June 29, 2026 • 12 mins
Iran has escalated tensions in the Strait of Hormuz after an IRGC drone struck a commercial cargo ship traveling along a newly established shipping route near Oman. In this episode, Buck breaks down what happened, why Iran is challenging the fragile U.S.-Iran ceasefire agreement, and what it could mean for global oil markets, commercial shipping, and U.S. foreign policy.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Breaking news from the last twenty four hours, and the
Strait of Horror moves the world's critical maritime checkpoint. It's
not number one, but very high on the list of
choke points I think, through which roughly twenty percent of
global oil trade normally flows. Well, there's another problem, a
(00:22):
direct challenge to the fragile US Iran Memorandum of Understanding
that was signed just around June seventeenth, the ISLA, the
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps the IRGC, struck a commercial vessel
using a drone. The attack occurred on a newly promoted
(00:42):
and oman Oman backed southern route near the Omani coast,
immediately triggered a pause in un efforts to evacuate hundreds
of stranded ships and over eleven thousand seafarers from the
Persian Gulf. Traffic had been rebounding after the deal, but
this incident exposed the limit of that momentum and tested
President Trump's claim of a workable path to safer, higher
(01:05):
volume transit. So Trump has publicly called this a foolish
violation after of rather the ceasefire framework. So this is
not a full shutdown of the Strait yet, but it
is a classic Iranian gray zone pressure tactic selective strikes
and warnings to maintain leverage without triggering all out war.
(01:28):
So well, let's go to what happened. First of all,
strike on the ever Lovely is the ship I believe. Thursday,
June twenty fifth, Singapore flag container ship ever Lovely was
hit while transitting the Straight of Horror Moves by a
one way attack drone, a loitering munition which was being
operated by the IRGC. It was hit on the starboard
(01:50):
side upper deck a slash bridge area. Damage to bridge
windows and structure were reported, but there were no casualties.
The ship continued under its own power, eventually exiting the
strait safely. The context of the transit was the vessel
was leading a small group of ships attempting passage on
the southern recommended route, hugging the Omani coast, an alternative
(02:16):
promoted to avoid mines in the central area and the
Iranian controlled northern lanes. So reports indicate no prior radio
warning or ordered to turnback was issued to this group
by Iranian forces. The attack occurred midday Thursday local time,
about seven nautical miles from the coast of oman So
(02:39):
US officials have already confirmed that it was an IRGC drone,
and UK Maritime Trade Operations issued an advisory noting the
projectile strike and the damage. This was the first reported
direct attack on a commercial ship in the Strait since
shortly before the US Iran Interim Agreement went into a
(03:00):
effect last week. So what is going on here? What
is happening? Why is Iran doing this? Well, Iran is
framing this as enforcement of its authority over the waterway
and the IRGC's naval arm and the Persian Gulf Astraight Authority,
which is an Iranian entity under US sanctions, had warned
(03:20):
in the days before this that vessels using routes not
sanctioned by Tehran were doing so illegally and at their
own risk. And they said that the new southern route
near Oman was unacceptable and completely dangerous and stated that
the only authorized route is the one declared by Iran
and that quote violators will be dealt with. Iranian messaging
(03:44):
emphasizes that transit outside their designated framework carries no guarantees
of safe passage, insurance coverage, reliability protection and the consequences
fall on owners, operators, etc. And there are indications that
Iran seeks coordination permission into a revenue for passage, which
is consistent with longer standing efforts to monetize control the checkpoint.
(04:08):
They want to have a toll system in place. The
Iranians now want to set it up so that they
get money for every ship that passes through. And if
you're a ship that won't pay the toll, well, you
might get hit with a drone, you might get bombed,
something very bad may happen to you. So this is
(04:30):
a big problem, and the Trump administration certainly has to
find a way to effectively deal with it. There's been
no full admission of this specific drone strike in Iranian
public statements yet, but I think everybody knows that this
pattern fits the prior IRGC tactics of warning about kinetic
action against anyone who quote violates end quote the new
(04:53):
order that Iran has set up here, which is you
have to go in our lanes and you have to
pay our tolls. So this attack happened even as some
ships continued moving on the southern route Thursday afternoon and
a Friday, Because you know, we are able to track
this stuff. Something called Lloyd's List Intelligence tracks these ships publicly,
(05:14):
so how is shipping traffic through the state looking well,
the pre war baseline of ships through the Strait of
Hormuz is roughly one hundred and fifty That was bi direction,
also go in both ways tankers and dry cargo ships.
