Hopefully more people start realizing this. It's been happening behind the scenes for way too long, but now it's out in the open, they don't care about hiding it anymore.
Also driving the price up are the Ansarallah advances in Yemen and today's Ansarallah bombings of the Saudi East-West pipeline. The market expects that they'll use military force to attempt to close the Bab al-Mandab strait, with their past attempts at closing the strait, stated goals of closing the strait and newly reported use of Claude to develop medium-range ballistic missile guidance software as evidence.
Would be surprising if they don't in fact. In fact it is perhaps quite straightforward to skip Claude and rather tell Qwen 3.8 27b to create an angry birds clone where you track the bird... or something along the line. Pretty sure they are also very good at smuggling various assets through borders, and where not.
It also looks like the US is reducing the amount of oil drawn from the strategic reserves (https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=W...), that could also affect the price. But the hostilities heating up overall is probably the largest effect.
> newly reported use of Claude to develop medium-range ballistic missile guidance software as evidence.
Why would they use Claude? Iran, China, and Russia have far more advanced MRBM systems than the US. So unless Claude is training on top secret info that the US military doesn't even have, they would be getting worse information than just talking to their allies.
It is marketing op from Anthropic. No proof given. More like trust-me-bro assertions. This also to pacify people that it is under control while quietly hide any real damages. China and Russia for this situation best considered not exist. Simplofy analyst has more winning chances, reality be damned.
Franklin was pretty specific, it was a good enough Constitution "for now" with a rickety set of checks and balances that'd do for a while .. until a Despot showed up.
He was thinking of "the people" having an ongoing scrutiny and active control to prevent any such slide .. rather than sitting about on their arses, not voting and counting on using guns if it got too bad.
They started that path to economic suicide by deciding they don't want cheap gas as well as shutting down reactors. Well, depending on your geopolitical beliefs, entire situation was possibility coordinated to get Europe on American LNG and off the stuff piped from Rusland and the Middle East. This was all in play well before Orange Man, but wow did he push the gas pedal down and accelerate it (pun intended). BTW there's only one way out of it, but many Europeans aren't going to like the medicine nor the global primacy people running the USA.
You don't strengthen an enemy (Russia) by buying their products. Defence is more important.
> as well as shutting down reactors
A German problem, not a wider European one.
The solution is to accelerate the transition into electric vehicles (including HGVs etc.), renewable energy, and nuclear. Oil is obviously still needed for materials production, air fuel, and so on, but extricating ourselves from situations where oil is becoming optional as fast as possible is the best course, not continuing to buy cheap gas from an aggressive neighbour that's fucking your elections and invading its neighbour.
How is Russia your enemy? They were happy selling gas to you. They were not so happy about the prospect of NATO setting up shop in Crimea nor American missile bases 250 miles from Moscow (remember "not one inch" after the USSR dissolution then later Putin practically begging at the Munich Security Conference in 2007 for NATO not to expand up it's ass?), which is where that was all heading. The reality is EU let Americans push them around (both Europe and their Ukrainian proxy) for their geopolitical objective of global "end of history" hegemony/primacy. And that's not even Russian propaganda, the American stink tanks and politicians have talked about this non-stop and out in the open since the 1990s. The Iran war is the result of the same "containment" policy, btw - but they don't have nukes so they received direct kinetic action. I bet if you said Yankee go home and stopped throwing drones at Wildberries (yes, that is all NATO ISR and targeting plus EU financing), made an agreement with the Russians where they weren't stressed about their western flank, then they would be more than happy to get back to selling gas and buying Mercedes. Don't believe me? That's what they were doing before we freaked them out with a coup next door then started helping Kiev shell ethnic Russians in the Russian part of Ukraine in 2014. But hey, pat yourselves on the back and enjoy deindustrialization and decreasing living standards...
Bullshit. Orange Man was elected in 2015, and Nord Stream 1 was shut down by Russia in 2022, while Europeans decided to construct Nord Stream 2 to completion (also 2022).
Both of your statements are technically true (the cancelled pipeline was called South Stream).
Also true is that another pipeline called Balkan Stream connects to Turk Stream to transport the Russian gas into Bulgaria, Serbia, and Hungary, and went into operation in 2021.
> And it doesn't help most of our economies are all export economies,
The worst part of all this is that becoming more export focused was pushed heavily by Germany during the euro crisis, and now its causing more problems.
