Larry Johnson and Glenn Diesen discuss Iran's possible entry into the Turkey-Saudi-Pakistan defence pact and the unravelling of US economic leverage in the Middle East
Glenn Diesen interviews former CIA analyst Larry Johnson on his YouTube channel.
Summary
Glenn Diesen and Larry Johnson discuss the emerging Turkey-Saudi-Pakistan defence pact — known informally as the Mecca agreement — and credible but as-yet-unconfirmed reports that Iran has been formally invited to join it. Johnson argues that this development, driven behind the scenes by China and Russia, represents a fundamental shift in the Middle East's security architecture away from US-dominated bloc politics. He contends that the US strategy of using economic coercion, sanctions, and support for radical Islamist groups to weaken both Iran and Russia has proven self-defeating, accelerating the very decoupling it sought to prevent. Johnson also outlines a three-phase analysis of the oil supply crisis resulting from the closure of the Persian Gulf, warning that the depletion of strategic petroleum reserves means a genuine shortage is now imminent, with cascading effects on diesel, aviation fuel, fertiliser, helium (down roughly 40%, threatening chip makers), and LNG (Qatar supplied approximately 25% of world supply, now curtailed). He raises the possibility that Iran may withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and move toward developing a nuclear weapon, and warns that any Gulf state that facilitates US sanctions against Iran risks becoming a military target.
Key Takeaways
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Iran's Possible Entry into the Turkey-Saudi-Pakistan Defence Pact
Glenn Diesen: Welcome back everyone. We are joined again by Larry Johnson, a former CIA analyst, to discuss what's going on, primarily in the Middle East. Thank you for coming back on the program.
Larry Johnson: Mayhem, chaos — the Middle East.
Glenn Diesen: That does summarise it. But there are also some indications that order or structure might emerge from this chaos — which is, I suppose, where it would emerge. I read an article of yours arguing that the recent defence pact between Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan has been misread. Many people interpreted it through their own biases. Some said it would be a new alliance against the Iranians. But you argue that the term "Islamic NATO" is misleading. Could you explain why?
Larry Johnson: I've had fun with it. I called it the Middle East Treaty Organisation — instead of NATO, we get MTO, or "Me Too." I was initially sceptical when they announced it, although it was clear it had been in the works for a while. When the United States and Iran were meeting in Switzerland in June, there was simultaneously a meeting in Cairo with the Iranian foreign minister along with Pakistan, Turkey, and Egypt. I presumed at the time they were discussing a regional security arrangement. But when the pact was announced two weeks ago with no Egypt and no Iran present, I thought, well, on paper — Turkey has the second-largest army among official NATO members. Previously it was third-largest if you counted Ukraine as a de facto member, since Ukraine had the larger army. Saudi Arabia was ostensibly the banker, the guys with the money, except they're in rather difficult financial straits right now. And Pakistan brings nuclear weapons to the table. So it's an interesting alliance.
Then we got news that Asim Munir was heading to Iran — and he has now arrived — carrying with him a formal invitation to bring Iran into what we'll call the Mecca agreement. There are also reports that others are on the invitation list or asking to join, such as Bangladesh, Egypt, and Syria. This thing looks like it may actually be acquiring life, particularly if Iran comes in. At the same time, Munir is reportedly talking to Iran about an expanded trade relationship — this in the face of the US threat to punish any nation that trades with Iran.
This is not unusual in light of what Pakistan did back in April. When the United States first announced the blockade of Iran, within two days Pakistan said it was opening six overland routes from ports on its southern coast straight into Iran for trade. Step back and consider how important the trade relationship between Pakistan and Iran actually is: Iran supplies roughly 70% of the natural gas Pakistan uses — for street vendors cooking, for heating homes in winter, for industrial purposes. Pakistan doesn't have a good alternative source for that. And Iran imports rice from Pakistan. The countries have a genuine basis for a mutually beneficial economic relationship.
I think what we may be seeing are the foundations of a new international security architecture for the Middle East. When Iranian Foreign Minister Araghchi was in St. Petersburg at the end of April and met with Putin, Putin came out afterwards and said we need a new security architecture. One week later, Araghchi made his pilgrimage to Beijing and met with Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who said essentially the same thing as Vladimir Putin. That's not a coincidence. Those two governments are coordinating policy. And at the same time, I think there are diplomatic moves being kept below the surface that are simply not being reported, because China and Russia are serious about building a separate international political and economic — and perhaps military — organisation outside the control of the United States and NATO.
