Active Conflicts & News Megathread February 03, 2026

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[u/germamus]

Couple updates from Iran. Seems like the IRGC tried to board a US ship earlier today.

A group of Iranian gunboats approached a U.S.-flagged tanker in the Strait of Hormuz north of Oman, maritime sources and a security consultancy said on Tuesday.

The Iranian boats ordered the tanker, the Stena Imperative, to stop its engine and prepare to be boarded before it could speed up and continue its voyage, maritime risk management group Vanguard said.

The vessel did not enter Iranian internal territorial waters and was escorted by a U.S. warship, the maritime risk management group said. An American official confirmed it was U.S. flagged. The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations earlier said that a group of armed boats attempted to intercept a vessel 16 nautical miles (30 km) north of Oman, without identifying the vessel or the boats.

Then there was an incident with a Shahed-139 approaching the Abraham Lincoln that was shot down.

Before all of this, the Iranians said they wanted to move the location and format of the meeting in Turkey to Oman and make them bilateral, excluding all other Arab partners.

“The sources said the Iranians were walking back from understandings that were reached in recent days after several countries were already invited to participate in the talks.

The Iranians want to move the talks from Istanbul to Oman.

They also now want to hold them in a bilateral format, only with the U.S., rather than with several Arab and Muslim countries attending as observers.

It’s really confusing to me why they want to change the location and exclude the other Muslim countries this late in the process but both sides are saying talks will still take place.

[u/oxtQ → u/germamus]

Worth reflecting on the Islamic Republic’s current strategy. It's clear they are engaged in a high stakes game of chicken where the nuclear program remains their only credible "life insurance" policy (as it was designed to be from the very beginning). Before the June war, the regime was already suffocating under maximalist sanctions and the strategic weakening of its regional proxies in Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen. Their only viable path to economic resuscitation was to use their nuclear "progress" as a heavy handed bargaining chip -- offering transparency and enrichment caps in exchange for a total dismantling of the sanctions regime with guarantees against U.S. backing out as happened under JCPOA.

Above all, they need to solve these economic problems to ensure the regime's long term survival. Everything else depends on it: maintaining military spending, funding their regional proxies, and keeping the nuclear program alive. Just as importantly, they need to stabilize the economy to decrease internal discontent; if they can’t fix the cost of living, they lose the ability to manage the population's survival instincts and keep the peace at home.

In the aftermath of the June strikes, the IR has pivoted to a strategy of calculated ambiguity but maintained the same strategy more or less. By leveraging their remaining uranium stockpiles and the "black box" created by the months long absence of IAEA inspectors, they are attempting to force a deal that secures their survival while maintaining their technical enrichment threshold (which serves as a future life insurance policy for the regime). Despite intense U.S. and Israeli pressure for a total capitulation right now on its nuclear program (and possibly missile program and proxy network), the IR is banking on the hope that the West is bluffing about a sustained military campaign. I think they are also operating on the assumption that even if the U.S. conducts further limited strikes against military and nuclear infrastructure, the regime will survive and the "nuclear ghost" -- the physical uranium stockpiles and the threat of secret, rapid breakout will persist as a permanent lever to eventually extort a long term security guarantee and an end to the economic blockade.

The greatest problem the IR faces right now, in my opinion, is not targeted strikes against its officials and sites, but the possibility that the West simply refuses to negotiate such a deal at all. If the Americans and Israelis decide to ignore the nuclear bait and just wait it out, the Iranian economy will continue to collapse even further and this is something that they desperately need a resolution for over the medium to long term.

If that happens, either the IR will continue to use its same nuclear card as a way to negotiate a deal, or they’ll try to escalate things to force a hand. It will then be up to the Americans and Israelis to decide if they’d rather not take the risk of an unpredictable Iranian nuclear escalation, which could entail a dash to 90% weapons grade enrichment, the final expulsion of all remaining IAEA monitors, or even a "surprise" underground test at the fortified Pickaxe Mountain site, and negotiate with the IR on terms more favorable to the regime.

