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   WITCH WILL CONTINUE
If he had another brain it would be lonely
(comment deleted)
Iran denies Trump's claims: 'We reject all negotiations – US has failed and Hormuz will remain closed' https://www.ynetnews.com/article/0t2zpd7dr

And Brent futures are starting to climb up again fast.

Trump's post is either him freaking out of a Black Monday and/or losing military command, or it can be interpreted as market manipulation. But I don't think he is much in control anymore.

Trump just said that a former president praised him in private for his war of aggression in Iran. All living former presidents confirmed they've had no communication with him.
Talks? With whom? I'm doubtful.
"A respected Iranian leader." Whatever that means.

Meanwhile, multiple Iranian sources have denied any talks taking place. At least with the US.

Jesus this website is an abomination. Javascript popover that animates to try to get under your fingers and constant refreshes.
TACO Tuesday comes on Monday.

My take: He wants "pauses" because he wants to resupply the strike group and/or wait for the Marine unit to transfer. I have my suspicions Iran isn't gonna fall for this trick.

Statements from Trump should be completely ignored, which Iran is effectively doing.

It’s as if he’s just options trading.

I wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if he attacked those power plants this evening.

The amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli with its marines will be arriving on station shortly [0]. The Iranian regime have been preparing for a fight with the Great Satan since it came to power.

It will be a holy war for the Iranian regime so they will not back down. So unless Trump/US does back down it's safe to assume things are going to get far worse.

[0] https://news.usni.org/2026/03/18/3-ship-tripoli-arg-31st-meu...

The "productive" talks are, of course, a lie. Trump just said that a former president praised him in private for his war of aggression in Iran. All living former presidents confirmed they've had no communication with him.
I'm hoping that this is part of a specific plan - Reza Pahlavi has made statements about his trying to influence Trump to not strike Iran's energy sector. Given that those shortly followed Trump's own threats to do so, it seems reasonable to think that the whole interaction could be designed to make Pahlavi look good in front of the Iranian public by apparently obtaining concessions from the US via diplomacy.

If that is the case, I'd expect some kind of official recognition of Pahlavi, or at least some kind of unofficial indication that the US would consider him to be an acceptable leader.

Would the Iranians accept Pahlavi? They don't love the current regime, but overthrowing the Shah was widely popular.

I hear that Pahlavi is less bad than his father, but surely somebody in Iran has a claim to leadership without being an obvious American puppet.