That is where Trump keeps shooting himself in the foot with his constant threats. Most recently he threatened to bomb countries that didn't buy US Treasury bonds. That is an effective sales technique — hold a gun to someone's head and ask if they want to buy your product. When you do that to enough countries, they start looking for another way out of that relationship. In the past two weeks he's insulted and threatened South Korea, threatened to bomb Oman, imposed 50% tariffs on Canada, and been in tense trade relations with Brazil. Meanwhile, China is offering all these countries: we'll trade in your currency, you trade in ours, no need for a letter of credit from a US bank, no movement of money through SWIFT — you can handle it through CIPS. What we're seeing is one of those historical watershed moments where the old order of petrodollar hegemony is coming unglued — not just on the economic front, but on the political and military fronts — and Trump doesn't have a good answer for it.
Collective Security vs. Bloc Politics — Lessons from Europe
Glenn Diesen: I often make the point that we have two types of regional security arrangements. We have alliances where country A and B cooperate against a non-member, country C. And then we have collective security arrangements where country A and B seek security with each other instead of against each other. That distinction is very important. If people really want to understand why we have a war in Europe now, they have to understand how we made that shift after the Cold War. Initially we did have agreements with the Russians — the Charter of Paris for a New Europe — where we would seek security with each other, not through a bloc system against each other. Russia was supposed to be included in the new security architecture, and in such an arrangement you seek indivisible security. In the Middle East, for example, the Iranians and Saudis would agree that Iran should not enhance its security at the expense of Saudi Arabia, and they find mechanisms of reciprocity.
What happened in Europe is that this was the agreement — we had a deal. We even developed the OSCE in 1994, an inclusive security institution. And then came the idea: well, the Russians are weak, why are we doing this? Let's expand NATO instead. That's what NATO expansion represented. We threw away this collective security institution to go back to bloc politics. All the dream of Gorbachev's common European home went out the window. Instead we returned to bloc politics — and not even stable status quo bloc politics. We expanded gradually eastward until we reached deeply divided societies: Georgia, Ukraine, Moldova. And there we had to fight it out about where the new dividing lines go in a re-divided Europe. Why would anyone do this? The conclusion that the Chinese, Russians, and others reach is: hegemony. If you're the hegemon, you don't want peace to break out. You want the world divided into obedient allies and weakened adversaries. That's bloc politics. That's hegemonic politics.
That's why the Chinese are quite concerned — they don't want to play into the bloc politics game. That's why they often make the point that BRICS isn't an alliance. It's more than an alliance. It's for countries to seek security with each other, not to go against the US. I would be hopeful if Iran were allowed to join this club — not just because of Iran itself, but because it would signify indivisible security instead of this hegemonic Game of Thrones war project. But what can Trump do if he wants to throw a stick into this? As you said, he threatened to bomb Oman if they made any deals with Iran. Do you see any indications they might try to prevent a collective security architecture in the Middle East?
US Economic Leverage and the Gulf States
Larry Johnson: They're going to continue to try to use whatever remaining economic leverage they have over Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, and Bahrain. What's really interesting is that some reports indicate that not only are they looking at Iran, but also Qatar, Bahrain, and Kuwait — that there have been contacts between them and Iran over the last couple of weeks. Even though those countries have been hit by Iran, and Iran was going after US military bases in those countries, Iran is still reaching out saying, "We don't have to constantly be at each other's throats."
The reality is that when you go back and look at the last 46 years of US policy in West Asia, from 1979 with the overthrow of the Shah and the rise of the Islamic Republic, the United States embarked on a policy of confrontation with Iran and subversion of the Iranian government. It used CIA findings to work with the Gulf Arabs, pitching it as a fight between Sunni and Shia Islam — a fight against these apostates. It started with funding the war, helping fund Saddam Hussein's war against Iran. The United States played the role of director in an orchestra, coordinating support for Iraq that came via Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and even the UAE.
The United States simultaneously went after both Russia after 1991 and Iran, and it relied upon relationships developed in the 1980s with the Mujahideen in Afghanistan — very radical groups that the US established relationships with through the CIA and through Pakistan. Pakistan played an enabling role in this as well. Once that war was over, it wasn't a case of everybody going back to their corners. The United States continued to play a dual track: on one hand claiming to fight a new war on terror, while at the same time funding the very groups engaged in that war on terror against us. We did it in Bosnia. We did it with the second Chechen war in Russia. Then it extended into Iraq — building an alliance with Mujahideen al-Khalq and carrying out terrorist attacks against Iran. And it expanded in 2012, where Iran became the primary target rather than Russia, and taking Bashar al-Assad out was both a way to put a finger in the eye of the Iranians and of Russia.
