Iran Is Smarter Than You Think (Part Two)

Now Saudi Arabia is publicly trying to protect Iran from American military action. Why? Because Mohammed bin Salman understands something that the people who are screaming about war and who are so worried about war and the outbreak of World War three and what have you, he understands something that they don't. Mohammed bin Salman recognizes that the future of Saudi Arabia, the economic future and the political future and so forth, the the whole future of the region, in fact, is inextricably tied to the future of Iran. The greatest risk to the Saudi vision 2030 is regional instability.

You know, vision 2030 isn't just about Saudi Arabia. It's about the whole region. And that that has been stated explicitly time and time again. And Iran has been included in that explicitly in the the vision for the region. There's no stability, there's no prosperity, there's no security, there's no sustainability without Iran.

Mohammed bin Salman envisions the Middle East becoming as he said, the new Europe, meaning the center of commerce, the center of culture, the center of tourism, the center of basically management and so on. Well, there's no way for that to succeed if Iran is excluded. You can't do it if Iran is excluded or if Iran is volatile. If Iran is war torn, the whole thing falls apart. Saudi Arabia itself is find find themselves in a position where they have to commit themselves to the transformation and the stable stabilization and the integration of Iran in order for the whole region to rise.

There's not another way forward. So Saudi Arabia normalized their relations with Iran in 2023, diplomatic ties. And since that normalization, the Houthis stopped firing missiles at Saudi cities. The Iranian backed militias in Iraq stopped targeting Saudi Arabian interests in Iraq. So the formula of managed coexistence has been working for Saudi Arabia, and any sort of a war would blow that up completely, would blow that up entirely.

Now Saudi Arabia together with Qatar, together with Turkey, they engaged in intensive back channel diplomacy both with Tehran and with Washington even before the first round of talks. The the the talks in Oman in early February. They were the ones in fact who actually persuaded both parties to even explore negotiations altogether in the first place. Initially, as a trial, Turkey had even hosted or or prepared to host the talks themselves. And there was gonna be Saudi and Qatari and Turkish observers in in attendance.

Now Iran ultimately decided to just go with Oman, I think partly to keep the process bilateral and to avoid Turkey gaining any sort of outsized leverage from that mediation. But Saudi and Qatari pressure on Washington has been instrumental, absolutely instrumental in getting the Americans to the table at all. Because at the end of the day, like I've said many times, Donald Trump is a Khalidji president. And you can understand Stephen Whitkoff, basically basically, Stephen Widkoff operates as an envoy for vision 2030 at this point. So you can understand him that way.

GCC mediators even reportedly floated concrete compromise proposals for Iran and for Washington to consider. Non aggression pacts, temporary enrichment freezes and so forth, constraints on arms transfers and whatnot. So, functionally, Saudi Arabia and The Gulf States have effectively been writing the diplomatic architecture that the talks in Geneva, the Armen talks are operating within. And critically, Saudi Arabia and the Brixiline faction of the a national OCGFC. They're the ones who are keeping Trump on script.

They're the ones who are keeping Trump in line. You know, Trump threatens and then he gets pulled back. Trump sets a deadline and then he he extends the deadline. This is not Donald Trump being indecisive. This is the regional powers demonstrating to everyone demonstrating to everyone, including to Iran's hardliners, that they are the ones who actually control whether America strikes or not.

The message to the IRGC hardliners is quite clear. It is that the external threat, the American threat, is real, but whether it materializes or not depends upon us, not upon you, not upon Israel, not upon America. So you should cooperate with us. I mean, you can look at Qatar. They're the ones who actually got hit by Iran last year.

Qatar shares with Iran the the the largest natural gas reservoir in the world. The the North Dome Field on Qatar's side and the South Pars Field on Iran's side. This isn't a symbolic relationship. This is physical. This is a physical geological fact.

Qatar's extraordinary wealth, their extraordinary wealth, the wealth that helped them, that enabled them to host the World Cup, to fund Al Jazeera, to house the US Central Command at Al Ordade airbase. This is all built on gas from a field that it shares with the country that America potentially wants to bomb. So you can't fully appreciate foreign policy without understanding that single geological reality, that physical reality. And has historically maintained functioning relationships with all factions in the region, with almost every faction in the region. I mean, were dealing with Hamas when no one else would deal with Hamas.

They've always kept the lines of communication open with Tehran. They are the ones who funded Hamas when Iran lost interest. And like I say, understand why they lost interest. They were only interested in Hamas as a resistance group, a militia. And then when they dropped them, Qatar took over and funded them.