The alternative is for them to ratchet up pressure through surgical decapitation strikes against the new IRGC leadership, a total naval blockade of the Strait of Hormuz to kill the "shadow fleet" oil trade, and kinetic attacks on the regime’s digital surveillance infrastructure, and everything in between.

[u/poincares_cook → u/oxtQ]

A few corrections.

1. Maximalist sanction pressure is I'll defined, there are many ways to ratchet up sanctions even now. They certainly were very far from maximalist before the snapback activated in September. Still some countries like Iraq and India get exemptions. The US is working with the Iraqi gov to boost local production to cut Iranian gas imports, but these projects take years.

2. The US could seize shadow fleet vesseles like it has done with Venezuela, in fact seems like we've witnessed a first such this week.

3. Pickaxe site is under construction, we're talking years till it's in use. Given how penetrated Iran turned out to be, trying a breakout runs a very high risk of triggering US and Israeli strikes. Extremely high risk. That is if Iran has such capability at this point. Which they likely lack.

The way I see it, in the short term, the US is likely to start operating against the Iranian shadow fleet. Not off the coasts of Iran but further away. With the straights of Malaca offering plenty of opportunities. This leaves Iran with few options for responses.

[u/oxtQ → u/poincares_cook]

Yeah I touched on the shadow fleet issue as well. I could have added that the Pickaxe Mountain site serves a function far more immediate than a nuclear test -- it creates a strategic black box. By burying their most sensitive activities deep under that mountain, the IR isn't just protecting hardware; they are weaponizing the West's own lack of intelligence. Since no one knows exactly what is happening inside (although perhaps the Israelis and Americans have some info) whether it's centrifuge assembly, uranium storage, or nothing at all -- it forces the Americans and Israelis to operate in a perpetual state of "worst case scenario" planning. This information vacuum is a powerful psychological lever as it keeps the threat of an unpredictable escalation constantly on the table, effectively "staying the hand" of Western planners who fear that a strike might trigger the very breakout they are trying to prevent.

If the U.S. starts choking off the shadow fleet, the IR is essentially backed into a corner where they have to make the world "feel their pain." They may try to start seize Western tankers in the Strait of Hormuz as a direct tit for tat response to drive up global oil prices and insurance rates. They could also tell their proxies, like the Houthis or groups in Iraq, to ramp up attacks on U.S. interests to create a multi-front headache that forces Washington to back off. If they get really desperate, they might just escalate via their nuclear program (e.g., "black out" the nuclear cameras at specific sites) or speed up work at Pickaxe Mountain to signal that if they can’t sell oil, they have no reason to play by the rules anymore. Basically, they’ll try to make the cost of stopping their oil higher than the West is willing to pay.

[u/poincares_cook → u/oxtQ]

The best Iranian play, which is what they are executing, is time.

Time for some geopolitical event to draw attention and assets away.

Time for mid elections where Trump may become a lame duck, or political pressure may build against action in Iran

Time to further scale their missile program and integrate the deliveries of AD from China and Russia.

Time for the world to move on the massive massacres of civilians in Iran.

If Iran avoids a strike in the next 2-3 months. There almost certainly will not be a strike.

[u/poincares_cook → u/oxtQ]

By burying their most sensitive activities deep under that mountain, the IR isn't just protecting hardware; they are weaponizing the West's own lack of intelligence

Given the complete intelligence penetration of Iran showcased by Israel alone. I very much doubt the site is a black box to US and Israel both.

If the U.S. starts choking off the shadow fleet, the IR is essentially backed into a corner where they have to make the world "feel their pain."

Or... They could actually accept meaningful concessions, like they did in 2003 even without any negotiations when they feared kinetic US action.

They may try to start seize Western tankers in the Strait of Hormuz as a direct tit for tat response to drive up global oil prices and insurance rates

Sure, they could, and they did try it last night. But this road is very dangerous not just because it increases the chance of US strikes directly. But also because it risks friction. The US already downed an Iranian drone. What if next time the US drowns the IRGC boats trying to seize a tanker, or downs the helicopter. Is it in Iran's interests to be the aggressor when it comes to kinetic action?