So we've seen this whole narrative — it's not unique to a particular administration, it's been an integral part of US policy to support radical Islamists for the purpose of weakening both Russia and Iran. And now it looks like the Gulf Arabs, who were used as the piggy bank for all this — the United States would get them to fund it — are starting to say, "Wait a second. This has been hurting us, not helping us." I think all are ready to move away from that except the UAE. The UAE is the one where I think Israelis have had control for years. And I think you're going to see another military strike by Iran against the UAE in the coming weeks.
Iran, Terrorism Narratives, and the Rehabilitation of al-Julani
Glenn Diesen: The way the US financed these radical groups — and the fact that Iran actually fought them — is something people often fail to recognise. Whenever they talk about Iran, they mention it in the same sentence as suicide bombers, much like they did with al-Qaeda before the invasion of Iraq, where they mentioned September 11 and Saddam Hussein in the same sentence enough times that people thought they were somehow connected, even though those groups despised each other. The same happened with Iran. Most of these terror groups terrorising the region and carrying out attacks in the West are Sunni extremist groups. You don't have many Shia suicide bomber groups at all. After September 11, the Iranians — who also have no love for Sunni extremist groups — offered to help against the Taliban and al-Qaeda. And the US ended up joining al-Qaeda in Syria, putting one of their leaders in power. You can't make this up.
Larry Johnson: Yeah, it's just nonsensical. I wrote a piece — it's posted at sonar21.com — explaining why the charge that Iran is the number one sponsor of terrorism is simply a lie. As I was going through it, it suddenly dawned on me: why would the United States provide financial support through intelligence organisations to the very groups we claimed to be fighting in the war on terror? It's contradictory. Why would you have Cofer Black calling on people to provide information about Bin Laden, while other elements of the CIA were working with the Bin Laden network? It comes down to Iran — destroying Iran. That was the primary objective, along with Russia. It was a two-edged policy designed to cut both Russia and Iran, and it was never reconciled with our overt claims that we were fighting a war on terror in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Apart from the fact that this policy has proved bankrupt, as you noted — one minute we've got a $10 million reward on the head of al-Julani, the next minute we're helping him trim his beard, putting him in a high-end Bond Street suit, giving him wingtip shoes instead of sandals, changing his name, and calling him President al-Sharaa. Historically we've seen similar transformations — Menachem Begin was formerly part of the Irgun, a Zionist terrorist organisation, and Shamir was also a member of a terrorist group in Israel. So we've done this before, but now we're being very blatant about it.
Within the Gulf Arab states, they were promised that doing this would bring them security. Well, they're not more secure now, and they've suffered significant economic losses. Both Saudi Arabia and Qatar are in tough financial straits right now — they're living off their savings, so to speak — and the prospects for Qatar to start raking in the dollars again are quite limited. A rational person is going to sit down and think: we need positive relations with Iran so the economy can start working again. And as they do that, it's a direct slap in the face to Scott Bessant and to Donald Trump.
Glenn Diesen: About the al-Julani issue — I was most surprised by how quickly the whole rewrite was done. He was still on the list of international terrorists, he was an al-Qaeda leader, and then within a few days they put a suit on him, changed his name, and declared him a moderate. All you need is a media that thinks its job is to parrot the talking points of the government, and there's no real problem — no criticism.
Oil Markets, Economic Warfare, and the Limits of Manipulation
Larry Johnson: But it's not just the war issue — it's also the economic problems. The ability of the Trump administration to manipulate oil prices will only work for so long. We saw that after Trump announced economic D-Day, Bessant said he was quite surprised and couldn't explain why oil prices were going up. At least in the movie Casablanca, Claude Rains, playing the police inspector, when he claimed to be surprised there was gambling in the casino, you knew he knew there was gambling. But here's Bessant who genuinely seems shocked — why is the price of oil still going up? I announced we were going to do this thing and it should have come down. He was tacitly admitting that the administration had been manipulating the price of oil.
