The Duran Podcast - ESCALATION: Massive strikes on Gas fields in Iran and Qatar. Trump expands WAR

Episode Date: March 19, 2026

ESCALATION: Massive strikes on Gas fields in Iran and Qatar. Trump expands WAR

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the situation in Iran. We had an attack on Iranian gas facility, the South Pars facility, and Iran-Ratting, and Iran retaliated by hitting one of the largest LNG facilities in Qatar, and actually the world, about 20% of the gas supply comes out of the facility in Qatar that was hit. and Iran also hit some targets in Saudi Arabia. Israel claims that Trump knew about these strikes. Trump comes out with a true social post saying that he had no idea about these strikes and that these strikes against gas facilities should stop.

But if Iran does hit gas facilities going forward, then the United States is going to hit Iran very hard. So you have a denial from Trump saying that he knew nothing about it. did this on their own. Israel is saying, no, that's not the case. Actually, Axios, which is very close to Israel and to Trump is the ones that are putting out the story that Trump did indeed know about these strikes. And that's where we are. This is a big escalation. We also have reports coming out of Reuters in the Washington Post claiming that Trump is going to reinforce the troops being deployed into the region. More troops is basically what Reuters is saying. And the Pentagon is going to request an additional $200 billion in funding for the war. So escalation is where we are. We are in a massive

escalation spiral. And we also, I think, saw yesterday a sequence of events, which, to my mind, I mean, they change, they radicalize further the situation in the war. I would say that we've actually reached a pivot point and basically have passed it because the attack on the South Pass gas field in Iran, which is enormous, and it's the same gas field that extends to Qatar. So it's the biggest gas field in the world in terms of known. reserves, there might be bigger ones in Russia, but this is an enormous gas reserve. It's the one that, by the way, the European Union in the past has wanted to draw gas from. That was many

plans of long ago. It's also provides most of the, most, it's the place where Iran gets its gas from, its heating gas for its population. And it's also how Iran, how Iran, generates most of its electricity, uses gas-powered power stations which produce electricity. So we had that attack. We also had something else, which is not getting anywhere near the number of reports that it ought to be getting, because we also had an Israeli strike on the Boucher nuclear reactor or the facilities around it in another part of Iran. And there are known, by the way, to be Russian technicians there, because Boucher was partly built

by the Russians. And up to now, there's been a sort of understanding that Boucher would not be attacked. And of course, just before that, we had the killing of Laredijani, the chief of the Iranian National Security Council, the Secretary of the National Security Council. Security Council. So what happened was an enormous escalation. And I can't help but think that what's happened is that the war up to now has not going well. The expectations that Iran would implode after the killing of Haimenei have obviously not been fulfilled. The expectations that Iran would run out of ballistic missiles have not been fulfilled. In fact, I've heard reports

that not only is the number of missile strikes against Israel and targets across the Middle East remaining steady, but it is in fact now starting to increase again. We've had reports that Israel itself is now critically short of air defense interceptors. And there's also been strikes against Tel Aviv and other Israeli cities. So the Israelis, who are all in with this war. I mean, they have no intention, I think, of ending it. They went all out and they've attacked these critically important energy facilities in Iran itself. And they attacked also the man who has been widely seen as the linchpin of Iran's defense, his security system. And I think it's an attempt.

to try to move the dial. I have no doubt that Trump was informed or knew about this. I cannot imagine that Israel could conduct operations of this kind without this information being shared or known by some people in the United States. What happened again is that these attacks did not have the results, at least not the immediate results that some people expected. Iran struck back. It began to attack energy facilities in the Middle East. It began to attack energy facilities. Qatar, especially.

It made attacks on Qatar's natural gas production industry. And they replaced Larry Jolie with someone else, which is what they have consistently done. throughout the course of this war. So Trump himself comes up, he's starting to get clearly, increasingly frightened. I'm going to say that, frightened and nervous and panicky. He puts out a message saying that he wasn't told, that it's nothing to do with him, that he wants Israel to stop carrying out these attacks. So that's one side of Trump, the other side of Trump, he could see that the war is getting out of control, their energy prices are surging because they are surging

on the back of all of these things. So he's now talking again about sending ground troops. And there's going to be this request to Congress for further funding, $200 billion. But if there is a decision made today, which there might have been, to go for a ground operation against Iran, whether to force open the strait of Hormuz or to capture Harg Island, it is going to take months to get this thing sorted and to get this thing up and running. And, of course, in the meantime, the war continues. The Iranians will no doubt make their own preparations.

