US Troops were told Iran war is for ‘Armageddon,’ return of Jesus

March 4, 2026
Jonathan Larsen

Advocacy group reports commanders giving similar messages at more than 30 installations in every branch of the military

A combat-unit commander told non-commissioned officers at a briefing Monday that the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that President Donald Trump was “anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth,” according to a complaint by a non-commissioned officer.
From Saturday morning through Monday night, more than 110 similar complaints about commanders in every branch of the military had been logged by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF).
The complaints came from more than 40 different units spread across at least 30 military installations, the MRFF told me Monday night.
The MRFF is keeping the complainants anonymous to prevent retribution by the Defense Department. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to my request for comment.
One complainant identified themselves as a non-commissioned officer (NCO) in a unit currently outside the Iran combat zone but in Ready-Support status, deployable at any time. The NCO said they were Christian and emailed the MRFF on behalf of 15 troops, including at least 11 Christians, one Muslim and one Jew. (Full email printed below.)
The NCO wrote to the MRFF that their commander “urged us to tell our troops that this was ‘all part of God’s divine plan’ and he specifically referenced numerous citations out of the Book of Revelation referring to Armageddon and the imminent return of Jesus Christ.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has enshrined evangelical Christianity at the uppermost levels of the US military, airing monthly prayer meetings throughout the Pentagon. Last year, the Pentagon confirmed to me that Hegseth attends a weekly White House Bible study. It’s led by a preacher who says God commands America to support Israel.
Monday’s email from the NCO said that their commander’s remarks “destroy morale and unit cohesion and are in violation of the oaths we swore to support the [C]onstitution.”
MRFF President and Founder Mikey Weinstein, a veteran of the Air Force and the Reagan White House, told me that since the US and Israel attacked Iran early Saturday morning, the MRFF has been “inundated” with similar complaints:

These calls have one damn thing in freaking common; our MRFF clients [service members who seek MRFF aid] report the unrestricted euphoria of their commanders and command chains as to how this new “biblically-sanctioned” war is clearly the undeniable sign of the expeditious approach of the fundamentalist Christian “End Times” as vividly described in the New Testament Book of Revelation.

Many of their commanders are especially delighted with how graphic this battle will be zeroing in on how bloody all of this must become in order to fulfill and be in 100% accordance with fundamentalist Christian end of the world eschatology.

Weinstein cited constitutional and Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) prohibitions against injecting religious beliefs into official military instruction or messaging.
He said, “Any military members seeking to take advantage of their subordinates by advancing their blood-soaked, Christian nationalist wet dreams upon the flames of this latest non-Congressionally sanctioned attack against Iran, should be swiftly, aggressively and visibly prosecuted.”
Weinstein added that the MRFF receives similar complaints about Christian eschatology — end-of-the-world theology — “whenever this shit blows up with Israel in the Middle East.”
After the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, for instance, the MRFF reported a complaint about an Air Force commander who said at a briefing that, “[T]he war between Israel and Hamas has all been foretold by the Book of Revelation in the Gospel of Jesus Christ and no one can do anything about that.”
After 9/11, President George W. Bush referred to the American “crusade” against terrorism, evoking the ancient clashes between Christian crusaders and Muslims. Bush’s language was seen as potentially inspiring Muslims to take up arms against the US, if it proclaimed itself a Christian army waging war on Islam.
French foreign minister Hubert Vedrine said, “One has to avoid falling into this huge trap, this monstrous trap” set by al Qaeda with the 9/11 attacks. Bush dropped the term “crusade.”
While Christian nationalism has simmered in the military for decades, Hegseth has ended even the pretense of official intolerance for it. Trump, too, has cast himself as a champion of Christian exceptionalism, embedding it within divisions of the executive branch.
As I revealed last year, Hegseth sponsors the weekly White House Bible study that preaches support for Israel.
Some Christians claim biblical prophecy requires Israel to exist for Jesus to return.
But Hegseth’s Bible study leader, preacher Ralph Drollinger, teaches that the reason to support Israel is that God still blesses Israel’s allies and curses Israel’s enemies, even though Israel killed Jesus (this smear, the historic root of antisemitism, has been rejected by every major religion).
After Israel’s attack on Iran last year, Drollinger dedicated two weeks of lessons to preaching support for Israel. His lessons went out to Cabinet members and members of Congress even as Israel, too, was lobbying for US engagement.
Hegseth has also initiated monthly prayer sessions, most recently featuring Doug Wilson, the far-right Christian nationalist. He has also brought in other preachers from his personal circle, rejecting any attempt at making the meetings ecumenical.
Hegseth himself also speaks at these meetings, proselytizing his personal religious beliefs. “This is … I think, exactly where we need to be as a nation, at this moment,” Hegseth reportedly said, “in prayer, on bended knee, recognizing the providence of our lord and savior Jesus Christ.”
While the MRFF historically has been able to get the Pentagon to swat down Christian incursions into the military, the Trump administration is openly disdainful of military norms and law. It remains to be seen whether and how wholesale Christianization of the Iran war will be opposed by officials inside the Pentagon, or political and legal advocates for secular values outside it.