Qatar hosts, as I say, the largest regional military base, American military base, and they've been one of the primary mediators alongside Oman, moving messages between the Iranian and the American delegations. And obviously, Qatar was heavily involved in the negotiations after October 7 between the Israelis and Hamas. And their position is unambiguous. Qatar's position is unambiguous. They want a diplomatic solution, and they are facilitating a diplomatic solution.

They privately told Washington that any strike on Iran is definitely gonna end up getting them struck, getting the American base struck as it was in June 2025. So this is a warning. You know, even though Iran did give Qatar advanced warning about that strike before they hit that base, it was all choreographed, and it was a demonstration rather than a genuine attack, but the precedent matters. Qatar knows that in a real war, in a real war, that warning might not come. It might not be choreographed.

So Qatar is simultaneously housing American military forces. They're simultaneously mediating between America and Iran, and they're simultaneously telling America privately that using Qatari territory for a war with Iran creates an unacceptable risk for them, an unacceptable risk to their own infrastructure and their own people. This is Qatar doing what Qatar always does, maximizing their leverage by being indispensable to every side. And then there are several other threads of diplomacy running in parallel to the Geneva process that deserves some attention, I think. India, for example, has quietly entered the picture.

One is really talking about that. India's deputy national security adviser traveled to Iran for meetings with the supreme national security council in late January. India has enormous stakes in what happens in what happens to Iran. The Chabahar Port, the port project that India has spent years and years developing as an alternative route into Central Asia depends entirely on Iranian stability. Everyone has has a stake in this.

India imports Iranian oil through workarounds, you know. India cannot afford a destroyed Iran, and they have been making sure that this message reaches both Tehran and Washington through back channels. So everyone has a stake. Everyone has a stake in what happens with Iran. Turkey, like I said, Turkey was originally positioned to to host the talks.

And Erdogan and MBS met in Riyadh in early this month in a meeting that was framed as bilateral, but which was clearly for the purpose of outlining how they were going to coordinate on the Iranian situation. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar represent together the de facto coalition of regional powers who are managing the transition. The whole the transition of the whole region and their alignment with one another as of now is actually closer than it has been in years. The old Saudi Qatari rift has largely been closed. It's it's pretty much a thing of the past.

And Turkish relationship with Riyadh is also warming. This is not coincidental. And Oman, as always, is the channel that actually works. The Omani foreign minister has been literally literally walking between rooms carrying messages. Oman has always maintained this very unique role in The Gulf.

They're one of the few Gulf states that has never fully sever ties with Iran through any of the regional crises of the past decades. And Oman, obviously, there there's the geography to consider. Oman literally sits at the mouth of the Strait Of Hormuz, and it has credibility with all parties. It has credibility with Iran, has credibility with The United States, with China, and so forth. So this isn't a coincidence that the first and second rounds of talks chose the Omani framework.

It's not a coincidence. And then there's Russia. Russia also has a stake in this. Russia is also involved in this, more than is even publicly visible. Russia offered to receive Iran's enriched uranium stockpiles as part of a compromise.

Iran so like I said before, Iran keeps the legal right to enrich while the the physical material leaves the country, And Russia would store it and and would reprocess it for them. This is Russia doing what Russia does with regards to Iran, finding ways to make itself structurally indispensable to whatever deal emerges. And Russia is coordinating with Iran on the military front as well. They just had joint naval exercises in the Gulf Of Oman. That was announced at the exact moment that the Geneva talks were underway.

That's also not a coincidence. Now that's not to signal that they're prepping for war, but it's a negotiating signal. Russia was handing to Iran diplomatic leverage to use at the table. In other words, we have options. Iran has options.

That was the message. Which allows Iran to make concessions, like I say, from a position of perceived strength rather than visible desperation. Okay. So let me tell you what I think is gonna happen. And I wanna be clear that I'm just offering a probabilistic assessment.

No one actually knows the future, what's gonna happen. But given what we know, the most likely outcome in my opinion, and I would put this at around 65 to 75% likelihood, is that there will be a deal within the next, I don't know, four to eight weeks. I mean, all of the structural incentives are there. They're overwhelmingly pointing towards agreement. Iran's economy is catastrophic and getting worse.

Their nuclear program has already been physically degraded by the attacks in June 2025. Their proxy network is largely dismantled as has been required by the whole transition process. The pragmatists seem to be in control of the negotiating process. The Gulf States are trying to pull Washington away from any sort of kinetic action. The BRICS aligned faction of the OCGFC perfectly understands that any any sort of a war or a destroyed Iran is a liability, not an asset to their regional plan.