We are in for a very, very long war and an increasing destabilization of the global. global economy, and perhaps the least important thing, but this is destroying the political position of Donald Trump. We also have an increase in the missiles and drones that Iran is using, which runs counter to the claims of Trump and the Pentagon, Pete Hexeth and Kane. Yes. Well, exactly. So I am sure that this was.

part of the reason for the enormous escalation that we saw yesterday. There's been, they've been comforting themselves with this narrative that the launchers have mostly been destroyed, that Iran's missile stockpiles are depleting, that its drone stockpiles are depleting. And finally, they began to realize that there was no visible sign of this. The stockpiles that are depleting are their own stockpiles. And this is why we saw this extraordinary escalation that we've seen over the last two days, especially yesterday. So it's, as I said, an attempt to move the dial

to make conditions of life in Iran, much worse to hope that this will finally provoke the unrest in Iran, which up to now we have not seen. But in the meantime, even as they talk about deploying troops, even as they come up with all of these things, we see the situation in the energy system, in the global energy complex, becoming more and more critical, and they're having to think about deploying ground troops. We are in a disastrous situation. You can use even stronger words. Many are, but we can now definitely say that the war is going badly wrong.

Well, if the war was going well, the Europeans would be on board and you wouldn't have resignations like Joe Kent. You wouldn't have statements like Tulsi Gabbards when she was testifying to the Senate. I believe it's the Senate and the House together. But anyway, you can tell from her statements that she was putting everything on President Trump. She didn't want to blame President Trump. Yes. And it doesn't look like she's going to be resigning. Maybe she will.

but it doesn't look like she's going to be resigning. But you could tell from her statement when she was asked about an imminent threat that Iran poses. And what the intel was telling her, Gabbard's response was the president decides. Exactly. I mean, thrown all on Trump. Yes. It was flattery, flattery, masking criticism. Yeah, the president decides.

The president decides. It was entirely his decision. It was not mine. You can start. And I think that where Gabbard has started, others will follow. We start to see Dan Kane, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of staff. He's also going to start to be talking in this way. And a $200 billion appropriation in the middle of what is likely to be a major fiscal storm.

I mean, the rise in energy prices has not yet translated into serious problems in the future. financial markets, but if this continues much longer, it probably will. There are rumors and discussions about whether interest rates should increase because of worries about inflation. There's serious alarm in Europe about raising interest rates at a time where the European economies are already in recession. Very serious alarm about this in Britain, but it might become unavoidable. And on top of all of that, you're going to come to Congress and you're going to ask for $200 billion. $200 billion, which, of course, will inevitably invite questions about what your strategy is,

what your plan is, how you expect to win this war. Because even the completely useless politicians who populate Congress are now going to be. we find themselves under growing pressure. Remember, we got the midterms coming very soon to ask those kind of questions. They're under growing pressure, but they can't push back too much because it's Israel. Yes. So they're not going to push back too much on the war and why are you involved in the war and what are we doing? Because you're talking about Israel wanting to continue this war. So even the pushback from Congress is going to be, is going to be softened. They're going to authorize the $200 billion. They're going to support the war. They have rejected

all attempts to trim back Trump's abuse of his authority as president to catapult the United States into this war. But they will need something. think when they go out and campaign, they will need something to say when they go on the talk shows, they're going to be asked, what is the plan, and they're going to have to come up with some kind of an answer. They will have to say, well, we do have a plan, we do have an idea of what the president is doing, of where this is going, of how we're going to win, because they have no choice. So they're going to ask those questions. And, it's going to be difficult for the administration to provide an intelligible and coherent answer

because it has none. No, they're going to, like the Democrats are going to, for example, Schumer and these Democrats, they're going to have to show support for Israel. They're going to have to condemn and demonize Iran. And they're going to have to put all the blame on Trump. This is the balancing act that they're going to have to. pull off the Democrats. The Republicans are going to try and give Trump as much support as they can. But I imagine as this war drags on, the Republicans are going to throw Trump under the bus,

especially if they start to see that Trump has lost it with regards to the management of this war. That's exactly what they're going to do. They're preparing their own alibi. It's going to take time though, but as it takes time, everything escalates. Yes. Yes. I mean, the political system in Washington has completely failed. The intentions of the founders have been set at north. They gave Congress authority, the sole authority to start wars. And Congress is not exercising. But, you know, this is in some ways now almost an irrelevance. Because in the meantime, even as all this is going on and the various politicians in Washington are busy trying to cover their backs, the reality is that the global economy is descending into chaos.