Honestly, I'm coming round to the notion that Angela Merkel was literally wrong on everything she ever touched.
Mind you, German political culture consistently makes the wrong decisions (basically in hock to the ICE car industry, which has aged badly).
> In a world where the Russo-Ukrainian conflict doesn't happen she was fine.
The German (so not just her) position on the post financial crisis reforms were wildly misguided, and her taking in of Syrian immigrants also didn't end well.
I think that shutting down the nuclear plants would also have been recognised as a bad idea, even without the war.
> and her taking in of Syrian immigrants also didn't end well.
Syrian refugees.
They were escaping a civil war, they weren't looking for a job.
Most Germans supported taking the refugees as of 2015, less opposed it.
As for nuclear, Germany already had decided to phase it out before Merkel, in fact, her government partially reversed it. But Fukushima in 2011 was the nail in the coffin.
Looking at physical markers Europe has been in degrowth for 20 years, less things produce, less sqm of new building, less tonnes transported by freight, the GDP is saved by maths tricks and hopium
It's not our fault that we use oil and gas for daily activities (including going to protests). It's the governments' and corporations' fault for making us do it (or maybe not stopping us).
The manure already needs to be dealt with anyway. Does it really matter whether we're transporting oil or manure? Surplus manure is also causing environmental problems. Why are we using fertiliser if there's too much manure?
Trump explicitly claimed that China sells wind turbines to other countries but doesn't use them for their own needs.
That is of course a stupid lie.
But it's amazing how many smart liars say something similar to "China controls 70℅ of the global wind market" without clarifying that they install nearly all of that in China because they installed 73% of new wind capacity in 2025.
Yesterday I saw a full-sized 100% electric Volvo semi-truck here in Zurich. It was owned by Aldi and making a delivery to one of their stores. It was a bit louder than I expected but nevertheless impressive.
I personally think forcing less well off people to use worse modes of transport (or not travel at all) is not a well thought out scheme for reducing environmental impact.
For me, it doesn't matter because my main mode of transport is an EV - but it's a luxury I can afford. Many people that live around me cannot.
It just means these people donate more of their money to the wallets of already absurdly rich owners of companies like Shell and Exxon - instead of using it to enrich their own lives (see the increased profits these companies are making since Iran).
But at least on a positive note, EV sales in my country have never been higher since Trump invaded Iran, so it is somewhat triggering the well-off to finally make the ("scary") switch to EV's.
The EU imports 97 percent of their crude oil, which is needed to refine diesel and still import a further 10% of their refined diesel.
It is somewhat amazing that Europe hasn't embraced electrification even more but taxing diesel use to encourage using it wisely is a smart geopolitical play given their situation.
Taxation on crude oil and its byproducts is largely for each member state to decide, as is electrification policy.
In some cases the EU steps in; for example with CO2 emission quotas, electrification targets, and largely regulating how countries operate in between them (for example, if France sells energy to Spain, it has to follow some bloc regulations if I am not mistaken).
I find it somewhat amusing how people insist in commenting on EU as if it was something it is not.
Then your comment is sort of pointless too. Unless you want to argue "every country in the world that does not produce enough oil and does not have enough refining capacity for said oil should electrify".
I do argue that every oil importing country should electrify.
EU (collectively or independently) is distinct only in that it is ahead of the pack on many of these topics, hence why the Netherlands diesel price is higher than the US price, as noted by the comment I replied to.
But EU countries could and should still go further.
By all means, I don't disagree. I just have a policy of stressing the point that EU is not a country when people comment on it as of it had the powers of a national government.
In fact, as someone that lives in one of those countries, I am actually viewing the events in the middle east with optmism. The closure of Hormuz and Bab-el Mandeb are the sort of harsh push that we needed to get out of our collective asses and cut our dependency on a resource that is in every angle you look at terrible for those who depend on it.
I am not naive, and I know that it is not possible to cut it entirely (oil is used for more than fuel). But if we stop depending on it for vehicles, electricity generation, heating and ao on, it will make a huge difference already.
"War is merely the continuation of policy by other means."
"Since war is not an act of senseless passion but is controlled by its political object, the value of this object must determine the sacrifices to be made for it in magnitude and also in duration. Once the expenditure of effort exceeds the value of the political object, the object must be renounced and peace must follow."
