Tonight's The Night – HotAir
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It was 1976, but at least this schmaltzy ballad by Rod Stewart wasn’t disco. It had that going for it. But while the song might be useful as the background theme for Graham Platner’s Kik page, it also has that anticipatory vibe for what President Donald Trump promised is coming to the remnants of the Iranian regime in just a few hours. 

Our update begins on Sunday, June 7th, when Israel struck a Hezbollah compound in Southern Lebanon. Iran, virtually powerless to support or defend its once-biggest terror proxy since the Americans and Israelis began Operation Epic Fury in late February, could not convince Donald Trump that Israel’s systemic dismantling of all of its terror network had to be part of the ceasefire. Trump and his negotiating team told Iran to pound sand, but also told the Israelis to dial it back a bit, because the Trump administration believed the crippling economic sanctions had all but brought the Iranian regime to its knees. 

A day after the Israeli hit, Iran removed any pretense of honoring the actual ceasefire by sending 10 missiles into northern Israel. No casualties were claimed, most of the missiles were intercepted or failed, and the rest were determined to be headed for open ground. 

Now you won’t be surprised to learn that Israel didn’t take too kindly to Iran getting back into the missile-launching game after a two-month sabbatical. They struck Iran very quickly and very hard. Targets in Tehran, Tabriz, Isfahan, and Karaj were hit repeatedly, including a petrochemical plant in Bandar‑e Mahshahr. The other targets were re-constituted air defense targets after the Americans and Israelis destroyed them in the first wave of Operation Epic Fury. 

President Trump was reported to be furious at Prime Minister Netanyahu over the strikes, but at least publicly toned down his account of the conversation. 





Do what’s right, but do it fast and be done with it, Trump said, hoping it wouldn’t derail the deal he was trying to finalize. 

Here’s where the story gets interesting. Ahmad Vahidi, the purported commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran, has been a literal ghost since the war began in March. There are hundreds of rumors online that he was to have given a pre-scheduled address on the state of the war, and probably death to America and death to the Zionists. He’s one of those types of hardliners. The rumor mill online has been circulating that Vahidi providentially happened to be visiting one of the sites that Israel hit in their counterstrike, and is now either on the Injured Reserve list or the Permanently Seeking 72 Virgins list. There has been zero confirmation, but the long and short of it is that the two people, at least on paper (or cardboard), who are allegedly running the war for the regime, and the country, for that matter, have both disappeared. 

Vahidi is the commander of the force prosecuting the war and the laughable blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, and Cardboard Mojtaba Khamenei, who, if not already dead, is in a cave somewhere updating his Kik account and checking out his competition from Maine. But neither one seems to be in command and control of much of anything at the present time. 

It has been thought of late that Khamenei was actually calling the shots and had to approve all revisions to the deal being negotiated. But because the regime is terrified of all electronics blowing up in their faces, for good reason, the process of transmitting updates and responses via human courier took time – several days in some cases. And yet when Israel hit Lebanon Sunday night, Iran’s missiles were in the air by Monday morning in response? No way that order went through the same human channels to Cardboard Mojtaba and back to the IRGC to execute that fast.

The big question that hasn’t been asked recently of the President, nor has he volunteered, is with whom he’s negotiating. Is it Vahidi? Is it Khamenei? It appears that Parliament speaker, Ghalibaf, and Foreign Minister Araghchi have been cut out of the loop, and I’m not sure what role “President” Pezeshkian is playing. But what seems to be emerging is that the regime’s fracture is deepening. 

Until Israel’s strike Sunday, Donald Trump seemed patient to wait for the economic squeeze being inflicted on the regime, Operation Economic Fury, to continue its course of starving the regime and the rest of Iran to death, even if it took another couple of months. And there was good reason for the President to continue playing that card. Here is Iran’s current economic condition as of the end of May. 





  • Year‑on‑year inflation reached 77.2% in May 2026, the highest since WWII.
  • Inflation in daily essentials (medicine, taxis, tobacco, communications) rose 113.8% year‑over‑year.
  • Food inflation hit 105%, with bread and cereals (remember, Iran hasn’t been able to import grain through the Strait for months) up 140% and oils/fats up 219%.