During the height of the crisis or the Iran blockade,
(05:35):
it was near zero for days on end, maybe a
ship or two, and hundreds of vessels were stranded. So
since the MoU went into effect recently there's been a
significant uptick. One week post announcement, one hundred and twenty
five transits were recorded and on peakeday sixty two vessels
went through. On June twenty fourth, Recently, on Wednesday, close
(05:59):
to eighty vessels went through. Another tracker noted fifty five
merchant ships with substantial oil volume in another day. So
maybe we're getting back to close to half of the
Straight of Hormuz traffic that we had seen before. But
in the last twenty four hours in the aftermath of
that strike, you had eighteen inbound, forty five outbound, and
(06:26):
twenty six vessels continued using the Omani route after the
ever Lovely was attacked on Friday, and some vessels appear
to be using or coordinating those Irani to prove northern routes.
So some vessels are saying, we'll actually do this Iranian
toll thing. We think that this is the way to go.
(06:47):
So the important takeaway here is that the momentum of
the opening of Hormuz has maybe slowed a little bit,
but it has not stopped. But the psychological and insurance
impact is probably going to still be felt. So there
could be a pullback, higher war risk premiums and more
hesitation for ships to go through in the days ahead,
(07:08):
And the UNS pause on its evacuation plan adds further
friction for the hundreds of ships and eleven thousand plus
seafareres who are still waiting. Oil prices have shown sensitivity
to all this, and we know that any sustained disruption
or insurance spike will feed into higher energy costs, but
I don't see that happening. I think that they're going
to be able to figure this out. That takes me
(07:29):
to the Trump administration. President Trump addressed the straight of
horror moves issued directly on truth Social this morning. On Friday,
the Islamic Republic of Iran shot at least four one
way attack drones at ships transversing the straight of horror moves.
He wrote, one of the drones solidly hit the upper
deck of a large and very expensive cargo carrying ship.
(07:51):
Damage was done, but the ship was able to proceed
on its way. We knocked down three other drones. Obviously,
this is a foolish violation of Arsies fire agreement. So
Trump saying, look, there were four drones actually, so that
would have been substantially more damage. It wasn't just one
drone to send a message. Four drones. Maybe it could
(08:12):
have disabled the ship. Maybe it could have even sank.
It depends on where they hit. But three of the
four drones were intercepted by the United States. Trump didn't
make summer noting this any of the usual blustery, bellicost
threats in this post about how he's going to destroy Iran,
you know, all the way down to the lowest level
(08:35):
of their military and Secretary of State Marco Rubio has
said that we're going to keep encouraging ships to use
that new southern route Neroman and that if there's continued
interference from the Iranian side of things, but with this
kinds of clear violation, that's going to be a big problem.
So the White House currently monitoring this and the deals.
(08:58):
Core bargain was that Iran i'm would use its best
efforts for safe commercial passage in exchange for the US
lifting the naval blockade of Iranian ports and sanctions, relief
on their oil sales, plus that sixty day window for
broader talks on the whole range of issues, including the
nuclear stockpile issue. So the US had taken a firm
response to this, but not not punching back with full force.
