Today, Explained - How Iran is winning

Episode Date: March 31, 2026

Iran is using the Strait of Hormuz as leverage in the war. It's working. This episode was produced by Peter Balonon-Rosen, edited by Jolie Myers, fact-checked by Andrea López-Cruzado, engineered by Patrick Boyd and David Tatasciore, and hosted by Noel King. Locals visiting Muscat Anchorage near the Strait of Hormuz. Photo by Elke Scholiers/Getty Images. Listen to Today, Explained ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members. New Vox members get $20 off their membership right now. Transcript at ⁠vox.com/today-explained-podcast.⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It only Tuesday, and the average price of a gallon of gas in these United States just topped $4. So President Trump is proposing a new strategy to get oil from Iran's Strait of Hormuz for, quote, all of those countries that can't get jet fuel. Social. Build up some delayed courage, go to the strait, and just take it. You'll have to start learning how to fight for yourself. The USA won't be there to help you anymore. just like you weren't there for us. Iran has been essentially decimated.

The hard part is done. Go get your own oil. But then crude oil prices rose again after an Iranian drone set a Kuwaiti oil tanker on fire. So yeah. Coming up on today explained how and where and why Iran is winning this war. Megan Rapino here. This week on a touch more, we've got two insiders to help us unpack the WMBA's new CBA, three-time champion and WMBPA Vice President Alicia Clark, aka AC, and ESPN basketball analyst Andrea Carter.

We're also going to take a look at our NCAA brackets and check out what's next in March Madness. Check out the latest episode of a touch more wherever you get your podcasts and on YouTube. This is Today Explained. Jerry Doyle, he's the Global Defense editor at Bloomberg News. Jerry, what's the Strait of Hormuz? The Strait of Hormuz is this little dog leg of water between. Iran and Oman basically a little bit of the UAE and it's important because all of the Persian Gulf countries that produce oil Iraq Saudi Arabia Bahrain Qatar the UAE all use

that waterway to get their oil out as long as there are no stress factors on the waterway things such as war or mines that's just the easiest and cheapest way to do it. The biggest action in the Strait of Hamoos at the moment is that Iran is able to get its oil out through the strait. Meanwhile, U.S. ships and any oil that been sort of generated in the other Gulf country is not getting out. A global energy supply choked off, where 20% of the world's oil once flowed, hundreds of oil tankers now idle. At least 18 ships have already been attacked in and around the strait, according to the UN. Foreign Minister Arakshi, thank you so much for your time this morning, sir.

Will the Straits of Hormuz remain closed so long as this war continues? It is only closed to the tankers and ships belong to our enemies, to those who are attacking us and their allies. Saudi Arabia has a pipeline running across the Red Sea that it has been able to pump out, something like 7 million barrels. per day, but that doesn't come close to hitting the shortfall that has resulted from the straight being closed. How did Iran actually shut the strait of Hormuz down?

Like, how is it keeping these giant tankers from just going through? The easiest way to put it is Iran has shut down the strait by virtue of being where it is. There have been reports that some mines are in the water, some sea mines have been placed in the water. Those haven't been confirmed. But it doesn't really matter whether those mines are there or not, whether there are a few mines, whether there are a lot of minds, whether there are no mines. As long as there's a threat, as long as there's a war going on, they have to act as though there are mines there. And Iran also has a large stockpile of anti-ship missiles that it can easily target ships in the Strait of Hormuz, and even into the Persian Gulf and below, making a transit really difficult just by. virtue of the fact that if you go through without permission,

if you try to go through without permission, then there's a good chance that you will get hit. I understand how landmines work. How do you actually mine the water, though? Well, there's several ways that sea mines can work. They can be placed on the seabed and activated by a ship passing overhead with acoustic sensors or magnetic sensors.

They can float in the water free, not attached to anything, just sort of driven around by the tides or water current, that will be activated by brushing up against the ship or even the sound of a ship nearby. There's other minds that can be moored to the seabed so that you can sort of keep track where they are. They float some distance below the surface

where the hull of a ship would be, and they stay in one place. So it's not that difficult to see how just any of those types of minds would make passage difficult. Sources today have told CBS that Iran has laid about a dozen mines in the strait. Mines are a scary thing to be dealing with as a marina, as a ship's captain. It's something we don't want to fool around with. This is maybe an insane question, Jerry, given what the United States has done in Iran over the last month.