The Iranian currency, the rial, is trading for 1.32 million rials to a dollar. And it hasn’t reached the floor. Iran has issued a 10 million rial note for the first time. Their economy is expected to contract by close to 10% by the end of 2026. Gasoline is being rationed, there’s virtually no medicine in the country, and much of the country suffers from electrical brownouts, the extent to which former California Governor Gray Davis could only dream. 

Iran’s labor market is nothing short of calamitous. Out of a population of 93 million, Iran’s labor force at its peak was around 25 million people. 10% of them have lost their jobs this year alone. Among different sectors and demographic groups, the damage is stunning. When one factors in the hyperinflation rate and GDP contraction, real job losses are more like 25%, not 10. 

Youth in Iran are hit among the hardest, with between 4-5 out of 10 able Iranian men under 24 out of work and without any source of income. Men between 24 and 40 are in the same dire situation. Women can’t find work. In Khuzestan, the oil-producing province, unemployment due to nothing being exported for months is hovering around 50%. 

And when I say no oil is going out, I mean no oil is going out. 

So what changed in Donald Trump’s calculus? A fateful drone attack on an Apache helicopter two days ago. 

The President was careful not to overreact to this incident until he learned the details. When he was asked last Friday in the Oval Office during a gaggle about how he would respond to an Iranian attack killing U.S. military personnel, he didn’t mince words. 

 
Within 24 hours of the Apache going down, the Pentagon’s investigation reported that an Iranian drone intentionally targeted the helicopter flying at low altitude, struck it, causing a fire, but out of what can only be described as God’s providence, it did not explode on impact. The pilot brought the helicopter down into the Strait, and the two occupants floated for a couple of hours before one of our new autonomous rescue boats, call it the Floating Waymo, picked them up. 

President Trump’s mood definitely soured once he realized how lucky not only he was, but the pilot and gunner in the Apache were, that they’re still alive. 





And respond, we did. Monday afternoon, late in the evening in Iran, a lot of ordnance was dropped all across the Iranian side of the Strait of Hormuz. Qeshm Island was hit. Suspected drone and fast-boat launch sites were destroyed. The Department of War called it a proportionate response. To me, proportionate would have included vaporizing regime members that forensic DNA tests couldn’t identify. 

It was a healthy wave of strikes that were undertaken, and then it was over. We all went to bed Tuesday night believing that this was possibly a one-and-done. 

Except Wednesday morning, the story got more detailed. The reason the Apache was there in the first place was part of Project Freedom 2.0, the super-secret sequel to the 48-hour-old Project Freedom to open up the Strait of Hormuz. 

Project Freedom 2.0, it appears, had been functioning without much Iranian interference for several weeks, stealthily escorting tankers through the Oman side of the Strait of Hormuz to safer waters. Once the drone found the Apache, the secret was pretty much over with, and President Trump gave more background. 

Former Senator Jim Talent and I have long said on my podcast, Duane’s World, that this was the checkmate move against Iran. If oil began moving through the Strait, along with the alternative pipeline routes through Saudi Arabia, Iran couldn’t threaten much of anything anymore. 

Here’s a good theory of how Project Freedom 2.0 has worked for as long as it has. 

⚓️ What has transpired is tankers, including Very Large Crude Carriers are exiting the Persian Gulf. Then, per @TankerTrackers , the VLCCs are conducting ship-to-ship (STS) transfers to other tankers in the Gulf of Oman. 
⚓️The empty tankers, which ran the Strait with their AIS, run back through the Strait to pick up a new load of oil from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar or Iraq. 
⚓️The Apache helicopter that recently crashed was probably a part of this operation. 
⚓️This explains why we have not seen an appreciable drop in the number of ships stuck in the Persian Gulf. By running the same ships, war risk insurance, potentially provided by the US through the Development Finance Corporation (DFC) through a pool of approximately of $40 billion, could be covering these ships making the transits. 
⚓️This would also explain the recent announcement by Kuwait to fix new contracts for its oil. ⚓️The question is how long is this sustainable and at what level is oil moving daily. With current pipelines through Saudi Arabia and the UAE, this system would need to move approximately 12-14M barrels/day through the Strait.