(09:22):
So they're saying it's a violation, but they want to
try to keep this thing on track. Now what does
this mean all going forward? This just shows you this
pretty fragile deal right now, and Iran is going to
keep looking for asymmetric leverage. So in the days two
weeks ahead, I think you're going to see shipping companies
are just going to be assessing day to day. That
(09:44):
means higher insurance costs, some delays, and preference for US
or coalition escorted or heavily protected transit roots the unit
of aactuation pause, delays, relief for stranded crews. Iran may
mix continued low level harassment campaigns with demands for coordination
(10:05):
and revenue. So Iran is going to try to use
this as it's primary leverage point, even if it doesn't
destroy a ship, you know, making this more likely that
stuff like this will happen. Oil price volatility and supply
chain nervousness will persist because well ships are going to
be at risk here at some level. And over the
sixty day window, we'll see what happens with this memorandum
(10:26):
of understanding. Iran is trying to signal that it has
de facto control of the Strait and so it will
not just give that up cheaply here, and Trump's approach
to this seems to be very much to stay with
the get everything flowing for the oil and everything else
will figure out later. Straight remains a choke point. Iran
(10:50):
is going to be able to impose costs using its
asymmetric military capabilities there. It doesn't have to close it fully,
it can just raise the cost of doing business of
transitting through. Now. The US and its military partners certainly
have the tools to open the Straight, but they don't
want to bring this into a broader conflict, certainly not
right now. Iran is incentivized to allow the oil to
(11:11):
continue to flow and get that sanctions relief. Hardliners might say,
we'll figure out a way to evade these, evade these
concessions we've made later on. That's most likely. So it's
a mixed bag and we will see what comes of
it in the days ahead, but still more or less
(11:33):
on track for the Trump Iran deal. Our sponsor is
super Shure. Most businesses rely on business insurance only when
things go wrong. It's the cost of doing business, they say.
But that doesn't mean you understand your policy as a
business owner or operator. And a once a year phone
call from the broker's not enough. Got insurance claims, coverage, gaps,
employee questions. Supershore is who you need. It's a new
(11:53):
company in the business of changing how businesses get their
insurance and how they operate with that insurance. Our company
is more than twenty five employees. Neither the owner, CFO
or HR manager you need to know about Supershore. Supershore
is license in every state for your business insurance and
employee benefits, all with year round support for you and
your team at no additional cost. Go to supershort dot
(12:14):
com slash buck to see why growing businesses are moving
beyond traditional brokers. That's Supershore dot Com slash buc k,
paid for by Supershort Insurance Agency LLC, a licensed insurance
agency that is the show shield High
Breaking news from the last twenty four hours, and the
Strait of Horror moves the world's critical maritime checkpoint. It's
not number one, but very high on the list of
choke points I think, through which roughly twenty percent of
global oil trade normally flows. Well, there's another problem, a
(00:22):
direct challenge to the fragile US Iran Memorandum of Understanding
that was signed just around June seventeenth, the ISLA, the
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps the IRGC, struck a commercial vessel
using a drone. The attack occurred on a newly promoted
(00:42):
and oman Oman backed southern route near the Omani coast,
immediately triggered a pause in un efforts to evacuate hundreds
of stranded ships and over eleven thousand seafarers from the
Persian Gulf. Traffic had been rebounding after the deal, but
this incident exposed the limit of that momentum and tested
President Trump's claim of a workable path to safer, higher
(01:05):
volume transit. So Trump has publicly called this a foolish
violation after of rather the ceasefire framework. So this is
not a full shutdown of the Strait yet, but it
is a classic Iranian gray zone pressure tactic selective strikes
and warnings to maintain leverage without triggering all out war.
(01:28):
So well, let's go to what happened. First of all,
strike on the ever Lovely is the ship I believe. Thursday,
June twenty fifth, Singapore flag container ship ever Lovely was
hit while transitting the Straight of Horror Moves by a
one way attack drone, a loitering munition which was being
operated by the IRGC. It was hit on the starboard
(01:50):
side upper deck a slash bridge area. Damage to bridge
windows and structure were reported, but there were no casualties.