I wrote another article laying out why there are three phases to this war's oil supply situation. Phase one: from roughly February 28th to April 5th. During that period, even though the Strait of Hormuz was closed and wells were starting to be shut down, you already had tankers that had been filled up and were on the high seas heading to their destinations. As far as refineries and consumers were concerned, there wasn't a shortage — the oil was still coming in. That changed around April 5th, plus or minus a week.
Then came phase two. The United States and other countries tapped into their strategic petroleum reserves. Think of it like this: you've been building up your savings account for years and you're sitting on $60,000. Your monthly expenses are $10,000 and you've lost your job. You keep drawing the money out — $10,000 a month — and you can only do that for about six months before you're out of money. That's what phase two was. The United States and other countries were drawing off those reserves and pretending there was no problem. The reality was there was still a shortage of sour crude — the heavier, high-sulfur crude from the Persian Gulf essential for producing diesel — and the US combat efforts in the Persian Gulf were also placing additional demand on diesel supplies. But the price was being stabilised through these reserve withdrawals.
Roughly around August 1st, that comes to an end. Phase three: there's an actual shortage. There's no more to draw from the reserves and no other country stepping up to increase production. In fact, what looks like it's happening now, with Trump's fight with Carney in Canada, is that Canada was a significant supplier of this sour crude to the United States — essential for making diesel and aviation fuel. Up to this point, despite past frictions, Canada still supplied that oil. Now that's in question. If Canada says to Trump, "Screw you, we're redirecting it to China," then the United States has a very serious problem.
This global shortage of diesel — and the growing shortage of aviation fuel — is a global problem, simply because once those 20 million barrels a day coming out of the Persian Gulf were cut off, refineries lost the ability to produce the diesel and aviation fuel they previously could, because they need that particular grade of oil. People who thought back in February, "They've closed the strait, let's watch for the shortage effect," didn't see the effect immediately and thought, "Never mind." Now it's started a much worse situation. When you draw down strategic reserves to this degree, it's no longer a sign of confidence — it's starting to show desperation, because there's no plan B anymore.
Glenn Diesen: I often make the point that when political leaders think they can control the market, they seem to overestimate themselves. You see the same with the Europeans — when the Ukraine war began, they decided to cut themselves off from Russian energy, which meant they had to go and try to snatch more energy from the Middle East. But that's where India was getting its energy from, so India had to go to Russia. Then the Europeans started lecturing India about not buying "immoral Russian energy" — while offering to buy it from India if India refined it first. The idea that they can control all of these things — I'm not sure where this confidence comes from, but it's a very slow learning curve.
The Sweet vs. Sour Crude Problem and Cascading Shortages
Larry Johnson: The average person thinks a barrel of oil is a barrel of oil. But oil comes in two flavours — sweet and sour. Within sour crude there's a range in terms of viscosity, from oil that flows through a pipe to the tar that comes out of Venezuela, which is very thick and doesn't naturally flow through a pipeline. The refineries set up to process that oil and extract what they call the middle distillates — diesel and aviation fuel — are not set up to handle sweet crude. The United States has Trump talking about energy independence because we produce all this sweet crude, but 70% of our refineries are set up to deal with sour crude. That's why we're actually a net importer of sour crude. This problem hits four geographic areas hardest: the United States and the Gulf of Mexico, India, China, and then South Korea and Japan — Japan and South Korea have really suffered the most. China suffered the least because it had significant reserves and is now buying even more from Canada and getting oil through Iraq and Iran. India has had to rely more on Russia. But it's created a disruption in the global supply of diesel and aviation fuel that is going to persist.
When you couple that with the additional economic fallout from the Persian Gulf shortages — liquefied natural gas from Qatar was providing about 25% of the world supply, and that's been curtailed; helium, which is a byproduct of LNG extraction, is down about 40%, which hits chip makers who need to find alternatives that aren't easy to find; and urea and sulfur, which account for about 30 to 35% of global supply and hit directly on fertiliser — it's broader than just oil. The longer the US keeps the blockade in place, the longer this disruption to the international economy. And yet the United States' play is to use threats: do this or we'll levy sanctions on you. And these countries go: we don't need this drama. They start selling the bonds. They start lessening their dependence on Washington precisely so they're not in a position where they can be held hostage.