In addition to disclosing that we’ve created and enabled a rat line of oil under the noses of the regime that falsely claimed they control all traffic with fees and tolls being charged, Trump also had the night to think over what the regime tried to do to us in flagrant violation of the ceasefire. And the President had apparently seen enough. 

No element of surprise this time. Just a promise that Iran will continue to pay for splashing one of our helicopters and attempting to kill two of our aviators in international waters. And he wasn’t the only one not worried about the element of surprise. Department of War Secretary Pete Hegseth said as much at a gaggle in Gitmo after a workout with the troops. 

And right on cue, when the sun went down in the Persian Gulf, aircraft began to fly. 

Virtually all of these locations were suspected air defense and missile sites that the Iranian regime have tried to reconstitute after being destroyed in the early hours of Operation Epic Fury. One off? Probably not. This was very much consistent with the first phase of the war in February/March – destroy their air defense capabilities, softening them up and leaving the entire country vulnerable to American and Israeli air superiority. 

Within 90 minutes, Phase 2 began. 

Everyone knew this was coming. Iran certainly knew it was coming. And yet, all they could return volley as they were being attacked was propaganda and lies. 

That didn’t happen…at least not yet. 

Iran tried to claim they bagged one of our destroyers. Centcom was quick to respond. 





Iran then claimed they attacked 18 of our sites around the greater Middle East. 

They launched whatever they had at Bahrain, Jordan, and Kuwait. All three deployed intercept systems, and as of the writing of this column late into Wednesday evening, nothing on the ground had been struck. 

So, where does that leave us on Thursday morning? Unless something radical changes inside the black hearts and minds of what’s left of the Iranian regime, tonight’s the night. 

Stay away from my window
 Stay away from my back door, too
 Disconnect the telephone line
 Relax, baby, and draw that blind

President Trump, after the second wave, told Trey Yingst of Fox News that he’d gotten a call from Iran begging him to stop the bombing. 

Here’s what’s fascinating about this. This call to Trump came from Iran directly. There was no intercessory mediation call from either Pakistan or Qatar. This is someone high enough up in the chain of command in Iran to be able to reach the Oval Office. (I know what you’re thinking. Jonathan Karl of ABC News has the same access.)

My point, however, is that Israel is not involved. Pakistan is not involved. None of the Gulf states is involved. And in their tepid response, at least as of now, Iran isn’t even targeting Israel like they did last week. 

This is the boss making the final set of moves. He told the Iranians that they have a piece of paper in front of them. I’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating. It’s not so much a deal as it’s a term of surrender. This is Trump’s deal on Trump’s terms. Iran turns over everything, gets nothing in return until they do. They have to bend the knee, and they have to do it right now. Today. Before mid-afternoon, Washington, D.C. time. If they don’t, well, as Rod Stewart sang, Tonight’s The Night. 

Presidents have drawn red lines, both in domestic and foreign policy, for most of my sentient life. In the last forty-something years, I’ve never heard a president say we’re not tapping this along any further, you’re waving the white flag by tonight, or you won’t have anything left to wave, nor the life or breath with which to wave it. The line doesn’t get any redder than we’ll bomb the excrement out of you tonight. 

Will the regime find a way to string Trump along and survive one more day? That seems to be their way, all the way down to their DNA. 

In The Princess Bride, the Dread Pirate Roberts told young Will every night, “Good night, Westley. Good work. Sleep well. I’ll most likely kill you in the morning.” And every morning, Will found a way to survive the day. 

The Princess Bride is a fairy tale. This is real life. And in this reality, with Donald Trump in control of things, he has shown a tremendous amount of patience up to now. But at some point, that patience runs out, and he will demonstrate he has the ability to become a killer as he did with former IRGC commander Qassim Soleimani, as he did with the Russian mercenaries in Syria, and as he did with Ali Khamenei and virtually his entire command structure on February 28. 

The Iranians may still believe they can talk and bluster their way into tomorrow. It’s looking more like the sand has run through their glass. 







Editor’s Note: For decades, former presidents have been all talk and no action. Now, Donald Trump is eliminating the threat from Iran once and for all. 

Help us report the truth about the Trump administration’s decisive actions to keep Americans safe and bring peace to the world. Join HotAir VIP and use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your VIP membership.



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