The U.S. military has established a covert shipping corridor through the Strait of Hormuz, which is allowing millions of barrels of oil per day to flow. This explains President Trump’s statements that the Strait is open.
Ten million barrels a day
This report is not new. However, the route seems specifically defined, which gives the Iranians knowledge we would rather they didn’t have.
The operation has been underway for several weeks, and 15–20 tankers have managed to enter and exit the strait each night through a southern channel along Oman’s coast, Axios reported, citing unnamed sources.
About 10 million barrels of oil per day have slipped past the Iranian blockade via the secret route, Axios’ sources said, helping satisfy global demand.
That is in addition to what Saudi Arabia sends through the pipeline, which brings the total close to the 20 million barrels that passed through the Strait before the war.
Making the Strait irrelevant…
President Trump recently said that eventually the Strait will be irrelevant. He said, “More than 50%-70% of the energy that moves through the strait now is going to go through underground PIPELINES.”
“The strait is never going back to the way it was.”
“The strait is going to become irrelevant…it is going to become just another body of water.
🚨 HOLY CRAP! Sec. Scott Bessent just announced the checkmate move: President Trump is making the Strait of Hormuz IRRELEVANT
“More than 50%-70% of the energy that moves through the strait now is going to go through underground PIPELINES.”
“The strait is never going back to the… pic.twitter.com/0j2mmSUXTa
— Q Shadow Walker (@QShadowWalker) August 19, 2026
The pipelines …
At the same time, Saudi Arabia is looking into an old Egyptian pipeline. Their own pipeline is being updated with the help of the US. The Houthis have bombed it.
🚨 BREAKING: President Trump announces he’s unleashing “ECONOMIC D-DAY” on Iran, following their refusal to make a deal
Trump also announced he will be SANCTIONING countries who attempts to do business with Iran.
“I am announcing the MOST CRUSHING ECONOMIC OPERATION EVER TAKEN… pic.twitter.com/ADpyNYCj7X
— Natalie Harp (@NatalieHarp_01) August 20, 2026
The Brilliant strategy…
Ida Turan writes an explanation of the strategy Trump is using that seems like a solid analysis. Here are a few excerpts:
The history:
The Islamic Republic is, at its core, a plunder-oriented and clientelist structure. Historically, it most closely resembles the early Arab conquests of Iran and the Mongol invasions, systems organized around extraction rather than governance or belief. The central prize has always been Iran’s oil.
Unfortunately, that oil wealth has never been linked to the welfare of the Iranian people or to any measurable competence in running the country. The money simply flows. Even under sanctions, extensive shadow networks in China, Iraq, the UAE, and the UK kept the revenue moving.
The plundering:
This revenue was divided among competing power cartels that Khamenei carefully managed and balanced for decades. Because these cartels are bound together by marriage and blood ties, their members remain confident that power will eventually rotate and that their own turn at plundering the oil wealth will come.
At the same time, over those same decades, Khamenei used the rents to co-opt a much wider layer of society. Bureaucrats, managers, contractors, industrialists and others were bound to the system through money, licenses, contracts and privilege.
Who they are and why:
Genuine ideological believers in Iran probably number under five percent. Yet because almost nothing can be done without proving loyalty to the IRGC and its networks, a far larger share, perhaps approaching half the population in practical terms, has its livelihood indirectly tied to the status quo and therefore benefits from the regime’s survival.
The regime is not the pure ideological state many imagine. It is profoundly corrupt. Ideology’s real function has always been twofold: to mobilize the masses when needed and to provide a veneer of legitimacy for repression and terrorism.
The ideology itself is a mid-up patchwork, selective Islam, the Karbala story, anti-Imperialism and anti-Israel rhetoric, and borrowed radical tropes. It is so incoherent that even many who publicly claim to believe it do not. This includes people at the very top: they chant “Death to America” while their children and their money live in the US. The mid-level bureaucratic class, in particular, has essentially no belief in it.
‼️If Trump’s recent post about “economic operation” on Islamic regime in Iran, left you impatient, this post might help.
What is happening right now is one of the most important and effective preparatory stages before the next round of military strikes. It is designed to force… pic.twitter.com/zBWCnREi9x
— Ida Turan 🇮🇷 (@iranidaturan) August 20, 2026
No invasions, collapse…
President Trump doesn’t want to invade and see deaths. He wants to collapse the regime with as little chaos as possible. They plan to shut off all funds to Iran. Turan believes Israel will come in and kill off the IRGC commanders. She says collapse is entirely achievable. She sees the flight of the rulers in their future.