That is the ultimate pressing fundamental issue. And it's important to say that there is the immediate issue of what is happening in global energy markets, but there is the longer-term problem of what is going to happen in the Gulf. If oil supplies are not resumed, if they aren't able to continue, if natural gas supplies don't resume, sooner or later, the position of the Gulf monies themselves is going to become increasingly brittle and fragile, and we could start to see things begin to break down. Some of them are probably more consolidated than others. Bachrein looks extremely vulnerable. Others are perhaps more stable. But ultimately, they all depend on oil.

They all depend on a steady flow of oil and the receipts they get from the oil to keep themselves functioning. If they can't function and they can't collapse, if the entire energy complex, of the Gulf begins to break down, then we are looking at a permanent, or at least maybe not a permanent, a prolonged period when irrespective of whether there is war or not, we are not going to see energy flow from the Gulf in the way that we used to do. And that is going to reshape the global economy. It is going to make some countries, notably Russia, more powerful than other countries, it is going to change the geopolitical space in ways that nobody could have imagined a month ago. I just wonder if Trump and his neo-Conn administration, which is what it is

at this moment in time, if they really care. I mean, it seems as if they're now running a policy of scorched earth. You know, we're just going to break everything. We will even break everything. We will even break everything and maybe we'll leave. I mean, he's even floated that out there. We'll leave it to Europe and to the Gulf countries to clean it up. But before we leave, we're going to break every freaking thing in the region. We're just going to totally destroy and break the whole thing down. I mean, Trump's policy in a way, in a weird way, mirrors the EU's policy with Project Ukraine in a strange way, or Germany's policy with regards to Project Ukraine, and that as we can destroy the living standards of the people up to a certain point. So let's do it.

We can bend things. Let's just not break it. So let's take our country the living standards of the working class people, the working class American, and let's just bend it as much as we can. but let's just be careful not to completely break it, not to have it completely snap, which is what the Europeans have done. And the Europeans have shown that people can endure a lot before they start to rise up or to really get angry. Yeah. I mean, they've shown that.

Yeah. I mean, Germany is completely deindustrialized. It's nothing of what it was five years ago. completely. And then Germans are still, you know, CDU, SPD, CSU, whatever, they're still there. There hasn't been any revolt, any revolution, anything like that. They're still supportive of the European Union. They still want to fight Russia. So, I mean, I think Trump and his administration may even realize that they do have a lot of, a lot of space to go until, until Americans really say enough. I don't know, that's my sense of things, that he has taken a playbook out of the Europeans when it comes to Project Ukraine.

I don't think he has himself because he's presumably concerned about his own political. His neo-con administration. But the people around him, frankly, if they can't succeed, if they can't defeat Iran, well, they smash everything up, including Iran itself and leave, which is what they always do. I mean, I said this before. It's a quote that I've made in the past about how the Romans made a desert and called it peace. The Americans, or let's say not the Americans, the neocons create chaos and call it freedom. Well, I don't think they're going to call it freedom this time.

They're just going to create chaos. They will completely smash everything in the Middle East. They will be massively frustrated that they couldn't achieve the objectives, that they set themselves. And like angry children throwing a tantrum, they will smash all the furniture because that's what they can do. And they will leave. And it's actually better, better than you say for them. Because as Trump never ceases to remind us, the United States is self-sufficient. in energy, they can stop exports of energy, they can contain energy costs in the United States

that will, to some extent, at least preserve living standards, and the people who will suffer are America's allies, the Europeans, the Japanese, all of these people, and already the narrative is going out there, that the United States has been doing all of these things that it's doing in the Middle East on behalf of its allies and the allies. allies aren't helping, so bad luck for them. The United States will do, has done everything it can, they can look after themselves from now on. So that's the kind of narrative that I The Allies have nowhere to go anyway. So you can smash the Middle East and by extension, smash them. But where's Japan going to go? Well, exactly. Where's Europe going to go? They have no other

options. Except we've been saying this for a while now. The only game in town for all, of the countries of the collective West is the United States. Exactly. That's it. They have nowhere else to run to. That's where they maneuvered. So Trump can smash all of them. Yes.