NCO Email to MRFF

As redacted by MRFF:

From: (Active Duty Military NCO and MRFF Client’s email address withheld)

Subject: Unit combat readiness briefing and Armageddon

Date: March 2, 2026 at 1:02:53 PM MST

To: Information Weinstein <mikey@militaryreligiousfreedom.org>

Mr. Weinstein thank you for taking my calls and the calls of some of my colleagues as to what happened earlier this morning with our combat unit.

Please protect my identity and the identities of those I’m speaking for as we discussed.

Our unit is not currently in the combat zone AOR regarding the Iranian attacks but we are in a “Ready-Support” function where we could be deployed there at any moment to join and augment the combat operations as participants.

I am a (NCO rank withheld) in our unit. This morning our commander opened up the combat readiness status briefing by urging us to not be “afraid” as to what is happening with our combat operations in Iran right now. He urged us to tell our troops that this was “all part of God’s divine plan” and he specifically referenced numerous citations out of the Book of Revelation referring to Armageddon and the imminent return of Jesus Christ. He said that “President Trump has been anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth”. He had a big grin on his face when he said all of this which made his message seem even more crazy. Our commander would probably be described as a “Christian First” supporter. He has been this way for a very long time and makes it clear that he desires all of us under him to become just like him as a Christian. But what he did this morning was so toxic and over the line that it shocked many of us in attendance at the ops readiness briefing. Besides myself I am reaching out to MRFF on behalf of 15 fellow troops. I know you asked me about the religious views of our group who has requested help from the MRFF. I can only tell you that I am Christian and at least 10 of the others are also Christians. One of the others is Jewish and one is Muslim. I don’t know the religious or non-religious status for the other three at this time.

I and my fellow troops know that it is completely wrong to have to suffer through what our commander said today. It’s not just the separation of church and state as we discussed, Mr. Weinstein. It’s the fact that our commander feels as though he is fully supported and justified by the entire (combat unit’s name withheld) chain of command to inflict his Armageddon views of our attack on Iran on those of us beneath him in the chain of command.

I hope by sending this email to you that this will help expose these wrong actions which destroy morale and unit cohesion and are in violation of the oaths we swore to support the constitution.

Full Statement from MRFF President Mikey Weinstein

Since the start of the unprovoked American and Israeli war on Iran, this past Saturday morning, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation has been literally inundated with desperate calls for help from military members across all branches, organizations and MOS/AFSC/SFSC designations (military occupational areas). Well over 100 calls have already come in and more keep coming.

These calls have one damn thing in freaking common; our MRFF clients report the unrestricted euphoria of their commanders and command chains as to how this new “biblically-sanctioned” war is clearly the undeniable sign of the expeditious approach of the fundamentalist Christian “End Times” as vividly described in the New Testament Book of Revelation.

Many of their commanders are especially delighted with how graphic this battle will be zeroing in on how bloody all of this must become in order to fulfill and be in 100% accordance with fundamentalist Christian end of the world eschatology.

