U.S. Flattens 90 Iranian Military Sites on Kharg Island but Leaves Oil Terminals Standing

Washington is reviving a playbook last used during the 1984-88 “Tanker War,” when Iraqi jets repeatedly bombed Kharg and U.S. warships re-flagged Kuwaiti tankers; then, too, attacks on energy chokepoints were meant to coerce behaviour without triggering a full-scale oil shock. The 2026 strike fits a longer trend of the U.S. leveraging dominance of sea-lane airpower to police global hydrocarbon flows—seen from Operation Praying Mantis (1988) to the 2003 Iraq invasion—while Iran uses asymmetric mining and drone tactics first honed during the Iran-Iraq war. Unlike past episodes, China now buys most of the crude in question and may gain bargaining power if flows halt, underscoring a shifting multipolar energy order. Over a 100-year horizon, this moment may be remembered less for the bombs than for highlighting how fossil-fuel chokepoints remain instruments of statecraft even as the world claims to transition away from oil; if hydrogen or renewables eventually dominate, Kharg-style gambits could appear as the waning shots of the petroleum age.