Outside the Beltway

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1. charontwo says:
   Monday, 23 March 2026 at 06:02

   Uh-oh.

   This seems – not good.

   “WaPo Gift”

   TEL AVIV — A surge of additional U.S. forces to the Middle East and President Donald Trump’s threat to “obliterate” Iran’s energy infrastructure have set the stage for what U.S. and Israeli security officials increasingly see as the war’s possible endgame: a battle for control of the Strait of Hormuz and key energy installations.

   Reopening the strait — a critical conduit for global energy supplies — has emerged as perhaps the paramount objective of a war that security officials now believe is unlikely to achieve goals that briefly seemed possible at the outset of the U.S.-Israeli military operation, including overthrowing Iran’s theocratic regime and putting a nuclear weapon permanently out of Tehran’s reach.

   …

   In Israel, Trump’s online threats have raised expectations that a new phase of the war could soon get underway with the arrival of additional U.S. firepower. In a sign of rising global anxiety over the political and economic instability, stock markets in Asia fell sharply on Monday, with Japan’s Nikkei closing down 3.5 percent and the Korea Composite Stock Price Index finishing 6.5 percent lower.

   A contingent of 4,500 U.S. sailors and Marines is heading to the Middle East, including an infantry battalion landing team backed by helicopters, F-35 fighter jets and armored landing vehicles. The Pentagon also sped up the deployment of a similar unit, the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, from San Diego, defense officials said last week.

   “Those Marines aren’t coming for decoration,” said an Israeli official, one of several who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military and intelligence issues.

   I have no words.

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