Glenn Diesen: I'm just a bit surprised at how political leaders think they can control the market. You see the same thing with the Europeans — when they cut themselves off from Russian energy, the Indians got their energy from the Middle East, so suddenly India had to go to Russia, and then the Europeans lectured India about buying immoral Russian energy while offering to buy it back from India if India refined it first. There's no logic to the idea that they can control all of these things. It's a very slow learning curve. But I want to pivot towards the war possibilities now, because if the economic war isn't working — the whole goal of strangling the Iranian economy — there's going to have to be some escalation on the war front. You've probably seen the comments about discussions in Washington of the possibility of using tactical nuclear weapons against Iran to make it capitulate. Several people have made these comments. How are you assessing this? Do you think the US could go down that road?
The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and Iran's Possible Withdrawal
Larry Johnson: I can't rule it out, but I think it's unlikely, if for no other reason than there are still enough adults around Trump and within the Pentagon who understand the actual stakes involved. What is an interesting — or troubling — development is that the Majlis, Iran's parliament, is actively considering withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The rationale is simple. When Iran signed on to the NPT, it was committing to not building a nuclear weapon and expecting that under this treaty it would be treated accordingly — that it wouldn't face threats from countries with nuclear weapons, and that it would agree to inspections in conjunction with the International Atomic Energy Agency. They did all that. And what did it get them? They've been attacked twice within two years. The IAEA inspectors turned out to have been working in close coordination with Western intelligence organisations, providing locations of Iranian facilities and the names and identities of key scientists and engineers who were subsequently assassinated. Iran played by the international rules. And what did it get? Dead scientists. Destroyed facilities.
So now, if they withdraw from the NPT, I think you'll shortly see an announcement that they have developed a nuclear weapon, or that the Ayatollah has authorised building one. That's something to keep an eye on, because I think the Iranian leadership has drawn the correct conclusion: if we're a nuclear power, the West is going to be less likely to attack us. And unlike Pakistan, Iran has a robust ability to deliver such weapons — a much more advanced ballistic missile system, tested and proven in combat, than Pakistan, which has a nuclear weapon but faces a very different challenge in delivering it effectively.
Iran's Options for Pushing Back Against US Sanctions
Glenn Diesen: Besides the NPT, how do you see the Iranians possibly responding to the United States? Trump announced this economic D-Day to strangle the Iranian economy, and the effective message to the world is: you're either with us or against us. If you don't abide by the sanctions, we'll come for you. How do you see the Iranians pushing back?
Larry Johnson: Any Gulf Arab state that participates in and enables the US sanctions will be a target of Iran — not just a verbal target, but a physical target. Iran will attack their economic infrastructure to make sure that, as they've said, if we're not going to get to export oil, nobody's going to get to export oil. That includes Saudi Arabia. Nothing will come out of not only the Persian Gulf, but the Red Sea. They'll work with the Houthis to shut down Yanbu in particular. The candidate most likely to get attacked, if the United States goes forward with this plan and tries to put additional economic pain on Iran, is the UAE. The UAE announced preemptively that it was cutting Iran off on all trade and economic relations. If the UAE persists in that, it will be hit.
Confirming Iran's Invitation to the Mecca Agreement
Glenn Diesen: Just to circle back to what we discussed first — the head of Iran's parliamentary news agency made a point that Iran had been invited to the Mecca agreement. Have we actually seen anything develop there? Has it been confirmed? What do we know so far?
Larry Johnson: Pepe Escobar and I got information yesterday that Asim Munir was travelling to Iran — and he has arrived and has been in meetings all day — with the express purpose of formally inviting Iran to become part of the Mecca agreement and strengthening bilateral military and economic relations with Iran. If those reports are true, and they do appear to be true, then I think Pakistan has made a decision that it's no longer going to be on Washington's leash. Washington keeps it on a leash like a dog, supposedly obedient to Donald Trump. In a sense, Pakistan is declaring its independence.
Glenn Diesen: That would entail Saudi Arabia as well. Saudi Arabia has effectively been the key adversary of Iran, fighting a cold war against Iran for all these years. If Saudi Arabia is, at least to some degree, leaning in the direction of putting an end to the anti-Iranian alliance system and finding a way of living in the region with the Iranians — how would all of this affect the United States?
Larry Johnson: We saw the first steps of that about two or three years ago, through Chinese intervention, when the Iranians and Saudis were reconciled. Prior to that, they had been fighting this proxy war in Yemen, and the Iranians had been delivering significant blows via the Houthis against the Saudi forces. China intervened, working behind the scenes, got them both to step back, put their guns down, and start talking. There's been more high-level contact since then between the Iranian and Saudi governments, with defence ministers meeting and so on.