But is blocking the Strait of Hormuz legal? Like, this is such an important, this is such an important waterway. It seems like maybe at some point someone said there's a. maritime law. You've got to let ships pass. Otherwise, the global economy goes to hell. I mean, that is true. It is a maritime law. Freedom of navigation sort of underpins a lot of global commerce, right? What's happening in the Strait of Hormuz sort of cuts against that. Iran has reportedly charged fees up to $2 million for a tanker or cargo ship to pass through. That also cuts against freedom of navigation and freedom of transit. And so, yeah, it's a lot of the

It's not legal what Iran is doing. It doesn't own the entire strait or all the waters of it. And ships, commercial ships should be able to pass through without any trouble. But because of the war, they're not. Okay. So arguably, everybody is breaking some laws in this war. Certainly in the U.S., we are having that debate in earnest. But you told me that Iranian oil is getting out.

What does that mean for Iran and what does that mean for the rest of the world? Well, for Iran, it means that they're actually making more money per day than they were before the war. Because oil prices have gone up significantly. They're making something by our estimates about $139 million a day in March, which is up by $20 million or so from what they were making in February before the war. They've been able to get roughly $1.6 million barrels per day out, which is on. on par with what they were doing before the war. So because they're allowing their own oil out and they are taking the money for it,

selling it mostly in China, that allows them to continue to profit from their oil even though nobody else is able to get theirs out. Now, for the rest of the world, the picture is not as great. 20% of the world's oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz. Iran's oil is just a small fraction, of that. So they've been able to get their oil out, but it is coming nowhere near, making up the

shortfall of having the entire straight clothes. And so as the global economy tries to absorb the shock of missing that daily supply of oil, you're starting to see it leak into all aspects, or many different aspects of the economy. For instance, things like fertilizer, which are heavily reliant on petroleum products and refining, those are starting to become more skilled. So if things don't change, we'll be paying a lot more for fertilizer. In just three weeks, the price of nitrogen fertilizer went from $480 to $700 a ton. So that means things like crop yields could start to become worse, and that of course would mean food prices could start to go up. Obviously, oil also refined oil, petroleum products, diesel fuel, ship fuel, gasoline for your car.

those things are also becoming more scarce. The fuel I will need to buy this spring will be in the 30% higher than before the war started. It used to be 60-something to fill my tank. Now it's 90-something. And as we use gasoline or diesel fuel to move around a lot of goods within the United States, within Europe,

with other countries, other places with large landmass, you're going to start to see the price of those goods go up as well. losing that supply of oil, we're just starting to see the effects of that. And I think a lot of economists expect that if it goes on for another month or another two months even, it could really become dramatic. I would think that if the war ends, Iran says, okay, it's over. The U.S. says, okay, it's over. And then the Strait of Hormuz opens back up.

We get back to normal pretty quickly? Well, it depends on how much damage had been done, right? There's been a lot of missiles and bombs flying around the region that have hit gas production infrastructure, that have hit oil production and distribution infrastructure. So those are not things you can instantly switch on and have working back at 100%. Also, the Strait of Hormuz, even if there is no war, even if Iran has promised to not fire into the Strait, promise there aren't any mines there, even if there's been some sort of military solution where Iran's ability to launch missiles and mines, been completely and indisputably destroyed. It's still going to take some time to make sure that that entire waterway is free of minds. There is another key waterway in this region, Babel Mandab.

And as I understand it, if I'm looking at my map right, you've got the Strait of Hormuz on one side of Saudi Arabia. Bab al-Mandab is on the other side of Saudi Arabia. Late last week, the Houthis in Yemen entered this war. And many analysts said, oh, wow, we might have another problem here. What is the threat on the other side of Saudi Arabia? Well, the threat there is, yeah, ship trying to pass north that need to get to the Suez Canal could come under a missile attack from the Houthis. So what you would see if the Houthis entered the war and started attacking shipping on the other side is, you know, it would make it difficult for among other things that the Saudi pipeline, which feeds across Saudi Arabia and into an oil terminal on that. And

that side make it harder to forget oil to get out and also, of course, affect other types of shipping as well, not just oil. So, you know, there are additional shocks to commerce and to the economy that could happen if the hoot thieves really get involved in earnest. So what a month in, what options does the United States have here? Broadly, if you want to end the war, you have to either do it through military force, which is to completely ensure that Iran no longer has control of this military, no longer has the military mean to shut down the strait or attack oil infrastructure around the region, or you negotiate a settlement. Like you get out of the war via diplomacy.

