trump has threatened to blow up power plants. If he does that, Iran will blow up desalination plants. Or the pipeline that supplies 30-40% of Israel's energy (from Azerbijan through Turkey). The escalation ladder inevitably leads to the use of nuclear weapons by Israel and/or the US, which is untenable.

Fourth, we haven't even begun to feel the impacts yet. Yes, gas prices are higher. That's only the beginning. Utility and food prices are going to spike. Higher diesel costs mean higher transportation. Higher bunkers costs will hit shipping costs. We're likely to see a repeat of 2021-2022 era inflation, if not worse.

If the Strait opened tomorrow, most of those things are already baked in for the next few years.

Fifth, countries are undergoing a sort of "energy nationalism". China, for eample, has stockpiled huge amounts of oil and stopped exported refined petroleum products. Other countries have done similar. This is going to have an outsized impact on countries completely dependent on energy imports, which includes most of Asia.

Sixth, the downstream effects go well beyond secondary products like fertilizer. For example, helium and other materials for chipmaking in Taiwan.

Lastly, this has massively strengthened Russia's position. You will likely see the lifting of sanctions and conceding of territory in Ukraine as an almost -inevitable consequence of an oil supply shock, particularly as LNG prices go up and we hit a heating crisis in Europe.

You are correct that the US has been destroying alliances but it's this war of choice that's going to make that really bite. Iran negotiated in good faith to end the 12 day war, which only ended because of missile interceptor shortages, a problem that's going to take years to address.

This time around Iran has had no choice but to make the consequences of a war of aggression so dire that the US and Israel never think about doing this again.

Also, North Korea demonstrated that the only way to get the US to leave you alone is to have nuclear weapons. The previous Ayatollah had a fatwa against nuclear weapons. Well, the US and Israel killed that guy in his house with his family. Iran now really has no choice but to develop nuclear weapons to guarantee their security. And I can't blame them.

With all do respect, it is you who is jumping to conclusions because this is only 3 weeks old.

> First, it's been exposed that the US cannot defend Israel despite spending $1 trillion a year on "defense", billions if not trillions on missile defence and the presence of multiple carrier groups in the region.

The US never has and has no reason to claim that it would or could stop all missile attacks on Israel from Iran. The US has long claimed that it's interceptors have a better than 50% interception rate against ballistic missiles. This has been shown to be if anything a dramatically conservative estimate in recent conflicts. But the math of interception has always been obvious - if you throw more missiles at a missile defense system than it has interceptors, some will get through. For years the main grievance the US has had with Iran has been its massive stockpile of long range missiles and, more recently, drones. That's the whole reason the nuclear agreement reached under Obama was not considered good enough by the subsequent administration (domestic politics aside).

Israel knew when it launched the war that it was going to get hit back. They are certainly not unhappy with the US' conduct of the war.

> Second, the US has exerted influence on the region with a security guarantee that's like NATO on steroids. It's a protection racket (like NATO). We give despotic regimes weapons and we dictate policy, get bases in the region and get the use of terriotiral waters and airspace for whatever we want, basically. But by starting this war of choice, we've shown that there's no security guarantee at all for the Gulf states.

This conflict most certainly does not mean that the security guarantee doesn't exist. The gulf states didn't start a war and find their ally reluctant to come to their aid. They instead found that they didn't have the option to sit out a war if the coalition they have been a part of for years goes to war. They may be rightfully very upset about a lack of communication and coordination before the conflict broke out, but this is again an issue with the current administration, not their long term strategy of alignment with the US.

> Now, these states will continue to align with the US for purely selfish reasons.

That's not a change to the status quo.

> Third, the military options here are dire. Militarily, the Strait cannot be reopened. The only military options are retreat or escalation. Trump has threatened to blow up power plants. If he does that, Iran will blow up desalination plants. Or the pipeline that supplies 30-40% of Israel's energy (from Azerbijan through Turkey). The escalation ladder inevitably leads to the use of nuclear weapons by Israel and/or the US, which is untenable.

That's a rather absurd line of reasoning. While not easy, militarily reopening the strait is very much still a possibility. Even if it remains closed for a period of time, that doesn't really hurt the US directly. Iran does not have the means to escalate to nuclear war, and the US has no motive.

> Fourth, we haven't even begun to feel the impacts yet. Yes, gas prices are higher. That's only the beginning. Utility and food prices are going to spike. Higher diesel costs mean higher transportation. Higher bunkers costs will hit shipping costs. We're likely to see a repeat of 2021-2022 era inflation, if not worse.

Sure if the war goes on for an extended period of time it will be bad for the economy, but this is a temporary pain. Once the war ends, oil prices will go back down. The previous blunders have done irreparable harm that will be felt for decades.

> If the Strait opened tomorrow, most of those things are already baked in for the next few years.

Nothing has been baked in for years. 100% of the concern right now is speculation that the strait might be closed for an extended period of time.

> Fifth, countries are undergoing a sort of "energy nationalism". China, for eample, has stockpiled huge amounts of oil and stopped exported refined petroleum products. Other countries have done similar. This is going to have an outsized impact on countries completely dependent on energy imports, which includes most of Asia.

This is not a change to the status quo.

> Lastly, this has massively strengthened Russia's position. You will likely see the lifting of sanctions and conceding of territory in Ukraine as an almost -inevitable consequence of an oil supply shock, particularly as LNG prices go up and we hit a heating crisis in Europe.

The adminsitration already massively strengthened Russia's position, putting pressure on Ukraine to concede territory and reducing pressure with regards to sanctions. While stepping further in that direction is a further blunder, the previous was far more catastrophic. They already set the house ablaze, this is just pouring gas on the flames.

> Also, North Korea demonstrated that the only way to get the US to leave you alone is to have nuclear weapons.

This is not a change to the status quo.