And critically, I think both sides are already closer to the actual substantive terms than the public rhetoric suggests. They're already coming to terms. America is not in fact demanding zero enrichment. Iran is offering to suspend enrichment for years and they're offering to eliminate the whatever enriched stockpile they have. So the architecture is already there.

The architecture for a deal is already assembled. Now the next most likely outcome, maybe 20 to 25 or so, is that there will be a limited American strike that will be followed quickly by a deal. Because as I say, the deal is already ready. This would be called maybe a sort of a shock therapy variant of the of the controlled demolition. So if the IRGC hardliners are stalling the pragmatists internally, if they're resisting or whatnot, then a precise American strike on whatever remaining nuclear or missile infrastructure that could give the pragmatists exactly the political cover they need.

That could give them the boost that they need or the support that they need. It would mirror the June 2025 pattern. Shock, brief escalation, then rapid diplomatic resolution. The hardliners can't argue against making a deal when the alternative has literally been demonstrated in the form of missile strikes. And this is again part of why those the military buildup has been happening.

So if you see the two week window for Iran's written proposal expire without delivery, then you can watch for that scenario of a a a limited strike. Full scale war in the way that the the mainstream media imagines it and they seem to be breathlessly preparing the audiences for, I put that at only around five to 10% likelihood. It doesn't serve any actor who has any real skin in the game. It doesn't serve the interest of anyone who's making decisions. Gulf investment plans, bricks energy supply chains, global oil flows through the Straits Of Hormuz, all of it collapses in a real war.

Mohammed bin Salman has publicly blocked American use of his airspace. Even the Emiratis have done that. The Emiratis have said you can't use our airspace. Qatar has communicated what happens to Al Hudayd. They've said that it's gonna get attacked.

If you attack Iran, then Al Hudayd gets attacked. India has communicated their stakes. The Brixiline faction of the a national OCGFC understands that a failed Iran failed Iranian state with 90,000,000 people and ballistic missiles pointing in all directions is a catastrophe for everyone's portfolio. It's it's the the the days are gone when the only portfolios that mattered were the portfolios of the military industrial complex. There's a lot more players in the game with a lot more varied interests.

And if you attack Iran and go to a full scale war with Iran, then everyone's interests are damaged by that. I mean, the only people who want a full fledged full scale war with Iran are the neocons. The neocon remnants in Washington and maybe Lindsey Graham. And they no longer control enough of the architecture to override everyone else. They're just not as important as they used to be.

So what you're watching in Iran right now, like I've said before, this is the latest chapter in a managed transition that's been underway for at least the last three to five years, if not longer. The military buildup, in my opinion, is not a prelude to war. It's the pressure mechanism that makes the internal transformation politically viable inside Iran. The Geneva talks are not a desperate last attempt at diplomacy, in my opinion. They're just the formal architecture through which the new Iran is being structured.

The IRGC's purge of the reformers was not a hardliner attack defeating the pragmatists. It was the system managing which voices get to participate in the transformation and which do not get to participate in the transformation. And the anti war diplomacy of The Gulf States, that's not just peace and brotherhood and what have you. This is the regional powers demonstrating that they, the GCC, Qatar and Turkey and Saudi Arabia and The UAE, they're the ones who will decide whether or not military action materializes or not. Because they're the ones who have the leverage to decide whether that happens or not.

Every actor in this story is playing their role in a larger choreography. Part of that choreography is the managed demolition of the Islamic Republic Of Iran as it has been configured for the last fifty years, as part of the construction of what Iran will be in the new regional order. In my opinion, that's going to be a pragmatic state that's integrated into the BRICS economic frameworks that's normalized with the Arab world, normalized with their neighbors, and no longer dependent on performing, you know, sectarian zealotry as their primary source of identity and their primary source of legitimacy. Look, I shared something the other day on X. There was a quote from Mark Rowan, the CEO of Apollo Global Management.

He's part of the Trump's, you know, board for peace or peace board or whatever it's called. Talking about the Gaza reconstruction and how much money, a $100,000,000,000 that that's promised in that. Infrastructure, housing, the coastline and so on. How much money is to be made? And that's gonna be ongoing revenue, ongoing profit.

That's not just a one time investment that you can make money. And he's saying that the problem isn't collateral or the problem isn't financing, the problem is peace. In other words, he's saying peace and profitability have now become the same thing. And that's the formula for the whole region. And I've been saying that since well before October 2023.