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation demands that all personnel in the Department of Defense (not “War”) remember and fully internalize that the oaths they swear are not to the narcissistic, sociopathic, orange, POS tRump, nor to little Petey ‘Kegseth’ nor to Jesus Christ. On the contrary, their oath is SOLELY to the United States Constitution, which includes both a full separation of church and state mandate in the First Amendment and NO establishment of any sort of putrid ‘religious test’ in Clause 3 of Article VI.”

Any military members seeking to take advantage of their subordinates by advancing their blood-soaked, Christian nationalist wet dreams upon the flames of this latest non-Congressionally sanctioned attack against Iran, should be swiftly, aggressively and visibly prosecuted for numerous violations of the military criminal code known as the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

You know, that very same criminal code that Secretary “Kegseth” is trying to prosecute Arizona Senator Mark Kelly under for simply advising military members not to obey illegal orders; you know like ordering otherwise helpless, military subordinates to acknowledge that the Iran war has been sanctioned by the fundamentalist Christian nationalist version of our Lord and Savior and the New Testament in specific order to bring about the end of the world and usher in the 1000 year reign of Jesus Christ.

 

Iran regime change a fantasy without US boots on the ground

Daniel Williams

Trump cajoles Iranians to overthrow their government, unarmed and with no fighting chance against the Revolutionary Guard

After raining thousands of bombs on Iran, the United States and Israel are outsourcing the task of overthrowing the government to civilians who are unarmed and otherwise ill-equipped to take on the heavily armed oppressive forces they would face.
US President Donald Trump and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu both urged workaday Iranians to rise up. The task was described as a now-or-never opportunity that will follow the forcible disarming of the Islamic Republic.
“When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take,” Trump said in a video message. “It will be probably your only chance for generations.”
Netanyahu, who during his 30-year political career has identified Iran as a prime source of regional antagonism to the Jewish state, described the occasion as “a once in a lifetime opportunity.”
“Soon, there’s going to be a moment that you’ll have to go to the streets to complete this act and to topple this regime.”
The sales pitch by Trump and Netanyahu seemed to ignore a reality facing the Iranian population: no nationwide organization exists to take on such a task, dissident groups lack weapons and are up against the government’s 150,000-member Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the enforcer of obedience to the regime.
The Revolutionary Guards put their fearsome talents on display by shooting down tens of thousands of protestors during nationwide demonstrations that broke out last December and continued into January.
The intense US and Israeli bombing campaign on display during the first four days of the current war is unlikely to have produced a big chance for civilians to take to the streets.
“First, an armed bombing campaign has never in history incited a successful uprising against the government,” Daniel Block, senior editor of Foreign Affairs magazine, told Canadian Broadcasting. “It’s incredibly difficult to actually bomb out all the state’s repressive capacity.”
For the US and Israel to provide a chance for success, Block added, “You need to have troops on the ground.”
Short memories could explain Washington’s failure to understand why workaday Iranians decline to act. In February, 1991, then-US President George H.W. Bush – having liberated Kuwait from an Iraqi invasion – urged the population of Iraq to overthrow Saddam Hussein, a dictator who was an ardent practitioner of violent oppression.