The ship continued under its own power, eventually exiting the
strait safely. The context of the transit was the vessel
was leading a small group of ships attempting passage on
the southern recommended route, hugging the Omani coast, an alternative
(02:16):
promoted to avoid mines in the central area and the
Iranian controlled northern lanes. So reports indicate no prior radio
warning or ordered to turnback was issued to this group
by Iranian forces. The attack occurred midday Thursday local time,
about seven nautical miles from the coast of oman So
(02:39):
US officials have already confirmed that it was an IRGC drone,
and UK Maritime Trade Operations issued an advisory noting the
projectile strike and the damage. This was the first reported
direct attack on a commercial ship in the Strait since
shortly before the US Iran Interim Agreement went into a
(03:00):
effect last week. So what is going on here? What
is happening? Why is Iran doing this? Well, Iran is
framing this as enforcement of its authority over the waterway
and the IRGC's naval arm and the Persian Gulf Astraight Authority,
which is an Iranian entity under US sanctions, had warned
(03:20):
in the days before this that vessels using routes not
sanctioned by Tehran were doing so illegally and at their
own risk. And they said that the new southern route
near Oman was unacceptable and completely dangerous and stated that
the only authorized route is the one declared by Iran
and that quote violators will be dealt with. Iranian messaging
(03:44):
emphasizes that transit outside their designated framework carries no guarantees
of safe passage, insurance coverage, reliability protection and the consequences
fall on owners, operators, etc. And there are indications that
Iran seeks coordination permission into a revenue for passage, which
is consistent with longer standing efforts to monetize control the checkpoint.
(04:08):
They want to have a toll system in place. The
Iranians now want to set it up so that they
get money for every ship that passes through. And if
you're a ship that won't pay the toll, well, you
might get hit with a drone, you might get bombed,
something very bad may happen to you. So this is
(04:30):
a big problem, and the Trump administration certainly has to
find a way to effectively deal with it. There's been
no full admission of this specific drone strike in Iranian
public statements yet, but I think everybody knows that this
pattern fits the prior IRGC tactics of warning about kinetic
action against anyone who quote violates end quote the new
(04:53):
order that Iran has set up here, which is you
have to go in our lanes and you have to
pay our tolls. So this attack happened even as some
ships continued moving on the southern route Thursday afternoon and
a Friday, Because you know, we are able to track
this stuff. Something called Lloyd's List Intelligence tracks these ships publicly,
(05:14):
so how is shipping traffic through the state looking well,
the pre war baseline of ships through the Strait of
Hormuz is roughly one hundred and fifty That was bi direction,
also go in both ways tankers and dry cargo ships.
During the height of the crisis or the Iran blockade,
(05:35):
it was near zero for days on end, maybe a
ship or two, and hundreds of vessels were stranded. So
since the MoU went into effect recently there's been a
significant uptick. One week post announcement, one hundred and twenty
five transits were recorded and on peakeday sixty two vessels
went through. On June twenty fourth, Recently, on Wednesday, close
(05:59):
to eighty vessels went through. Another tracker noted fifty five
merchant ships with substantial oil volume in another day. So
maybe we're getting back to close to half of the
Straight of Hormuz traffic that we had seen before. But
in the last twenty four hours in the aftermath of
that strike, you had eighteen inbound, forty five outbound, and
(06:26):
twenty six vessels continued using the Omani route after the
ever Lovely was attacked on Friday, and some vessels appear
to be using or coordinating those Irani to prove northern routes.
So some vessels are saying, we'll actually do this Iranian
toll thing. We think that this is the way to go.
(06:47):
So the important takeaway here is that the momentum of
the opening of Hormuz has maybe slowed a little bit,
but it has not stopped. But the psychological and insurance
impact is probably going to still be felt. So there
could be a pullback, higher war risk premiums and more
hesitation for ships to go through in the days ahead,
(07:08):
And the UNS pause on its evacuation plan adds further
friction for the hundreds of ships and eleven thousand plus
seafareres who are still waiting. Oil prices have shown sensitivity
to all this, and we know that any sustained disruption
or insurance spike will feed into higher energy costs, but
I don't see that happening. I think that they're going
to be able to figure this out. That takes me
(07:29):
to the Trump administration. President Trump addressed the straight of
horror moves issued directly on truth Social this morning. On Friday,
the Islamic Republic of Iran shot at least four one
way attack drones at ships transversing the straight of horror moves.
