Professor Glenn Diesen argues Iran effectively controls the Strait of Hormuz, rendering the US blockade in international waters an act of piracy. He contends the overstretched US Navy cannot counter Iranian mines and drones, while skepticism surrounds President Trump's near-deal claims amidst European damage control following troop withdrawals from Germany. With Russia and China bolstering Tehran to counter US sanctions driving up Treasury yields, Diesen warns that despite potential pauses in operations like Project Freedom, further attacks on Iran remain likely before any claimed victory. [Automatically generated summary]
Transcriber: CohereLabs/cohere-transcribe-03-2026, WAV2VEC2_ASR_BASE_960H, sat-12l-sm, script v26.04.01, and large-v3-turbo
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US Navy Control in Waters00:15:05
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What if it is better to perish fighting for freedom than to live as a slave?
What if freedom's greatest hour of danger is now?
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Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
Today is Wednesday, May 6, 2026.
Professor Glenn Deeson will be with us in just a moment on Just How Strong is Iran?
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Professor Glenn Deason, welcome here, my dear friend.
Thank you, as always, for accommodating our schedule.
I just finished an interview with our mutual friend and Colleague, Professor Mohammed Mirandi from Tehran.
As you know, Professor Mirandi was part of the negotiating team on the Iranian side that met with Vice President Vance and the other Americans in Islamabad about two weeks ago.
He is of the view that Iran controls the Strait of Hormuz.
Can't seem to get a straight answer out of the United States.
What's your understanding of who controls the Strait of Hormuz?
By control, I mean.
Who decides what ships go in and what ships come out?
Well, when one says issues such as strength, it's more complicated and difficult to say depending on how you measure it.
But in terms of controlling the Strait of Hormuz, it seems more clear cut.
That is, the Iranians control it simply because they can manage who goes in and out.
This is because they have a long, this is essentially their coastline, it goes within their territorial waters.
They can hit any ships, intercept them from the coast.
They can do it from deep inside their own country, inside their territory, that is.
So, no, if Iran was to shut it down, it can shut it down.
This has always been known.
And this is exactly what Iran has done now.
If it was possible to break this, to prevent them from controlling the Strait of Hormuz, then something would have already been done.
But I think this is very clear cut that it is closed.
Making matters worse, there's not much we can do to actually open it.
The United States Navy is fearful of getting too close to Iran for fear of attacks that it won't be able to repel.
So, the American so called blockade, as I understand it, is between four and 600 miles from the strait, trying to stop ships that already exited the strait.
This is in the high seas.
The president himself admits it's an act of piracy.
Correct me if I'm wrong, or if you have a different understanding, the strait at its narrowest point is about 24 or 25 miles wide.
That's half Iranian waters and half Oman waters.
It's not international waters, but where the US is, is international waters.
Yeah, that's correct.
And I've heard Marco Rubio refer to the Strait of Moose as being international waters, but this is not the case.
But there are some rules in which one can argue that there should be safe transit through the territorial waters of other countries.
This is.
You know, the UNCLOS, the United Nations Law of the Seas.
But again, neither the Iranians nor the Americans have actually ratified this.
So, for this reason, the Iranians, they are in control.
This is part of their sea and it's not international waters, as you said.
But making, but that's kind of the legal aspect of it.
But for the United States to set up a blockade outside, this is an act of war and it's also against international law.
But So, given that it's hard to walk this back, I was expecting Washington from trying to come up with some illegal justification, but instead we saw Trump, as you said, argue almost proudly that, well, I guess we're like pirates now.
We seize ships and take their cargo.
So, yeah, I think piracy has become normalized.
It's happened before.
The Europeans are doing the same, by the way, with the Russian vessels, but they at least attempt to dress it up, something that looks like legality.
But if we can add something, that is the ability to intercept these ships.
It's very different from what the Iranians are doing.
It's a very narrow strait, as you said.
They can put the mines, they can then limit or even further narrow the scope of where the ships can pass.
If some refuse to follow this, they can have speedboats coming in quickly in and out.
They can use drones.
They have a lot of instruments which are cheap and easy to use.
Trying to block the sea far away from Iranian coastlines, they have a huge, huge territory they have to control with not enough ships.
And suddenly it becomes very, very difficult.
They can't get too close to the coastline.
These ships have to be supported somehow, they have to go in for maintenance.
It's a very difficult thing to do.
And again, the US doesn't enjoy this narrow strait either.
So it's a very different job, both in terms of the legality, but also the extent to which it can actually be implemented.
Is the United States Navy a world class Navy or does it lack maneuverability or the number of ships needed to be world class?
Well, the United States does have the, well, from what I understand, the best Navy.
So one shouldn't underestimate the U.S. Navy or its military.