So it's not just Pakistan playing a role as mediator — the ultimate architect behind all this is China, and to a lesser extent Russia. They are dead serious about the need to get the United States out of the Persian Gulf and out of the various countries where the US has been using covert action to stir up opposition to existing governments. I don't see Iran and Saudi Arabia setting aside this reconciliation. I think the Saudis recognise that if they keep dancing to the music the United States wants them to dance to, it's going to further damage Saudi Arabia economically. Whereas if they can separate themselves from that dependence, there's an open road that China and Russia are offering that frankly looks a lot more attractive than what the United States can offer. What the United States is offering is: buy our bonds, help us fund our deficits. What's in it for Saudi Arabia? They get to hold a bunch of potentially worthless paper. China is saying: we've got bonds backed by gold. The Saudis look at that and go with the Chinese.
The Petrodollar System and the Seeds of US Decline
Glenn Diesen: I remember when the Chinese were mediating the Saudi-Iranian reconciliation three years ago, I thought it was interesting that afterwards the former head of Mossad, Ephraim Halevy, came out to comment on the whole deal, arguing that if the Gulf states are going to end this alliance against Iran, perhaps Israel should too — that a lot of their issues could be resolved. You can see that if peace breaks out, the whole alliance system can collapse. My first thought was that it could actually be an interesting out for the US, if it really wants to pull back from the Middle East as its national security strategy suggested it should, by focusing on the western hemisphere and East Asia. But as you say, what happens to the whole US economy then? The security architecture is also the reason the Gulf states pour so much money into US bonds. The US has put itself in a very difficult position where it can't actually afford to make peace, because if peace breaks out, the whole financial system appears to be at risk of coming crashing down.
Larry Johnson: This is a Hegelian dialectic in full glory — the United States is sowing the seeds of its own destruction through its current policies. It enjoyed being the hegemon, being the reserve currency. But the minute it decided the only way to maintain that status was through the use of force, threat, coercion, and sanction, that's when it began losing its ability to maintain that status. Prior to the sanctions imposed on Russia in 2022, the momentum for BRICS — and particularly for China-Russia economic cooperation — wasn't really there. It was just sort of limping along. Then at the end of January or beginning of February 2023, Xi Jinping flew to Moscow, met with Putin, and they came out pledging their friendship and solidarity. And about a month after that — you're right, it's three years now — China brought Saudi Arabia and Iran to Beijing and those two countries restored diplomatic relations on March 1st. You think that's a coincidence? That what Russia and China decided to do in the January-February timeframe just happened to be followed by China getting the Saudis and Iranians reconciled? No. This is part of a broader strategic structure that Russia and China are erecting — refocusing the security architecture not just militarily but economically.
The acceleration of CIPS, the cross-border interbank payment system, the increased use of the yuan as a settlement currency — when the United States tried to sanction China on agricultural products, China punched back by going to Brazil and saying, "We'll buy all your soybeans." Now China is one of the major customers for Brazil, and those purchases are made not with US dollars but with the respective Chinese and Brazilian currencies, handled through Chinese banks — entirely outside the once-dominant US-controlled financial network. The United States is going to fight like hell, and may even engage in further wars, in an effort to try to preserve that status. But they can't do it. It's mission impossible for them.
Glenn Diesen: That's the problem with continuous efforts to coerce countries into submission — after a while they learn to decouple. The Chinese developed an alternative to GPS after discovering that the United States could simply shut down the GPS of one of their ships on some charges that proved to be false, essentially shutting down any shipping operation it chose. They realised they couldn't depend on that anymore. You see the same logic now in finance, in transportation corridors, across the board. It's too tempting to abuse that administrative control over the international economy, but once you start to do that, countries will move away. And that's what we're seeing now in a big way.
Larry Johnson: Yes.
Glenn Diesen: Well, Larry, thank you very much for taking the time. I look forward to it — you know, it's like that Rolling Stones song, "Paint It Black." We're sort of painting a black picture, but so be it. It is what it is.
Larry Johnson: Well, it could be positive at the end. There's always a natural balancing towards equilibrium. The lesson countries have to learn is that if one abuses its position — too much military force — others will balance it. If it abuses sanctions too much, others will learn to live without it. The learning curve is not impressive, but hopefully over time an equilibrium can be restored, with mechanisms in place that punish this kind of aggression.
Glenn Diesen: On that desperate effort to end on a positive note — thank you again for taking the time.
Larry Johnson: All right, my friend. Thanks so much. Take care, Glenn.