The goal of the war seems to have shifted to opening the strait of Hormuz, which was open before the war.

I remain of the opinion that the forces being sent are not to capture islands or seize the nuclear material, the force in theater and being sent is grossly inadequate to those ends.

I heard on a military podcast that the marines are ideally suited for raids-get in do damage get out.

That might be their purpose

Or as a QRF for threatened embassies.

The Iraq situation is deteriorating, maybe they are reserves for that situation.

The thing to keep an eye out is if Piggy calls in the National Reserves. That would indicate a true land campaign.

But, again, we are at a serious operational disadvantage for any land campaign. As the Rus-Uk war shows drones completely change the battle front. Where can our troops safely assemble free of drone? Russia abuts Ukraine. We would have to set up a jumping off point for any campaign well within drone range. which will subject our forces to attack during assembly.

I honestly don't have any good concept of what the land campaign could encompass. Probably I am missing some basic options, I admittedly am not an expert on modern warfare, but the stuff being discussed, Kharge Island and seizing the nuke material seem like incredibly bad ideas.

It is obvious that Piggy is desperate. At best he is manipulating the markets for corrupt purposes. More likely he is flailing for a solution. Some in his circle may even be pointing out the poor situation he finds himself in, maybe.

It really would be helpful if Piggy wasn't surrounded by sycophants who tell him what he wants to hear.

Desperation breeds defeat. Enemies can smell it and exploit it.

Maybe Iran is taking enough damage for them to consider negotiating, but no matter what else, they will be coming to negotiations from a position of power.

That is the opposite of any reasonable goal America would want to achieve with Iran

The tea leaves have been hard to read as to what is actually going on with regards to negotiations, I admit I am not an expert on the diplomatic speak and the interworking of the various middle eastern regimes. But the Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Gaza war certainly had months and years of negotiations (in the Russian-Ukraine war that have not even reached peace).

So, my gut says these "negotiations" will go nowhere

Meanwhile, Piggy is sending more troops to the ME

Despite Hegseth's bizarre, childish rants, America's military is executing a war of diminishing returns. More and more effort to destroy less and less

Despite the Trump administration lies, Iran's military capability is nowhere near degraded. As has been explained repeatedly Iran is winning that war.

America has lost several strategic objectives since the start of the war:

1. Nuclear material still not seized.
2. Iran regime more radicalized and hard line
3. Iran more motivated to develop nuclear weapons
4. Strait of Hormuz under Iranian control
5. Military stockpiles being depleted
6. Nascent Iranian opposition silenced or moved towards agreement with regime.
7. Damage to Gulf State partners with long term questions as to our security agreements with them
8. De Facto lifting of sanctions against Iranian oil.
9. Lifting of sanctions against Russian oil, which will allow Russia to pursue their war with Ukraine with more resources
10. Stretching of our strategic/global resources in Europe and the Far East, denuding those areas of resources used as a deterrent to aggression
11. Further weakening of our relationships with our allies.

And to believe our administration the above is offset by us blowing up some speedboats and missile launchers

To be clear

America or Israel bombed regular armed forces of Iraq. Not some random militia group but the actual army of Iraq.

That is not good

Some other observations

Iran now controls the movement of around 20% of the world's oil

Basic supply and demand will cause the price of oil to rise

But that rate of movement means a volume of oil that passes through the system to the nations of the world on a daily basis.

A portion of that volume is no longer available. So, not only will rich nations be paying far higher prices, but poorer nations will also simply NOT have oil. These are nations with limited or no reserves or alternatives to rely on. That means these poorer nations will not have power for industry, for hospitals, for schools, for their economy. This war will cause massive harm to these countries

Israel is expanding its war on Lebanon even further expanding their "buffer zone", which in reality is Israel seizing recognized land from Lebanon.

In my opinion America MUST divest itself from this aggressor, immoral, genocide committing, criminal nation. Only then could Israel reverse course to the liberal democracy they need to be.