Those are really the only two options at this point. Jerry Doyle is the Global Defense Editor at Bloomberg News. Coming up, is the U.S. going to put boots on the ground? Support for the show today comes from HIMS. E.D. is more common than many people realize. And it can often be easier to treat than you might think. With HIMS, you can connect online with a licensed provider to explore personalized treatment options all discreetly and on your terms.

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slash explain. Go to Shopify.com slash explained. What's that? That's Shopify.com slash explained. When Westcham first took flight in 1996, the vibes were a bit different. People thought denim on denim was peak fashion. Inline skates were everywhere. And two out of three women rocked, the Rachel.

While those things stayed in the 90s, one thing that hasn't is that fuzzy feeling you get when WestJet welcomes you on board. Here's to Westjetting since 96. Travel back in time with us and actually travel with us at westjet.com slash 30 years. This is Today Explained. I'm Noelle King. It's today explained. President Trump has been using Truth Social to telegraph his war plans. One of them is a possible attack on Karg Island.

Truth Social. If the Hermuz Strait is not immediately, quote, open for business, we will conclude our lovely, quote, stay in Iran by blowing up and completely obliterating all of their electric generating plants, oil wells, and Karg Island. Phil Stewart, Chief National Security correspondent from Reuters, calls the island Iran's economic jugular. About 90% of Iran's oil is exported through Karg. And so blowing it up would be a very big deal. And Trump is reportedly considering something else that would be a bigger deal. Which is deploying, you know, ground forces to go into the island, either for a little bit of time or for a significant amount of time, to really make sure that Iran can't get access to this place that is so vital for its economy. If the U.S. were to deploy troops to Karg Island, how big of a deal would that be?

Well, it would be a tremendous undertaking. It would be one of the most complicated operations that it's carried out in many years. And the reason for that is just because it's so close to Iran. You know, it's just miles off of Iran's mainland. And it's within rocket range and within range of drones and all kinds of other projectiles that could be fired that would be fired at U.S. forces seeking to occupy it. So if U.S. forces were to deploy to this island,

we should not assume that Iran would throw its hands up and say, okay, guys, Iran would fight back? They would absolutely fight back. And not only would they fight back, but, you know, the war that's already become a regional war would almost certainly intensify because the Iranians haven't really retaliated against energy infrastructure in the way that they could if Carg Island were taken off the board for them. They would really see it as like this is an existential threat and it is time to pull out all the stops. They have said they would attack energy infrastructure elsewhere in the Gulf. So all the U.S. Bhaas of Bhaas, the energy, and the fanavari of the

state of the regime Zionistie, so all of U.S. allies would see their energy infrastructure attack. They've threatened desalienization plants that Arab allies of the United States rely on in order to have water for their people. Bahrain's government said an Iranian drone strike damaged a Bahraini desalination plant.

Kuwait says one Indian national has been killed in an attack on a power and water desalination plant. All of this infrastructure is just sitting out in the open. And it requires an intense amount of air defense to protect. And that's what we've seen is just the U.S. and its Gulf allies going through enormous amounts of air defense to try and protect these cities and structures and bases. And if the Iranians were really to go after energy infrastructure in a serious way, it could have global repercussions very, very quickly. All right.

So we actually don't know what the president's plans are with respect to Karg Island. but we are speaking on Monday morning, you and I are, and this morning Trump posted on Truth Social. The U.S. will completely obliterate all of their electric generating plants, oil wells, and Karg Island. I mean, that is as, that seems like, as explicit a threat as one can make. What do you make of what he said there? The president has really vacillated between these two extremes. One is escalation, like he's talking about in that tweet. full, you know, maximalist escalation where the U.S. will go after the most important energy

infrastructure that Iran has. And it's a nation that relies on energy for its entire economy, right? And for, you know, powering hospitals and schools and other things that are important, not just for the military, but for civilians. Our military is the greatest in the world by far. Iran is being decimated. Those kind of maximalist comments, on the one hand. On the other hand, he's talking about negotiation. So we've had very good negotiations today. With Iran. All weekend, you had senior Trump administration officials talking about their efforts to negotiate

an end to the conflict. So we don't really know where we're going to end up. And one possibility that where we could end up is something in the middle, where you have U.S. forces temporarily deploying to some places to put more pressure on Iran, something that the U.S. military has been planning to do. And it is possible that instead of choosing one of these two options, one is complete escalation, and the other is negotiation, you might see, you know, come to fruition, these plans the military has been putting on the board for some time, which are, you know,

