{"id":45065,"date":"2026-06-30T13:50:53","date_gmt":"2026-06-30T18:50:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/?p=45065"},"modified":"2026-06-30T13:50:53","modified_gmt":"2026-06-30T18:50:53","slug":"the-mark-of-amateurism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2026\/06\/30\/the-mark-of-amateurism\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mark Of Amateurism"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nicholas Grossman comments on the latest war strikes in the Strait of Failure<\/del> Hormuz<\/em>:<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t a return to full-scale war, but it isn\u2019t peace either. It is a new phase in the conflict: the fight to control Hormuz. The United States already lost the fight Trump started; it failed to achieve his declared goal of the Iranian regime\u2019s unconditional surrender, or, barring that, Tehran\u2019s acceptance of stringent nuclear restrictions. Now the conflict is over whether Iran controls Hormuz and can charge fees, or if the U.S. can restore the pre-war status quo, with ships transiting freely.<\/p>\n

The two sides\u00a0are making incompatible claims<\/a>\u00a0about the MOU\u2019s contents. Iran\u2019s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said that under the agreement,\u00a0Iran has sole responsibility for the strait<\/a>. Meanwhile, the\u00a0Trump administration asserts that the U.S.<\/a>\u00a0will not allow Iran to \u201cillegally control an international waterway.\u201d<\/p>\n

The MOU itself is ambiguous enough to allow for either interpretation. But that\u2019s the problem: this core issue was never worked out. The MOU was essentially a negotiated agreement to negotiate an agreement,\u00a0punting all major points of contention to future talks<\/a>. [MS NOW<\/strong><\/a>]<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is the sort of loose-ends that I’d expect arrogant amateurs, telling themselves for years that their predecessors were overstaffed and underqualified, to leave behind. Now putting innocents in danger, needlessly expending munitions.<\/p>\n

It’s a bad sign for the Strait of Hormuz and all the nations in the area. Well, except for Iran. Whatever you think of theocracies – I despise them – it doesn’t keep them from developing expertise in the areas of diplomacy and negotiation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nicholas Grossman comments on the latest war strikes in the Strait of Failure Hormuz: This isn\u2019t a return to full-scale war, but it isn\u2019t peace either. It is a new phase in the conflict: the fight to control Hormuz. The United States already lost the fight Trump started; it failed \u2026 Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45065"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45065\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45068,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45065\/revisions\/45068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}