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.
But, Trump being Trump, he'll probably do a suckerpunch attack today on the deadline.
Meanwhile, multiple Iranian sources have denied any talks taking place. At least with the US.
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.
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.
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.
From what I gather it's not that the Iranian people want to return to a Shah, but that Reza has been consistent in stating a desire to lead Iran to a more democratic system, and he has enough trust and goodwill with the people of Iran to make it work.
The outcome I'm hoping for is for the IRGC and Basij to be desolved or effectively powerless, with Reza Pahlavi leading a transitional government and keeping the promises that he's made thus far to liberalize. I want to see him go down in history not as the man who restored the Shah of Iran, but as the person who refused to accept personal authority and instead entrusted it to the people.
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...
WITCH WILL CONTINUE
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.
That said... if it turns out the Pahlavi can bring about an Iran that makes most of its people reasonably happy and free, I'm all for it.
> if it turns out the Pahlavi can bring about an Iran that makes most of its people reasonably happy and free, I'm all for it.
Yeah, that's where I am. I'm hoping it works out that way because that's the best path toward a free and happy Iran, not recommending it as a course of action :)
There are Crypto perpetual futures markets open all weekend but those are much smaller so it's unlikely they could make millions there.