----------
Clausewitz would have been flabbergasted by this war. If we're being overly generous to Trump, we might call it an act of senseless passion. The reality is probably worse. The U.S. still hasn't seemed to figure out what it's policy goals or winning conditions are, aside from the president's desire to be an all-powerful winner. Trump seemingly places no value on his nation's blood or treasure, so it might be a very long time before he begins to feel the effort his nation is expending isn't worth the value of his own vanity.
The U.S. needs to have its magna carta moment and reign in its mad king. Maybe that will come with the mid-terms, or maybe this war will drag on for two more years. Trump isn't going to stop it, now or after the mid-terms. As far as he's concerned, the pain isn't his.
Maybe we (and Clausewitz) needlessly rationalize past leaders as those rational actor ignoring their emotional passions. Trump puts emotions and passions right there in the open, not bothering with plausible denialities. Hegseth is open and proud on his "we do it to show we are masculine" doctrine. But, none of them is a new kind of guy like no one ever heard about before. Emotional irrational men were always present, always seeking power, sometimes getting it. We just strip that side of them, pretending it was calculated and rational.
The political objectives for the war were Netanyahu's who managed quite the move in getting Trump to commit to this. But still an open question how much his motives were rationally objective or senseless passion.
I'd say this should push Americans towards smaller, more fuel efficient cars and EVs, but I know better. The American consumer seems immune to price pressure.
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[ 2.3 ms ] story [ 61.7 ms ] threadSaudi Arabia’s crude output falls to lowest level since 1990 https://finance.yahoo.com/energy/articles/saudi-arabia-crude...
Why would they use Claude? Iran, China, and Russia have far more advanced MRBM systems than the US. So unless Claude is training on top secret info that the US military doesn't even have, they would be getting worse information than just talking to their allies.
The people need to learn.
Because the responsibility lies in the founding fathers thinking that electing kings with little to no checks was a good idea.
He was thinking of "the people" having an ongoing scrutiny and active control to prevent any such slide .. rather than sitting about on their arses, not voting and counting on using guns if it got too bad.
This isn't 40k.
You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly, and we've asked you before.
If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
The Chinese economy has real weaknesses make no mistake about it and a competent US leader could have worked with his global allies to exploit them.
You don't strengthen an enemy (Russia) by buying their products. Defence is more important.
> as well as shutting down reactors
A German problem, not a wider European one.
The solution is to accelerate the transition into electric vehicles (including HGVs etc.), renewable energy, and nuclear. Oil is obviously still needed for materials production, air fuel, and so on, but extricating ourselves from situations where oil is becoming optional as fast as possible is the best course, not continuing to buy cheap gas from an aggressive neighbour that's fucking your elections and invading its neighbour.
How is Russia your enemy? They were happy selling gas to you. They were not so happy about the prospect of NATO setting up shop in Crimea nor American missile bases 250 miles from Moscow (remember "not one inch" after the USSR dissolution then later Putin practically begging at the Munich Security Conference in 2007 for NATO not to expand up it's ass?), which is where that was all heading. The reality is EU let Americans push them around (both Europe and their Ukrainian proxy) for their geopolitical objective of global "end of history" hegemony/primacy. And that's not even Russian propaganda, the American stink tanks and politicians have talked about this non-stop and out in the open since the 1990s. The Iran war is the result of the same "containment" policy, btw - but they don't have nukes so they received direct kinetic action. I bet if you said Yankee go home and stopped throwing drones at Wildberries (yes, that is all NATO ISR and targeting plus EU financing), made an agreement with the Russians where they weren't stressed about their western flank, then they would be more than happy to get back to selling gas and buying Mercedes. Don't believe me? That's what they were doing before we freaked them out with a coup next door then started helping Kiev shell ethnic Russians in the Russian part of Ukraine in 2014. But hey, pat yourselves on the back and enjoy deindustrialization and decreasing living standards...
Also true is that another pipeline called Balkan Stream connects to Turk Stream to transport the Russian gas into Bulgaria, Serbia, and Hungary, and went into operation in 2021.
https://n1info.rs/english/news/balkan-stream-gas-pipeline-op...
We've been doing fine championing our nationalism instead of creating a strong internal market.
Because Hungarians decide in Hungary and Spaniards in Spain doing business across Europe is still very tough.