He wrote, one of the drones solidly hit the upper
deck of a large and very expensive cargo carrying ship.
(07:51):
Damage was done, but the ship was able to proceed
on its way. We knocked down three other drones. Obviously,
this is a foolish violation of Arsies fire agreement. So
Trump saying, look, there were four drones actually, so that
would have been substantially more damage. It wasn't just one
drone to send a message. Four drones. Maybe it could
(08:12):
have disabled the ship. Maybe it could have even sank.
It depends on where they hit. But three of the
four drones were intercepted by the United States. Trump didn't
make summer noting this any of the usual blustery, bellicost
threats in this post about how he's going to destroy Iran,
you know, all the way down to the lowest level
(08:35):
of their military and Secretary of State Marco Rubio has
said that we're going to keep encouraging ships to use
that new southern route Neroman and that if there's continued
interference from the Iranian side of things, but with this
kinds of clear violation, that's going to be a big problem.
So the White House currently monitoring this and the deals.
(08:58):
Core bargain was that Iran i'm would use its best
efforts for safe commercial passage in exchange for the US
lifting the naval blockade of Iranian ports and sanctions, relief
on their oil sales, plus that sixty day window for
broader talks on the whole range of issues, including the
nuclear stockpile issue. So the US had taken a firm
response to this, but not not punching back with full force.
(09:22):
So they're saying it's a violation, but they want to
try to keep this thing on track. Now what does
this mean all going forward? This just shows you this
pretty fragile deal right now, and Iran is going to
keep looking for asymmetric leverage. So in the days two
weeks ahead, I think you're going to see shipping companies
are just going to be assessing day to day. That
(09:44):
means higher insurance costs, some delays, and preference for US
or coalition escorted or heavily protected transit roots the unit
of aactuation pause, delays, relief for stranded crews. Iran may
mix continued low level harassment campaigns with demands for coordination
(10:05):
and revenue. So Iran is going to try to use
this as it's primary leverage point, even if it doesn't
destroy a ship, you know, making this more likely that
stuff like this will happen. Oil price volatility and supply
chain nervousness will persist because well ships are going to
be at risk here at some level. And over the
sixty day window, we'll see what happens with this memorandum
(10:26):
of understanding. Iran is trying to signal that it has
de facto control of the Strait and so it will
not just give that up cheaply here, and Trump's approach
to this seems to be very much to stay with
the get everything flowing for the oil and everything else
will figure out later. Straight remains a choke point. Iran
(10:50):
is going to be able to impose costs using its
asymmetric military capabilities there. It doesn't have to close it fully,
it can just raise the cost of doing business of
transitting through. Now. The US and its military partners certainly
have the tools to open the Straight, but they don't
want to bring this into a broader conflict, certainly not
right now. Iran is incentivized to allow the oil to
(11:11):
continue to flow and get that sanctions relief. Hardliners might say,
we'll figure out a way to evade these, evade these
concessions we've made later on. That's most likely. So it's
a mixed bag and we will see what comes of
it in the days ahead, but still more or less
(11:33):
on track for the Trump Iran deal. Our sponsor is
super Shure. Most businesses rely on business insurance only when
things go wrong. It's the cost of doing business, they say.
But that doesn't mean you understand your policy as a
business owner or operator. And a once a year phone
call from the broker's not enough. Got insurance claims, coverage, gaps,
employee questions. Supershore is who you need. It's a new
(11:53):
company in the business of changing how businesses get their
insurance and how they operate with that insurance. Our company
is more than twenty five employees. Neither the owner, CFO
or HR manager you need to know about Supershore. Supershore
is license in every state for your business insurance and
employee benefits, all with year round support for you and
your team at no additional cost. Go to supershort dot
(12:14):
com slash buck to see why growing businesses are moving
beyond traditional brokers. That's Supershore dot Com slash buc k,
paid for by Supershort Insurance Agency LLC, a licensed insurance
agency that is the show shield High
Host
Buck Sexton
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