But on the other hand, from what I heard while speaking to common friends of ours, such as Colonel Douglas McGregor, he makes the point, which I've also read.
Several reports confirming that a lot of the US Navy has been neglected over the years, and there's definitely room for a lot of updates.
And we've seen some reports specifically about the blockade on Iran, where there's been some problems with some ships, whether or not this has been sabotage or the ships just getting old.
It's difficult for me to say, but again, the US is a big fighting force.
But it's overstretched, I think.
This is the problem of the post Cold War security architecture based on the global primacy of the United States.
One has to be everywhere at all times.
One gets overextended, and you can have material decline in terms of the vessels.
One can also have, I guess, other problems in terms of having too many generals, too many people being promoted.
One can build up a lot of bureaucracy and corruption.
So, there's a lot of problems one can deal with.
But again, I just wanted to make the point.
One shouldn't underestimate the fighting power of the United States either.
It's just that this mission it chose in Iran is impossible.
I don't see how anyone could open up the Strait of Hormuz.
Because they can't get too close to it to control it because it exposes them to attacks from the land.
I understand it.
Do you understand that negotiations are actually going on between the United States and Iran as we speak?
Speak, it would be long distance negotiations through an intermediary because they're not in the same place at the same time.
But are they talking?
I mean, the president this morning said we're close to a deal.
Well, oil went down and the stock market went up.
So is he manipulating the markets or are we close to a deal?
Well, it could be both.
I think we can definitely say that Trump's speeches tend to have a large part of it is to Managed the market to, yeah.
So I think this should be an uncontroversial claim to make.
But that doesn't mean that one is true and the other one has to be false.
I would hope or at least assume that there's still some talks going on.
But if they were as successful as he suggests, I would have assumed that the talks would have upgraded from, well, essentially talking on the phone to actually having something of a meeting.
Because so far, What we hear from the Iranians every time Trump is making the point that, you know, we're talking, the Iranians are giving way, we're close to a deal.
Usually, this is the point in time the Iranians come out and say, well, no, we're not talking.
No one's speaking to each other, and this is nonsense.
So, I'm given all the lies coming out of the White House these days.
I'm very skeptical, but I'm sure there has to be some talk because both the US and Iranians, the way I see it, would like to put an end to this on very different terms, of course.
What are the Europeans talking about?
We know that the European political leadership has famously and unanimously said no to the president.
This is your war, or it's Israel's war, but it's not our war.
But do you detect anything below the surface, either respect for the U.S. military, disparagement of the military, respect for Trump, disparagement of Trump?
You have your finger on the pulse of what the elites are saying and thinking in Europe.
Well, I think the instinct is to stay out of this.
And I think the US gave the Europeans a way of doing it because Trump didn't even let the Europeans know that he was going to launch this surprise attack on the Iranians.
And he waited also to ask for help until it became evident he was going the wrong way.
So, given that this was the case, the Europeans had little incentive and also an out in terms of.
Not going along with this war.
Of course, there's a lot of tensions.
All of this comes in the wider global conflicts that is, the United States threatening to annex Greenland, that is Danish territory.
But also, the Europeans are a bit concerned that this war is exhausting too many of America's resources because the Europeans would like to get the United States deeper involved in the war against Russia.
So, there's a lot of different considerations going on.
But I think the main one is.
That one hand, the Europeans do not want to get involved in this war.
On the other hand, the main incentive for sending troops would be they want to keep the transatlantic alliance alive because we can see what is happening now.
That is, with Europeans not doing anything to help the US, the US is in a position where it can blame the failure in Iran on the Europeans and they can also use this as an opportunity to then, that is, Trump can use it as an opportunity to pull troops out of Europe and begin to.
Degrade the entire transatlantic alliance.
So, this is something the Europeans are very concerned about because, well, there's not much to Europe in terms of fighting power without the United States.
So, the Chancellor of Germany, Friedrich Mers, made a statement which was his opinion.
In my opinion, it was true, but it was just an opinion.
And the opinion is that the United States has been humiliated by Iran.
Most of the world accepts that and agrees with it.
President Trump, of course, was furious and is now pulling, he says, I can't do this overnight, apparently, 5,000 troops out of Germany.
There's between 37,000 and 42,000 there.
A, is this significant?
B, how do the Europeans react to this?
Well, it is significant.
And well, first, I would have to say that Mertz, recognizing this is significant, appears to have done a bit of a U turn or damage control, in which he now.
Makes the point that the Iranians will have to stop stalling for time.
They have to make concessions.
They have to open up the straight of Hormuz, give up their nuclear ambitions, all of this stuff.
So it appears that Mertz got the message and he's now falling in line again, which could have been the purpose of pulling these troops out.
