Julien Borger – The Guardian April 14, 2026
The US blockade of ships using Iranian ports in the Gulf has come into effect, turning the six-week-old conflict between the US-Israeli coalition and Iran into a test of economic endurance.
US Central Command (Centcom) made no formal announcement of the start of the blockade but had said it begin on Monday at 5.30pm Iranian time and would apply to any ships entering or departing Iranian ports or coastal areas, while ships using non-Iranian ports would not be impeded.
Donald Trump claimed that 34 ships had passed through the strait of Hormuz, the gateway to the Gulf, on Sunday, but there was no supporting evidence for the claim. Speaking to reporters at the White House, the president also claimed: “We’ve been called by the other side,” who he said would “like to make a deal very badly”.
Throughout the conflict, which began with a US-Israeli attack on 28 February, Trump has made frequent claims that Tehran had been in direct contact, desperate for an agreement, but the claims have never been substantiated.
Iran warned that ordinary Americans would pay the cost for Donald Trump’s latest move in the shape of higher petrol prices, and also vowed that if the US went back to bombing, the Tehran regime was ready to retaliate. For his part, Trump said any Iranian attack boats approaching the US flotilla in the region would be “immediately eliminated”.
It appeared on Monday that US naval forces were going to try to enforce the blockade east of the strait of Hormuz, in the Gulf of Oman, beyond easy Iranian missile and drone range. It remained unclear how Centcom intended to stop any oil tanker attempting to break the blockade. A missile attack could cause an environmental disaster, leaving open the possibility that US forces could seek to board and take control of any vessel not obeying US instructions.
UK Maritime Trade Operations issued an advisory to seafarers to “maintain heightened situational awareness” pending updates giving details on how they were expected to navigate through the new conditions in the region.
Trump said any Iranian “fast attack ships” would be eliminated if they approached US vessels enforcing the blockade with “the same system of kill” as the US has used to sink nearly 50 small boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, killing at least 168 people who it has claimed without evidence were involved in narco-trafficking.
Trump ordered the blockade following US-Iranian talks in Islamabad that ended after 21 hours without agreement.
The tactic is aimed at strangling the heavily oil-dependent Iranian economy, and forcing Tehran to meet US demands to reopen the Hormuz strait to ships from the ports of Gulf allies, and to accept a complete ban on uranium enrichment.
A blockade??? Yet another war crime from Trumpstein on behalf of his kike masters but not a peep from the ((( Guardian ))). How typical.
Now that Trump has made the moves that will break the world’s economy which will affect ordinary people the most, British Chancellor Rachel Reeves has already given Rolls-Royce a welfare payment for a massive £600million. I expect more corporate giro payments to go out in the following weeks and months.
Of course, a large portion of these payments will probably leave the country to go into foreign accounts, and only come back to this country briefly every quarter to pay dividends to wealthy shareholders, after which it will soon leave this country again to dodge our capital gains taxes. Apart from what little money goes into research and pay British wages, which will all be taxed, the bulk will move into tax havens and buy foreign assets like villas, cars and sweatshops. We will never see that money again, except for foreign tourists bringing bits of it back here and there.
Trump may well be stupid enough to actually attack Chinese ships seeking to enter or exit the Straits. The Chinese probably have submarines shadowing American carriers right now.