Expert: US Takes Oil Trump Card Away From Kremlin

• 11.03.2026, 15:56

The war against Iran is a game changer in the global energy market.

The U.S. and Israeli operation against the ayatollahs' regime in Iran is now in its second week. In that time, the allies have launched a series of strikes on key military and strategic sites.

Iran has already attempted to mine the Strait of Hormuz, but the U.S. has announced the destruction of Iranian mine barriers.

Does Tehran have a realistic chance of blocking the strait after all, and what will that mean for the world economy?

About this, Charter97.org spoke with Ukrainian political technologist and managing partner of the National Anti-Crisis Group Taras Zagorodniy:

- Nobody blocked anything. It was Iran's statement that they would cover it. Further, insurers refused to insure ships that pass through the Strait of Hormuz. And no serious tanker will leave without insurance, and no port will accept any tanker without insurance. This concerns serious companies.

The US has already taken concrete measures. They have already announced that they will insure themselves and will earn money on it. Now they will take this business away from the British. Further they will drive convoys, as it was in the 80s, when the Iran-Iraq war was going on - there were big problems there too. But the issue was solved in the 80s, and this despite the fact that the level of technology, as you understand, at that time was much lower than it is now. Now the technological gap between the U.S., Israel and Iran is gigantic. And what are they doing now? They are now busy destroying the entire Iranian military infrastructure and infrastructure for the production of drones, ballistic missiles, and so on.

And the minimum task that the U.S. will set for itself now is to ensure that no living soul can drive a car from the coast of Iran, not just to launch a missile. So now they are solving this very issue.

I already see information that tankers have already sailed through the strait. Yes, there is an attempt to mine, but it is firmly suppressed. The technological capabilities of the US and Israel are huge, and they will do it, don't even doubt it. Iran's fleet, I think, has already ceased to exist.

There Ukraine can also help with its other technologies, for example, the same Sea Baby drones, which drove the Russian Black Sea Fleet to Novorossiysk, and they are already slowly killing it there. So the U.S. will do it, don't even doubt it.

Further on, there is a parallel process going on, if we talk about oil. Saudi Arabia is now launching an oil pipeline that goes to the Red Sea. It used to pump 2 million tons, now its planned capacity is 7 million tons. Then there are more reserves, which the developed countries have not used yet. There are strategic oil reserves. In 2022, for example, 180 million tons were released to the market. Now, according to various estimates, there are about 2 billion tons in reserves. If they reach an agreement, if there is expansion, they will be able to bring down oil prices for a month or two until the Americans solve the issue of free passage of these ships through the Strait of Hormuz. That is, I think it will be at least a week while these bombardments are going on.

I read the Israeli press and statements of the military command: they are extremely serious, because Israel may not have such an opportunity when there are three U.S. aircraft carrier groups near Iran. So they're going to deal with Iran in the toughest possible way, and they're going to do everything they can to make sure that this issue is resolved.

I think that Iran will not be able to mine anything there, because, in fact, it's not mined. It's, you know, just a matter of fear and these fantastic fairy tale stories in the style of "One Thousand and One Nights," of Shaherezade, that they're defeating everybody and that they're now going to shut down everything they can.

- Putin has effectively abandoned the ayatollah regime. What does this war mean for the Kremlin?"

- First of all, the Kremlin has no other options. What will they do? Will they send in soldiers? But that's a categorical quarrel with Trump. They are afraid to enter into a conflict with them after all. What else can they do? Send more air defense? That's how they're going to wreck it. It's already clear: neither Chinese air defense nor Russian air defense are simply incomparable technological levels compared to Israel and the United States.

That's why Putin has no other choice. The Russians will now tell their fantastic fairy tales that they have exchanged Iran for Ukraine, that now they will be given something. They told the same thing about Venezuela. So in this case they have no possibilities.

After the US has moved to a military operation, all Russian attempts to play mediator between Iran and the US have also already been canceled. Trump doesn't need this at all anymore because they already have a military operation.

What does this mean for Russia? For Russia, it means a catastrophic scenario. That's why the Soviet Union was constantly interested in the Arab world, the Middle East. They were constantly gambling that there would be instability there. They first helped Israel against other countries, then against Israel they helped Egypt, Syria, other countries, then they started to help Iran. For what purpose? In order to keep the constant danger of destabilization of the Middle East.

The Middle East is being destabilized. What does that mean? The price of oil is going up. And now they're taking that toolkit away from them. There's no way the Kremlin can control the price of oil anymore. This means that the Russians will no longer be able to make super-profits.

Further, this is still the way to the Indian Ocean. A more or less safe one. Through the Caspian Sea, through Iran and with access to the Indian Ocean. And now what? If Iran is taken away from them now, they will be cut off from this transportation route.

And Iran was connected with the military-industrial complex. Yes, Russia has completely switched to its own production of Shaheds, but still Iran was helping them.

Now all this is being covered with a copper wedge. And that's all - even less opportunities to manipulate prices. And scare too with high oil prices, and a lot of other things. So they're being thrown out of where they've basically been present in the Middle East for the last 70 years. What's important is the position of China, which has also had little to no reaction to its ally being destroyed.

- What are the implications of this war for Beijing-Washington relations, and what has it shown about China's real willingness to defend its partners?"

- China has never been willing to defend its partners because they physically don't have to. Well, look, there was this peculiar division of labor in the world. China would come in with its economic infrastructure, and Russia would provide forceful cover, as it did, for example, in Venezuela. In Africa, they often operate that way too.

But now that's being shut down too. This story is linked to China, if we can see. And therefore what is the relationship with the U.S.? The U.S. gets leverage against China. I mean, they want to control Iranian oil. And most of the oil goes to China. So the U.S. creates leverage on China, because China has rare earth metals, and here they will control oil. That creates the preconditions to pressure China, to knock resources out of China.

And as the esteemed Donald Trump would say, we're holding more and more cards. And now I'm sure that the Americans in some format will now put Iranian oil and gas under their control and dictate terms around the world in the energy market.