Bush encouraged “the Iraqi military and the Iraqi people to take matters into their own hands and force Saddam Hussein to step aside.” Western air force crews dropped leaflets from the air calling on Iraqis to “Fill the streets and alleys and bring down Saddam Hussein and his aides.”
Kurdish citizens in northern Iraq began assaulting Saddam associates. So did even more numerous Shiite Muslims in the south. Believing that all this was a sign that the Saddam era was over, General Norman Schwarzkopf, the top US military commander in Iraq, permitted remnants of the Iraqi army to fly helicopters all over the country on supply runs.
Saddam’s loyalists used the helicopters, along with their own armed vehicles and cannons, to put down the rebellions. Some 60,000 Shiites were slaughtered along with 20,000 Kurds.
Rather than focusing on avoiding a similar blunder, Trump and his advisors seem fixated on a different faulty decision made in 2003. President George W. Bush, the first Bush’s son, ordered an invasion of Iraq on the false accusation that Saddam, still in power, had secretly developed weapons of mass destruction. No such weaponry was ever found.
The invasion turned into an eight-year occupation overflowing with attacks on US and allied forces by both Iraqi Islamic nationalists and Iranian-trained militiamen and terrorists.
Trump interprets that experience, as well as America’s 20-year occupation of Afghanistan, as “forever wars” to be avoided. That means letting the Iranians themselves do the messy work of regime change. If they fail, it’s their fault.
In any case, Trump has not promised to overthrow the Iranian government, but rather, “to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime.”
“We are going to destroy their missiles and raze their missile industry to the ground. It will be totally … obliterated. We’re going to annihilate their navy,” Trump said in a video from his Florida beachfront mansion and resort, from where he launched the war.
In Washington, Secretary of State Marco Rubio translated the stew of words as meaning: Iran will never be allowed to develop either nuclear weapons or long-range missiles that can carry them.
While promising to defang the Iranian military’s ambitions, Trump also said he is willing to talk about the Iranian nuclear program, further throwing into doubt any ambition he might have had to oust the Islamic government from power.
Trump appears to be trying to apply the policy he is carrying out in Venezuela, whose President Nicolas Maduro was corralled by a US team that raided Caracas and ferried the leader to jail in New York on drug-trafficking charges. The government and institutions left behind are still at work, albeit under the thumb of a watchful Rubio and a team of viceroys.
Critics say that the Venezuela model is not applicable to Iran. The Revolutionary Guard, created more than four decades ago, has grown into an all-encompassing internal and external security force responsible for political control, border defense and the operation of Iran’s ballistic missile units.
The Guard Corps is also in charge of Iran’s blocking of the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow entrance to the Persian Gulf. Oil shipments through the Strait account for 31% of global supplies, with most of the traffic routed to Asian countries.
“Iran’s expansive security organizations are not waiting to find out what Trump has in mind,” says an analysis published online by NDTV, a television network based in India. “It has invested heavily in asymmetric warfare: ballistic missiles, drones, naval mines and cyber operations. Its ability to disrupt shipping in the Strait of Hormuz … gives it leverage that Venezuela never possessed.”
 