Instability and violence, and yes, Zionism, these things only works in the region in the post World War two world order, and none of this works anymore. Not in The Middle East. This doesn't work anymore. Now moving forward with the transition of the global economy, the Middle East, the Middle East region, the region needs to be stable. Profitability and peace are one and the same thing.

And in my opinion, this applies to Iran as well. I mean, you're talking about a $100,000,000,000 just for Gaza. You can multiply that by 10 or 20 or 50 or a 100 if you're looking at an integrated Iran. And no, an Iran that is devastated by war doesn't give you that. It doesn't give you that.

Full scale war with Iran destroys Vision 2030 and there's no real plan b, not for the region, not really even for the global transition. This is the plan. There isn't a plan b. The remainder of the twenty first century is reliant upon a stable and prosperous Middle East. There's no two ways about it.

Over the last decade, hundreds of major companies, American Western companies, have opened or relocated their regional headquarters to the GCC, almost 600 just to Saudi Arabia alone. Talking about Deloitte, Bechtel, IBM, Siemens, Baker Hughes, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, BNY Mellon, BlackRock, on and on. Google, Meta, you know, financial services, asset managers, consultancies, tech companies, you name it, everything. The region is becoming the center of the world. It's becoming the center of the world.

The world of finance, the world of business, the world of, tech, AI, EVs, renewable energy, logistics, on and on. The trajectory is as clear as day It's as clear as day. Collective sovereignty is being built from The Maghreb to Pakistan, from the GCC to the ASEAN countries and across BRICS. And Iran wants to be Iran wants to be and needs to be and I believe is going to be integrated into that regional cohesion. And once it is, subhanallah, once it is, Iran has unlimited potential.

But the American hardliners, the neocons, and the Iranian hardliners, the r g c IRGC and so on, and of course the Zionists, These are the the three most intransigent elements that are trying to hold on for dear life to that post World War two world order. And I think everyone is trying to finesse them out by one way or another. They're trying to finesse them out without triggering a backlash. Now there is one other thing to consider. One other thing to consider.

And that is that a limited war with Iran would inevitably open the way for Iranian strikes against Israel. Which as I talked about before back when it happened, back when that, that back and forth tit for tat happened last year between Iran and Israel. Imposing losses economically and militarily and to damage the infrastructure on Israel against Israel. This is useful for creating domestic changes within Israel. So this is something that will probably also be a factor in determining how things actually play out, how things actually proceed.

Because, yes, the weakening of Israel and the dismantling of hardline Zionism is just as important, it's actually even more important than the the dismantling of hardliners on the in Washington and hardliners in Tehran. Dismantling the hardliners, the the the the zealot, crazy, genocidal, fascist, racist, supremacist mentality of the Israelis is absolutely necessary. It's the most necessary thing for regional stability, but it is also the hardest nut to crack. So potentially, limited strikes or a limited war, which would enable Iran to launch their missiles against Israel and weaken Israel, degrade Israel's capability, degrade Israel's capability and capacity, that could actually be a desired outcome from the negotiations. And I'm saying a desired outcome from all sides, from everyone who's involved, from the Americans, the Iranians, and The Gulf.

Everyone would like to see that happen. So the the Israelis should understand this. The Zionists should understand this, but of course they don't. They should understand that an attack on Iran constitutes an attack on Israel. And Iran can can definitely absorb considerably more damage than Israel can.

Any mutually degrading exchange will weaken Israel far more than it weakens Iran, which as I said before at that time just facilitates the economic absorption of Israel into the sphere of influence of the GCC. So in my opinion, war is unlikely, but it's not impossible. It's not impossible. Strikes are possible or even probable with orchestration and with coordination. But, obviously, the whole situation is volatile.

There's no question about it. It is volatile. But at the end of the day, and this isn't hyperbole, this isn't hyperbole, the whole global order of the twenty first century, the whole multipolar project, and the future of the region is at stake. Now, obviously, I am from Al Asuna Al Jemmaar. So I have my personal issues with the sectarian nature of the Iranian regime.

Full disclosure. But like I said before, I can be objective about it. And I can be objective about how important Iran is and about how brilliant that regime has been and how pragmatic and how adept they are in politics, how expert they are in politics and propaganda. And sectarian differences do not cause me to devalue that country or its people. No.

They deserve safety, they deserve stability, they deserve security and peace, and they deserve to prosper. Iran deserves to be, they deserve to be an economic and a cultural behemoth. And I pray and I hope and I believe that this is exactly what will come to fruition, InshaAllah.