Exactly. So, and then, as I said, don't be surprised. Nobody should be surprised if we start to see the oil price drifting up to $150 a barrel or even beyond. gas prices are now surging, they might start, start to surge in the US as well. If the United States does, what it has done in the past, what Jimmy Garter once did, if Trump announces a ban on energy exports in order to contain prices within the United States. I mean, I think he's perfectly capable of doing that. I think he would find that there's perfect, quite a lot of

people in the United States that would support him within the political system, within the economic system, that will leave the Europeans in a disastrous situation. But you could see already that there are talks and hints and rumors and discussions about whether we could start some kind of dialogue with the Russians and the predominant view, the view Friedrich Nelz, the view of U.S. of Ursula, of all of these people, is no, of course, we can't. We mustn't speak to the Russians. We must, on the contrary, hold on earth,

Cadyneous to struggle on. We can't talk to the terrible people on the other side, and we must stick to our, and try and preserve our alliance with the United States. So there may be a major energy shock in Europe this winter. At this moment in time, that is looking perfectly plausible, but it will not be by itself enough to change policies. And the same in Japan, the Japanese government, the new Japanese government, Mrs.

Dakaichi, she's not going to make up with China. Impossible. So, and if she goes, whoever takes a place, they won't be able to change the direction either. So we're all trapped within this policy, but what we're going to see is the smash of the Middle East and quite plausibly a major crisis in the global economy also. What what Trump has to do, Trump, the president, not the administration, the man, what he's concerned about and what he's looking to do is just to figure out a way to bump up his approval. Yeah. He's looking for a way to sell this war. So that's looking for a way to sell this war. So,

that Americans can be on board with this war. That's why they keep on changing the narratives. They're throwing the spaghetti up against the wall and they're trying to see what sticks. Is it uranium? Is it ballistic missiles? Is it regime change, which is the truth, by the way. But is it regime change? Is it imminent threat? Is it killing Hamene? Is it Iran's going to take over the world? Is it Iran's going to create a missile that can hit the United States? So they're throwing out all these things to try and figure, is it a coalition? maybe a coalition will warm up the American public to this war and we'll get my approval ratings back up because everyone wants to see the United States in a coalition of 40 countries like Bush had

it or like Obama had it or whatever even Biden, like Biden had it with Project Ukraine. You see I'm the president leading 40 countries, the 40 countries of the West, the 40 democracies of the West. I'm leading them up against the access of evil. These are the narratives that they're trying to figure out or trying to cobble together. For me, this is, I mean, it's not about military. There's nothing that these countries can add to the military situation at all. But it's perception, its narrative spin. It's about Trump's approval, approval rating because he is sinking.

We've already seen the narrative. Iran is a terror regime. It is holding the world to ransom by closing the strait of Hormuz. Somehow it is illegitimate and wrong for Iran to close the Strait of Hormuz. We need to break the siege of Hormuz, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, and bring down the terror regime. That means we have to deploy ground troops. It is your living standards.

It is the living standards of the entire world that are at stake, because unless we do this, we will leave this terrible evil regime in a position where we can hold the entire world for hostage. That narrative is going to be repeated relentlessly. It has already been repeated relentlessly. And it will stick. It will stick with enough people to make it move forward for a certain while. This is probably what we're going to see. hear, and we're going to hear more and more of it over the next few months. Of course, if the

ground troops go in, if there's fighting, if people start to come back in body bags, if outcomes are not in the way that has been promised, then we will maybe start to see a swing in public opinion and people will start to move against this particular narrative. But for the moment, actually, I think the narrative is actually is actually starting to gain, at least with some people, a certain traction. Okay. We will end the video there. The durand.com. We're on X, rumble and telegram.

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