Khamenei’s killing is neocolonialism’s final gambit

Jan Krikke

From 1953 Mossadegh coup to Khamenei’s assassination, Iran bookends the rise and coming fall of US neocolonial dominance

In 1953, the US and the UK staged a coup in Iran that deposed Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh, the first democratically elected leader of a major Muslim country. The intervention, staged to regain control over Iranian oil, was a milestone in the transition from colonialism to neocolonialism.
The recent US-Israeli killing by bombing of Iran’s spiritual leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was an extraordinary spectacle of state-sanctioned assassination. One unintended consequence could be the unraveling of the petrodollar system, a key pillar of neocolonialism and American hegemony.
If the US and Israeli strategic objective was to decapitate Iran’s leadership and intimidate the nation, indications so far are that the effect has been catastrophically counterproductive. The assassination of a spiritual leader, however contested within Iran, has unified broad sections of the Muslim world in indignation.
The importance of the petrodollar system to the US goes a long way in explaining why US President Donald Trump risked a regional war to eliminate Iran’s spiritual leader. The abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro fits into the same pattern. Like Iran, Venezuela has massive energy reserves and is building growing ties with China.
Follow the money
After the 1971 collapse of the Bretton Woods gold standard, the US secured an arrangement with Saudi Arabia in 1974 whereby oil would be priced exclusively in US dollars.
This created an artificial and perpetual demand for American currency: any nation needing oil must first acquire dollars, effectively forcing the world to subsidize American economic dominance.
This arrangement exemplifies what Ghana’s president, Kwame Nkrumah, first identified as neocolonialism: the condition in which states possess “all the outward trappings of international sovereignty” while being in reality “directed from outside.”
He famously detailed this concept in his 1965 book, “Neo-Colonialism: The Last Stage of Imperialism.”
Unlike classical colonialism, which involved direct territorial occupation and administrative control, neocolonialism operates through economic domination, debt structures and currency mechanisms that perpetuate extraction without the burdens of formal empire.
The petrodollar represents neocolonialism’s perfect instrument: invisible, self-reinforcing and virtually inescapable.
Iran has always been the weak link in this architecture. When Iran’s Mohammad Mossadegh dared to nationalize the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (later British Petroleum), the CIA and MI6 orchestrated a coup. The UK’s leader at the time, Winston Churchill, worked for the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company before entering politics.
After deposing Mossadegh, the US installed the Shah’s brutal dictatorship, which ruled for 26 years until the 1979 Islamic Revolution ejected American influence. That religious revolution created the only major regional power that did not subordinate its oil policy to American interests.
Today, the six quasi-feudal Gulf states are crucial to the petrodollar system. All host American military bases and participate in the petrodollar bargain, recycling their oil wealth into US securities and weapons systems.
Gulf States’ holdings of American securities exceed US$1 trillion, with sovereign wealth funds managing another $4.9 trillion in assets deeply integrated with Western markets. Iran stands outside this arrangement, trading oil in euros, yuan and rupees while actively encouraging trading partners to abandon the dollar.
With US forces using the airspace of its client states in the Gulf to attack Iran, Tehran has retaliated by launching missiles precisely at those Gulf states hosting US bases—Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the UAE—striking the symbols of their complicity in the neocolonial order.
The nuclear pretext
The official reason for killing Iran’s leader and the broader war has centered on Iran’s nuclear program. But this rationale collapses under scrutiny.
Iran has consistently maintained that its nuclear activities are peaceful, and multiple US intelligence assessments have confirmed that Iran suspended any organized weapons program in 2003.
Despite unprecedented inspection access, the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency has never produced credible evidence of a diversion to weapons development.
The hypocrisy is staggering. The US, which maintains an arsenal of approximately 5,000 nuclear warheads, has never signed the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, an agreement that aims to ban all nuclear explosions worldwide.