Chinese Backing for Iran00:05:11
But overall, if you look at the overall troop levels, it wouldn't be that devastating.
But overall, it signals what Trump has already been communicating, what was explicitly Outlined in the national security strategy of the US back in December of 25, which is that, well, NATO's not really considered a key priority anymore.
The Europeans are not a priority.
So the Europeans see this as one step towards NATO falling apart.
And yeah, this is deeply problematic for the Europeans because this unravels the entire security architecture since World War II.
Is Trump carrying through, as far as you can tell, with the removal of the 5,000 troops?
Is the number 5,000 significant in comparison with the number of troops that are remaining?
Well, it's not for me to say how it impacts the United States' ability to carry out its mission there.
But no, from where I'm standing, it does seem that this is quite a significant number.
But that being said, the U.S. have.
Many more troops there.
So I think it's more the concern that this is merely the first step in a further unraveling.
But if they have about, what is it, like 35,000 to 40,000 troops, I might be missing the target there.
Then this is, you know, you can argue it's a minor percentage, but still, it's quite significant.
Okay, got it.
Got it.
In the past two weeks, Iranian Foreign Minister Arachi has visited President Putin in St. Petersburg and his opposite number, the Chinese foreign minister in Beijing.
What significance, if any, do you place on these trips?
What do you think Mr. Arachi was asking for?
I think clear support.
Well, we see from allies, be it the Russians and Iranians, I think they were also taken a bit back by the successes of Iran.
From what I heard, there were many who thought that the Iranians might buckle under the immense pressure and force by the United States when it bombed.
But I think now, They've seen that Iran can fight, and also they recognize that the attempt to knock out Iran also fits within the wider US strategy to weaken and defeat Russia and China as well.
So, from what I take or from what I read and hear, is that the Russians and the Chinese are going to go more fully into backing Iran now.
And again, this is not some act of altruism, I think it's also self interest.
Beat the Chinese, for example.
When the US took out or kidnapped Maduro, Washington was quite clear that, well, it's because Venezuela shouldn't have energy ties with China.
When the US puts a blockade on Iran, where the vast majority of its oil goes to China, you also have people like Scott Besant making the point that, well, now the Chinese aren't allowed to buy Iranian oil.
So they see that they are targets.
Here are these big statements coming out of Beijing that they will now ban.
Their own companies from abiding by US sanctions.
So now they have to decide the Chinese company are they going to obey the laws of their own government or the laws of what's essentially become a hostile government?
They're also going to stop buying US bonds, right?
And they're going to prohibit Chinese investors from buying US bonds.
What's that going to do?
Increase the interest rates that the American Treasury has to pay to get people to lend it money.
Exactly.
And you see already the yields on the US Treasuries going up.
And this is very problematic because when the US debt becomes high risk, the investors want a higher return on investment, higher interests.
But for the United States to be able to do this, to manage this debt when one is $39 trillion in the hole, it's a problem when one has to pay more, especially for the Treasuries then.
Anyways, I think that.
Overall, this, yeah, all the different countries, be it Iran, Russia, China, they're all essentially engaged in this same game where they see that the U.S. efforts to restore its global primacy is something that puts them all in the same boat.
They're all being threatened.
You see this play out in the military realm, but also in the economic realm.
So there's a lot of changes coming our way, and which is another indication why this war would have been a massive, well, has been a massive mistake.
A Massive Strategic Mistake00:01:54
Do you have any feel?
For whether the Israelis and the Americans will soon resume heavy duty attacks on Iran?
Well, so far, I think it could go both ways because what we've seen over the past 24 hours was first, Trump, after only, well, less than 48 hours after this, what is called Project Freedom, to open up the Strait of Hormuz.
This was, again, the goal was to do this on Monday.
By Tuesday, he's.
He tweeted out that it's already been put on a pause because, well, he said we have great negotiations with Iran.
But this is what you would say if you want to walk back a mistake.
Then you had Marco Rubio come out arguing that Operation Epic Fury has been a success.
All the objectives have been met.
And for this reason, Operation Epic Fury has been concluded.
It's done.
So it seems like the Trump administration might be walking back what was effectively.
A probing activity, but I suspect that they will not that the war isn't over just yet.
Even if the U.S. is pulling back, they accrued a lot of firepower in the region.
And it wouldn't surprise me if they will have one more go at Iran before claiming victory and going home.
Professor Deason, thank you very much.
Great analysis, as always, and deeply appreciated, my dear friend.
All the best to you.
We'll look forward to seeing you next week.
Look forward to it.
Thanks.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Coming up later today at 2 o'clock this afternoon, wherever he is in China, Pepe Escobar, and at 3 o'clock, the great Phil Giraldi.