Iran’s regime lost the war the moment American force and economic pressure exposed its bluff; what remains is the slow collapse of a terror state running out of money, options, and time.

By Roger Kimball

May 3, 2026

Some nearly stochastic notes on Iran. I begin by singing the same song I have been crooning since President Trump announced the ceasefire and naval blockade in mid-April. The war is over. If this were a novel, we’d be in epilogue territory where we tie up some loose threads in the plot and learn about the fates of various characters.

First, let’s talk about money, or rather Iran’s lack thereof. On February 28, the US and Israeli militaries unleashed Operation Epic Fury (“Roaring Lion” in Israel). Despite what you hear from the Left (and from the Iranian propaganda mill), that was one of the most successful and also one of the quickest military operations in history. But the inventory of ships sunk, air defenses obliterated, drones and ballistic missiles incinerated, arms manufacturing infrastructure exploded, and regime leaders eliminated tells only part of the story. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent outlined another current of the narrative in his ongoing description of Operation Economic Fury.

The naval blockade, which interdicts shipping to and from Iranian ports, is costing the regime some $500 million per day. The current exchange rate is nearing two million Iranian rials for one US dollar. Iran’s effort to circumvent the blockade via land routes from Pakistan will never amount to much. Bessent summarized the status quo for regime leaders who might be puzzled:

It is very difficult for rats in a sewer pipe to know what’s going on in the outside world. Some color for the Iranian leadership as they literally sit in the dark:

1.   The United States has complete control of the Strait of Hormuz.

2.   There is a hard currency, i.e., U.S. dollar, shortage.

3.   Food and gasoline rationing are in place.

4.   The entire international community has turned against you.

5.   The BLOCKADE will continue until there is pre-February 27 Freedom of Navigation.

Many of the thugs running Iran and enforcing its terror regime have retirement accounts and other assets outside the country. The US Treasury knows all about them. “The retirement funds they thought they had outside of Iran, we are freezing. Same with their villas in the South of France. We are going to track them down, and we are going to continue the economic pressure as well as the blockade.”

According to a bulletin posted by CENTCOM on May 1, the US Navy has so far encountered 45 commercial vessels attempting to evade the blockade. All were forced to turn around. Even The Wall Street Journal, no friend of President Trump or the war in Iran, has acknowledged the success of Operation Economic Fury. “Iran Is Grasping for a Solution to an American Blockade It Can’t Break,” reads a headline from April 30.

Tehran thought it was gaining the upper hand after the war started in February as it attacked ships navigating the Strait of Hormuz, shutting down commercial traffic and blocking a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas supplies. Six weeks into the conflict, the US responded by blockading shipments from all Iranian ports.

That shut down Iran’s network of shadow ships, which for years defied US sanctions on Iran’s substantial oil exports by going dark at sea before clandestinely transferring their cargoes to China. The tankers have been unable to breach a cordon of US warships that have chased them all the way to the Indian Ocean.

How do you spell “desperation”? How about deploying mine-laying dolphins to harass maritime traffic in the Strait of Hormuz? That’s one of the regime’s latest tactics, suicide dolphins, along with sundry threats to cut internet cables and telecommunications infrastructure that cross the Strait.

The situation on the ground for ordinary Iranians is dire. There is a stream of reports about the regime torturing and executing protesters. Recently, notices have been plastered on city streets announcing that cell phones, Starlink hardware, satellite dishes, and VPNs are illegal. One brave Iranian using Starlink issued a harrowing story about a young father who used Starlink to get the news:

They are openly hunting us for daring to seek truth.

And they just proved they mean it.

This innocent Iranian father [second image] was using Starlink—just like me—to get real news for his family in the middle of the blackout and get the censored information out to the world. They arrested him. They tortured him. They beat him to death.

A father. A husband. A man who only wanted to protect his children from the regime’s lies.

I am using Starlink right now to write these words to you. Every single day, the regime’s agents threaten me. Every single day I know I could be next. My heart is shattered. My soul is on fire. The fear is real, and it never leaves.

But I will not stop. My country is on the line. My people are on the line. 90 million Iranians are suffocating in this 47-year nightmare.

That’s one part of the story. The other part involves ordinary citizens smashing into regime sympathizers with their cars, killing them, or members of the Iranian diaspora happily reporting on an explosion that eliminated 14 IRGC leaders. Biggest understatement of the moment: the Iranian regime is collapsing before our eyes. President Trump gave an update a few days ago:

We don’t even know who the hell we’re talking to. We call, and Mohammed picks up, the cousin of the brother-in-law of the barber . . . and I tell them: Are you the leader? We’re looking for a REAL LEADER, not a scared duck! . . .

Whoever grabs the job lasts less time than a kebab in my hand. They’re like a headless duck team: they quack, they flap . . . and in the end, one always ends up fried.

Tehran’s current line is that they will stop their attacks in the Strait of Hormuz—piddly little expostulations that they are—if the US ends the war, lifts the blockade, and postpones talk about Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Trump’s answer? Forget it. And by the way, he noted, he doesn’t want Iran to abandon its nuclear program for 5 years, 10 years, 20 years. Iran may never acquire nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, as the clock ticks and Iran’s economy slips into drain-swirling oblivion, CENTCOM commander Admiral Brad Cooper has just briefed President Trump on “final blow” strike options, including “Iran’s remaining military equipment and installations, regime/IRGC leadership, and other infrastructure.”

President Trump may very well choose to redeploy the kinetic option. We’ll see. Either way, the regime is finished. Let’s leave the last word to Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy:

We’ve learned two things from our conflict with Iran:

1.   If you turn the other cheek with Iran, they’ll stab you in the neck.

2.   President Trump has oranges the size of beach balls.