Israel, the region’s sole nuclear power, possesses an estimated 90 warheads while maintaining a policy of deliberate ambiguity and refusing to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. India, which tested nuclear weapons in 1974 and 1998, has been rewarded with a civilian nuclear deal rather than sanctions.
What also threatens the petrodollar order is an Iranian breakthrough in peaceful nuclear technology. If Iran masters the complete nuclear fuel cycle, it achieves energy independence— and with it, the ability to allocate more of its oil for export in currencies other than the dollar.
Every megawatt of nuclear-generated electricity in Iran is a direct challenge to dollar hegemony, freeing petroleum for markets that increasingly trade in renminbi, rupees and rubles. The nuclear issue has never been about weapons; it has always been about sovereignty.
Moral bankruptcy
The global order’s moral bankruptcy has been exposed by the international response to Khamenei’s killing. While China and Russia have condemned the attack, European leaders have mostly offered only tepid statements urging “restraint”, though Spain has refused US access to its bases and the UK has limited US use to “defensive” operations.
That’s because Europe, as a vassal of the petrodollar system, is hesitant to question the framework that maintains its economies reliant on energy trade denominated in dollars.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has issued appeals for de-escalation but has failed to condemn the assassination of Khamenei, effectively aligning himself with the (neo)colonial forces that once subjugated the subcontinent.
Beyond the strategic miscalculations, Khamenei’s assassination breached a fundamental norm in international relations.
While states have long practiced targeted killings of militant leaders, the assassination of a foreign head of state represents an unprecedented escalation. It signals that no Iranian official, civilian or religious, can safely engage in international diplomacy.
The timing of the attack, which occurred just days after Trump’s envoys had negotiated with Iran’s foreign minister in Geneva, compounded this breach. Oman had on Friday reported what it called a “breakthrough”, with Iran agreeing not to stockpile any uranium.
By attacking while negotiations were ongoing, the US demonstrated that its commitment to diplomacy is contingent on the US dictating the terms. Trump’s subsequent statements have confirmed this interpretation. Speaking like a New York mobster, he told ABC News, “I got him before he got me.”
Bookending neocolonialism
Iran tragically bookends the rise and potential fall of neocolonialism. The 1953 coup that overthrew Mossadegh inaugurated the modern era of American-led economic domination in the Middle East, establishing the template for subsequent interventions in Guatemala, Chile and dozens of other countries. The assassination of Khamenei could potentially signal a significant shift.
The petrodollar system that seemed eternal a decade ago now faces existential challenges from multiple directions. China trades oil in yuan, Russia has abandoned the dollar for most energy transactions and the BRICS nations actively discuss alternatives to dollar hegemony.
Understanding the current trends, Saudi Arabia has begun to accept renminbi for oil sales to China. India and Iran have operationalized a rupee-rial payment mechanism. Every transaction that bypasses the US financial system contributes to building the infrastructure for a post-dollar world.
By overreaching so blatantly, the US has accelerated the very forces seeking to dismantle the neocolonial order. The assassination was meant to demonstrate American power; instead, it has revealed American desperation and the moral bankruptcy of its political elite.
The killing of a spiritual leader cannot preserve a system that has lost its moral legitimacy. The petrodollar rests on consent, however coerced. Once that consent evaporates—once nations realize they can trade without dollar intermediation—the entire edifice crumbles.
The question is not whether the neocolonial order will end, but what will replace it. The answer lies with the peoples of the Global South, who must ensure that the dismantling of dollar hegemony does not simply substitute one master for another.
Iran’s long struggle against domination—from Mossadegh’s nationalization to Khamenei’s martyrdom—offers a lesson: sovereignty is not given, it is asserted. The petrodollar’s death throes will be violent, but from its ruins may finally emerge the genuine independence that was promised in 1953 and stolen in a single night.
When future generations write the history of this moment, they will record that the old order died not with a whimper, but with a drone strike over Tehran. They will question: Where were the leaders of the Global South during the last great crime of neocolonialism? India, of all nations, should have an answer. Its silence is its judgment.
 