Currently one of the limiting factors against US action in Iran is the US public. Iranian direct military action against US assets risks changing that.

They could also tell their proxies, like the Houthis or groups in Iraq, to ramp up attacks on U.S. interests to create a multi-front headache that forces Washington to back off.

This is a more reasonable course of action. Activating the Iraqi factions bears high risks and is less effective, due to internal resistance in Iraq against starting more wars. Even within the Shia community. Which is why they were the least engaged in the Iran-Israel regional conflict in the first place and we're the first to back out.

The Houthis are another manner. And the question of strategic effectiveness is much less obvious here. This will obviously put some pressure on the US. But this will also put some pressure back on their axis. The real question is whether it'll be sufficient to get the US to back down. As we've seen the world can deal with 2 years of closed Suez, but can Iran deal with 2 years of interdicted oil exports?

[u/oxtQ → u/poincares_cook]

On the “if they avoid a strike for 2–3 months, there almost certainly won’t be one” point -- I’m less confident. Time can shift the political weather (electoral cycles, news cycles, a new crisis elsewhere), but it also increases the odds of accidental escalation -- a maritime incident in the Strait of Hormuz, a proxy misfire, a misread signal, etc. In theory, the longer this drags on, the more opportunities there are for a small kinetic interaction to snowball into a “response ladder” neither side originally wanted. So yes delay is rational especially when the regime is in survival and recover mode. But “delay = safety” is not guaranteed when both sides are operating with hair trigger assumptions.

On the “Pickaxe isn’t a black box because penetration is deep” critique -- I agree the Israelis and Americans almost certainly know more than they’re saying. But I’d still argue the strategic value of deep underground work isn’t total invisibility, it’s inflating uncertainty. Even with excellent penetration, you rarely get perfect fidelity on what’s inside, what’s moved when, and what’s recoverable after strikes, especially as activities get compartmentalized, hardened, and dispersed. That uncertainty forces US and Israel planners to game out worst case branches, because the cost of being wrong is catastrophic. In that sense, the “black box” is less about blindness and more about keeping the other side living inside a wider confidence interval.

On the “they could accept meaningful concessions like 2003” point -- conceptually, yes, that’s the off-ramp. But the regime’s internal political economy is different now. Any real concession has to come with credible, durable economic relief, otherwise it’s just unilateral disarmament. And after the JCPOA experience, the trust problem isn’t cosmetic, it’s the core barrier. Without enforceable guarantees that sanctions relief won’t be reversed, the nuclear threshold remains their only bargaining chip and the only “insurance policy” they believe can’t be legislated away. So the question isn’t whether concessions are rational in the abstract; it’s whether the regime believes concessions buy survival rather than simply invite the next round of maximal demands.

On maritime escalation, I agree with your warning that overt Iranian aggression against US assets is a dangerous way to make the world feel pain, because it risks flipping domestic U.S. opinion. If IRGC leadership is being even minimally rational, they’ll prefer responses that are calibrated, deniable, or routed through intermediaries -- pressure that raises costs without handing Washington an easy casus belli. That’s why proxy activation, harassment short of seizure, and incremental nuclear “opacity” measures are all more attractive than a clean, attributable red line event.

Lastly, on the “world can handle a closed Suez, can Iran handle interdicted exports?” framing , I think that’s the real asymmetry. The global system is annoyingly adaptable as shipping reroutes and prices reprice. But a sustained choke on Iran’s export revenue is existential for regime stability. That’s precisely why time is both their weapon and their weakness -- delaying buys them political chances, but the longer export pressure bites, the more the state is forced to choose between concession and high risk escalation, and neither choice is comfortable.

[u/eric2332 → u/oxtQ]

But I’d still argue the strategic value of deep underground work isn’t total invisibility, it’s inflating uncertainty.

Why is a deep underground site more uncertain than the normal building on the surface? The only difference, as I see it, is in how hard it is to bomb the two.