EP024 - The Closing Window

Five hours. That's how long it took this week for Donald Trump to go from threatening to bomb Iran's Kharg Island — the island that handles roughly ninety percent of Iran's oil exports — to announcing on social media that the United States and Iran were about to sign a peace agreement. Five hours, on the eve of his eightieth birthday. Around the same time, three thousand kilometers away, six Chinese coast guard vessels — each at least six thousand tons, larger than anything Japan's coast guard operates — were finishing a five-day patrol through waters east of Taiwan, logging the registration details of nearly two hundred ships. Two very different stories. Same week. And the same underlying instinct: when you have leverage, and you suspect the window to use it is closing, you move. Fast. -- Hosting provided by SoundOn