Hormuz doesn’t need to close to cripple Asia’s economies

Saima Afzal

Asia’s economic vitality depends on imported hydrocarbons flowing freely through the now jeopardized Strait of Hormuz

If the Strait of Hormuz remains threatened and constrained by the war on Iran, Asia will face its most serious test of energy security since the 1973 oil embargo. For decades, policymakers understood the vulnerability, but few likely believed it would ever be realized on such a disruptive scale.
The stakes of the current crisis escalated dramatically on February 28, 2026, when a joint United States–Israel military operation killed Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The targeted strikes created a historic rupture in the Islamic Republic’s command structure and triggered an uncompromising retaliatory posture from Tehran.
The resulting confrontation has now spilled directly into the Strait of Hormuz, transforming a long-recognized strategic chokepoint into an active theater of war and geopolitical leverage.
Iran’s warning that it will “set fire” to vessels attempting to pass through the strait has shifted the crisis from abstract risk to operational threat. Whether Tehran can fully enforce such a declaration remains uncertain. What is beyond dispute, however, is the structural exposure it reveals, particularly for Asia.
Roughly 20% of global oil and a comparable share of seaborne liquefied natural gas (LNG) move through the narrow corridor between Iran and Oman. In 2025, around 20 million barrels per day, nearly $600 billion in annual energy trade, transited the waterway. About 3,000 vessels pass through it each month.
Narrow waterway, concentrated risk
At its narrowest point, Hormuz is about 33 kilometers wide. The primary shipping lanes lie within the territorial waters of Iran and Oman. The channel is deep enough for fully laden very large crude carriers, making it indispensable for Gulf exporters.
That geography grants Tehran asymmetric influence. Even in the absence of a formal blockade, drone strikes, missile threats and naval harassment can make transit commercially prohibitive. Insurance markets have responded quickly through escalated premiums, raising the cost of shipping and raising inflationary risks worldwide.
Reports indicate traffic has already thinned, with dozens of tankers idling near the strait. Charter rates for supertankers on Gulf-to-Asia routes have surged. The corridor need not be physically sealed to be economically impaired. In modern energy markets, the insurance market can close a strait faster than a navy.
The bulk of Hormuz-bound crude is destined for Asia. In recent years, roughly four-fifths of oil and condensates exiting the strait have flowed eastward. China, India, Japan and South Korea account for most of those imports.
China purchases most of Iran’s 1.6-1.7 million barrels per day of exports and relies heavily on additional Gulf suppliers whose shipments also pass through Hormuz. Japan and South Korea import more than 80% of their energy needs. Taiwan and Singapore face similar structural exposure.
China is not without buffers, but its insulation is partial. Beijing has expanded its strategic petroleum reserves over the past decade precisely to cushion external shocks, and it has increased discounted crude imports from Russia since 2022 as a partial hedge against maritime disruption. Yet neither mechanism fully offsets Gulf dependence.
Russian supply cannot replace Hormuz volumes at scale, and reserve drawdowns provide only temporary relief. The crisis also casts uncertainty over Beijing’s broader ambitions: Belt and Road-enabled energy corridors across West Asia were designed to deepen supply integration, not operate amid a military confrontation.
Moreover, efforts to expand renminbi-denominated oil trade depend on predictable shipping flows. A prolonged disruption underscores a reality Beijing has long sought to mitigate: that China’s energy security remains tied to contested sea lanes beyond its direct control.
Oil markets, though volatile, possess certain buffers. Cargoes can eventually be rerouted and production elsewhere can increase incrementally. Gas markets, however, are tighter and less flexible.
Approximately one-fifth of global LNG trade passes through Hormuz. Qatar, a cornerstone supplier for both Asia and Europe, depends on these routes. LNG infrastructure is rigid: liquefaction capacity is fixed, contracts are destination-bound and spare volumes are limited. Storage cushions are thin.
If Qatari cargoes are delayed or constrained, Asian buyers would compete directly with Europe for replacement supply. Price spikes would not be linear. Electricity costs, industrial production and fertilizer inputs would rise rapidly.
An oil spike strains mostly transport costs; a gas spike permeates the entire global economy.
The specter of sustained energy price spikes is already reviving inflationary fears. A US $10 rise in crude typically adds several tenths of a percentage point to headline inflation.
Elevated LNG prices feed into power generation and food production, broadening the impact. Central banks across Asia, having only recently regained partial inflation control, would face renewed trade-offs between price stability and growth support.
Emerging Asian economies are especially vulnerable, with many operating fuel subsidy regimes. Higher import costs will strain fiscal balances across the region. If geopolitical risk strengthens the US dollar, imported inflation intensifies.
The 1970s demonstrated how energy disruptions can reshape economic trajectories. The question now is whether Asia’s more diversified and technologically advanced economies can avoid a similar dynamic or whether energy dependence remains the decisive constraint.
Can Iran sustain a closure?
Iran possesses tools to disrupt transit in naval mines, fast attack craft, anti-ship missiles, drones and submarines. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy has long trained for chokepoint harassment.
Yet a sustained total shutdown would be difficult and costly. During the 1980s “Tanker War,” attacks on shipping prompted US naval escorts and large-scale maritime security operations and traffic eventually resumed.
Moreover, Iran itself exported roughly $67 billion in oil last year, meaning a prolonged closure would also constrict its own revenues. This makes episodic disruption more plausible than a permanent blockade, but episodic disruption may be sufficient to destabilize markets.
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have developed bypass pipelines to the Red Sea and the Gulf of Oman. These routes provide partial relief but cannot fully compensate for Hormuz flows. Analysts estimate that even with maximum diversion, millions of barrels per day would remain vulnerable.
The US, cushioned by domestic shale production and LNG exports, retains strategic flexibility. Asia, however, does not. The region’s economic rise has been powered by imported hydrocarbons. In an era of intensifying US-China rivalry and fracturing geopolitical alignments, that dependence carries new strategic weight.
If the current crisis persists, it will not simply be another cyclical commodity spike. It will expose the structural underpinnings of Asia’s post-Cold War growth model and the geopolitical risks embedded within it. And Asia’s strategic autonomy may prove narrower than its economic influence suggests.