And it doesn't help our train economies are all export economies, which is a broken model for quite some time (yet trump seems to not see it).
The worst part of all this is that becoming more export focused was pushed heavily by Germany during the euro crisis, and now its causing more problems.
Honestly, I'm coming round to the notion that Angela Merkel was literally wrong on everything she ever touched.
Mind you, German political culture consistently makes the wrong decisions (basically in hock to the ICE car industry, which has aged badly).
In a world where the Russo-Ukrainian conflict doesn't happen she was fine.
In a world where it does, suddenly an export economy hungry for materials and energy suffers the lack of Russia.
The German (so not just her) position on the post financial crisis reforms were wildly misguided, and her taking in of Syrian immigrants also didn't end well.
I think that shutting down the nuclear plants would also have been recognised as a bad idea, even without the war.
Syrian refugees.
They were escaping a civil war, they weren't looking for a job.
Most Germans supported taking the refugees as of 2015, less opposed it.
As for nuclear, Germany already had decided to phase it out before Merkel, in fact, her government partially reversed it. But Fukushima in 2011 was the nail in the coffin.
It hasn't worked out politically, though.
Again, I'm aware, I just wish different decisions had been made.
Also - while it may encourage production at other sites with a higher cost of production, higher prices in general will slow demand.
Energy can be replaced by renewables. There are alternatives for various uses of plastics. And I thought manure was a pretty good fertiliser.
Not everything needs to be replaced, but it would help a lot if we replace what we can.
That is of course a stupid lie.
But it's amazing how many smart liars say something similar to "China controls 70℅ of the global wind market" without clarifying that they install nearly all of that in China because they installed 73% of new wind capacity in 2025.
https://www.aldi-suisse.ch/de/ueber-aldi-suisse/unternehmen/...
For me, it doesn't matter because my main mode of transport is an EV - but it's a luxury I can afford. Many people that live around me cannot.
It just means these people donate more of their money to the wallets of already absurdly rich owners of companies like Shell and Exxon - instead of using it to enrich their own lives (see the increased profits these companies are making since Iran).
But at least on a positive note, EV sales in my country have never been higher since Trump invaded Iran, so it is somewhat triggering the well-off to finally make the ("scary") switch to EV's.
It is somewhat amazing that Europe hasn't embraced electrification even more but taxing diesel use to encourage using it wisely is a smart geopolitical play given their situation.
Taxation on crude oil and its byproducts is largely for each member state to decide, as is electrification policy.
In some cases the EU steps in; for example with CO2 emission quotas, electrification targets, and largely regulating how countries operate in between them (for example, if France sells energy to Spain, it has to follow some bloc regulations if I am not mistaken).
I find it somewhat amusing how people insist in commenting on EU as if it was something it is not.
Then singling out EU countries becomes silly.
EU (collectively or independently) is distinct only in that it is ahead of the pack on many of these topics, hence why the Netherlands diesel price is higher than the US price, as noted by the comment I replied to.
But EU countries could and should still go further.
In fact, as someone that lives in one of those countries, I am actually viewing the events in the middle east with optmism. The closure of Hormuz and Bab-el Mandeb are the sort of harsh push that we needed to get out of our collective asses and cut our dependency on a resource that is in every angle you look at terrible for those who depend on it.
I am not naive, and I know that it is not possible to cut it entirely (oil is used for more than fuel). But if we stop depending on it for vehicles, electricity generation, heating and ao on, it will make a huge difference already.
"Since war is not an act of senseless passion but is controlled by its political object, the value of this object must determine the sacrifices to be made for it in magnitude and also in duration. Once the expenditure of effort exceeds the value of the political object, the object must be renounced and peace must follow."
----------
Clausewitz would have been flabbergasted by this war. If we're being overly generous to Trump, we might call it an act of senseless passion. The reality is probably worse. The U.S. still hasn't seemed to figure out what it's policy goals or winning conditions are, aside from the president's desire to be an all-powerful winner. Trump seemingly places no value on his nation's blood or treasure, so it might be a very long time before he begins to feel the effort his nation is expending isn't worth the value of his own vanity.
The U.S. needs to have its magna carta moment and reign in its mad king. Maybe that will come with the mid-terms, or maybe this war will drag on for two more years. Trump isn't going to stop it, now or after the mid-terms. As far as he's concerned, the pain isn't his.