Europe Needs to Hear This Harsh Truth

Shipping and military expert John Konrad spent all day in D.C. on Tuesday talking to his military sources and concluded that "the Navy appears to be in no rush to reopen the strait," even while Iran dictates whose oil tankers are allowed to pass.

"What is this administration trying to leverage?" Konrad wondered, and that nobody he talked to was willing to discuss the fate of Hormuz "until European politicians and media stop calling Americans war criminals and monsters."

While Konrad admitted he has "no idea" when Hormuz will reopen, "but if the price is a modicum of cooperation and respect for everything America has done for decades to keep Europe safe, the strait could stay closed for months, or turned into a toll booth for years, because the majority of Americans…. and the vast majority of Trump administration officials I’ve talked with… seem fed up with their arrogance."

The self-styled sophisticates in Brussels and Europe's capitals remain remarkably provincial in their outlook, and that's why today we will speak some harsh truths to our friends in Europe — not because the truth is harsh, but because they believe that we naïve Americans don't recognize it.

So here comes the truth bomb, laser-guided right into the atrium of the EU's Berlaymont building.

The harsh truth is that Hormuz is their priority, not ours, and yet they refuse to make any serious contribution to the war effort.

The U.S. is a net exporter of oil and liquified natural gas (LNG), and we buy hardly anything from the Gulf. Closing the Strait of Hormuz is an inconvenience for us (in the price of gas and diesel) and hardly a strategic necessity. In both military and economic terms, Hormuz is way down our target list. Complicating the decision matrix even further, re-opening Hormuz at this stage likely requires ground troops — so it's simply smarter for us to continue the bombing campaign and see if we can't wait out an increasingly split and brittle regime that might still collapse under pressure.

Europe, of course, doesn't see things the way we do. Europe believes that their needs must be our priority, and that, furthermore, we're required to do their job for them.

And Another Thing: We could do more to stabilize energy prices, but in 2024, the Biden Cabal declared a moratorium on the construction of new LNG export terminals. So while the rest of the world suffers an LNG supply shock, our producers are forced to, at times, pay people to take LNG off their hands, and even burn off excess. Crazy, right?

Before Epic Fury, something like 20% of the world's LNG and 25% of seaborne oil trade passed through the strait each year and accounted for something like 10-15% of Europe's energy supplies. Losing that hurts, and Politico reported on Tuesday that one "top Brussels official urges Europeans to work from home and drive less."

EU energy chief Dan Jørgensen says Europe faces a "very serious situation," and that "even if... peace is here tomorrow, still we will not go back to normal in the foreseeable future."

Sucks to be EU, chief.

Meanwhile, Europe's contribution to the actual military effort is barely minuscule, and a handful of nations, including France (duh), Spain (fricken commies), and even Giorgia Meloni's Italy, have closed their airbases to our military traffic headed to the Gulf. Apparently, "lead, follow, or get out of the way" isn't a part of Europe's lexicon.

So Trump's message to Europe, more implied than explicit for once, is this: If you need the Strait of Hormuz opened, come and open it yourself. There's also the implication, as Konrad noted, that if we do someday soon control Hormuz, maybe we'll charge Europeans a toll to keep it open.

Or at the very least, maybe stop closing your airbases to our military aircraft, you sniveling, presumptuous, Euro-weasels.

Although that part of the message is all mine.

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