Maira Butt – The Independent May 8, 2026

Iran is able to withstand the effects of the US blockade for three to four more months and retains significant missile stockpiles, according to US intelligence, casting doubt on Donald Trump’s claim that Tehran needs the war to end imminently.

New analysis by the CIA suggests that the Islamic Republic may be more resilient than expected and could withstand the economic pain of the blockade until later this year.

The confidential report was delivered to officials in the Trump administration earlier this week, four people familiar with the document told The Washington Post.

By storing some of its oil in floating storage aboard tanker ships and decreasing the flows in its oil fields, it has enabled its wells to remain functional, one person said.

“It’s nowhere near as dire as some have claimed,” the source explained about Iran’s economic situation.

It may also be able to smuggle oil through overland routes by truck and rail, the report said, providing the regime with economic backup.

“There’s a belief they could begin moving some oil via rail through Central Asia,” one official said.

The CIA estimate that Iran could survive between 90 to 120 days — and maybe longer — before facing more severe economic hardship, the four people familiar with the analysis said.

It corroborates reports by The Independent last month, which suggested that Iran had around 120 days of availability of Iranian crude for China.

The analysis on 15 April predicted that Iran is unlikely to be impacted by the blockade anytime in the near future due to “substantial volumes already on the water”, Kpler’s senior crude analyst Johannes Rauball told The Independent at the time.

Tehran also retains 75 per cent of its prewar inventories of mobile launchers and around 70 per cent of its prewar stockpiles of missiles, a US official said. The intelligence runs contrary to president Trump’s statements about the country’s rapidly diminishing weapons cache.

“The leadership has gotten more radical, determined and increasingly confident they can outlast US political will and sustain domestic repression to check any resistance,” one official said.

“Comparatively, you see similar regimes lasting years under sustained embargoes and airpower-only wars.”

The US officials emphasised that the blockade is impacting Iran and has inflicted “real, compounding damage — severing trade, crushing revenue, and accelerating systemic economic collapse”.

“Iran’s military has been badly degraded, its navy destroyed, and its leaders are in hiding,” one senior US intelligence official said in a statement. “What’s left is the regime’s appetite for civilian suffering — starving its own people to prolong a war it has already lost.”

White House spokesperson Anna Kelly told The Washington Post that Iran is losing half a billion dollars a day because of the American blockade.

“During Operation Epic Fury, Iran was crushed militarily” she said in a statement. “Now, they are being strangled economically by Operation Economic Fury and losing $500 million per day thanks to the United States Military’s successful blockade of Iranian ports.

“The Iranian regime knows full well their current reality is not sustainable, and President Trump holds all the cards as negotiators work to make a deal.”

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