limited occupation of islands or shoreline along the Strait of Hormuz. The problem, I think one might say, is that limited occupation seems to be something that the U.S. has planned for in the past, and then it wasn't so limited, yeah? Absolutely. You know, there is a real risk of mission creep. But I would argue that that is something that the folks that I've spoken to are aware of. They're aware of the mission creep risks. They don't have the kind of military movements of ground forces into the region that you would expect ahead of a major ground invasion. So all of the kinds of things that we're seeing, the movement of forces that we've seen,

are much more closely aligned with the idea of a limited operation and not a major invasion. Tell me what we're seeing specifically. What makes you think that? So, you know, so far in recent days, we've had a movement of, you know, a couple thousand paratroopers into the region. And those folks could be some of the kinds of people that would parachute onto Karg Island, for example, or might parachute onto some of these other smaller islands that are also significant for protecting the straight-of-war moves, which, you know, when the president isn't talking about Karga Island is one of the things he also talks. They have to open it up. They have to open up the straight. There's different ways to militarily open that straight. The question is, you know, will he pull the trigger and carry out this limited operation that would include not just those paratroopers, but also thousands of Marines and sailors that have been moving into the region in recent days to give the president these extra options.

One of the big questions with this war, time and again, has been why, why, why, why? Why are we doing what we're doing? What is the strategic principle behind what we're doing? So Senator Lindsay Graham, who's been acting as sort of a proxy for the White House, has gone on TV and said, Here's what I tell President Trump, keep it up for a few more weeks, take Carg Island where all of the resources they have to produce oil, control that island, let this regime down a vine. And that is the argument for deploying troops or for attacking Carg Island. We did Eogima. We can do this.

Is this argument convincing people in Washington? Is it convincing the people who need to be convinced? You know, I think that Senator Graham's argument is very persuasive among certain people in Washington. And certainly U.S. military planners believe that Iran responds to pressure, right? If you look back to the killing of Iran's general Qasem Soleimani during the first Trump administration, you know, there was a lot of, there are a lot of folks that believe that Iran, Iran's, you know, provocative actions against the United States and its, and its allies kind of really scaled back after that, that they, that they respond to pressure. Now, there's another school of thought that Iran

absolutely will not buckle when under pressure. That it's actually part of the kind of ethos that they are, you know, the United States is their, is their top adversary, along with Israel, and that, you know, in the event of attack, you know, people are going to kind of rally around that identity as, you know, sort of the resistance force. And that is a very powerful argument as well, because Iran has traditionally seen themselves as revolutionaries as kind of a resistance against the United States and against Israel. And now that they're under attack, the question is, would an escalating attack really force them to back away from that identity? Or will it kind of have them double down. I think Americans really want to know whether we are going to see troops en masse deployed into

the region, whether boots on the ground, so to speak, will come to pass. You've been reporting on this for a long time. What set of circumstances do you think would need to be in place in order for us to deploy into Iran or into this region in a big way? Like, what could happen here? So this is the most important question, and I'm so glad you asked it and asked it in that way, because really there are a lot of things that can happen once you start putting more and more skin in the game, as it were, by deploying ground forces. You know, if there were a large strike that killed a large number of U.S. troops, if Iran decides to, you know, go big in its retaliation and it's successful, because I think they have tried to, you know, target U.S. troops and have killed 13. and wounded more than 300, so it's not as if there's no cost. Three U.S. military members are dead and five others are hurt after heavy bombing continued in Iran overnight into this morning. Six U.S. service members have been killed during Operation Epic Fury.

Several servicemen were injured, according to the Pentagon, after an Iranian missile and drones slammed into this American air base in Saudi Arabia. But it's not, you know, so far, the United States has not seen the kind of major attack that some of these military planners really feared before the war began. You know, there was real concern that there could be a catastrophic strike on, on U.S. bases or U.S. personnel that could actually create a lot of political risk here and force the United States to double down or force U.S. allies. You know, if it was a big strike on, you know, desolonization plants or major cities in the Gulf, that, you know, you could really see this becoming, you know, an intensified war much more than it is right now. Phil Stewart, he's Reuters chief national security correspondent. Peter Balin-on-Rosen produced today's show and Jolie Myers edited. Andrea Lopez-Crisado is our fact-checker, Patrick Boyd, and David Tatashore engineered. I'm Noelle King. It's today explained.