By John Helmer, Moscow
  @bears_with

On Sunday afternoon, just before he began to eat what his calendar  called a “family dinner”, President Donald Trump believed he had ended his and Israel’s year-long war against Iran. He told the global oil and betting markets: “I hereby fully authorize the toll free opening of the Strait of Hormuz, and, simultaneously herewith, authorize the immediate removal of the United States Naval blockade. Ships of the World, start your engines. Let the oil flow!”  

An hour later Trump, as he was digesting what he and his heirs, Eric and Donald Jr., had been eating, he celebrated himself: “Many presidents have tried to make Peace with Iran, and all have failed before me. The Leaders of the Region have, for the first time, found a President who can help them achieve real Peace. With the opening of the Strait upon the signing of the Deal on Friday, for purposes of mine removal, oil will flow on both ends again for the Region, and the World!”  

Iran’s Supreme National Security Council issued its own celebration of “complet[ing] its superiority over the American-Zionist enemy…the war and military operations on all fronts, including Lebanon, will end immediately and permanently starting tonight. In addition, the naval blockade against Iran will be ended immediately and completely. The signing of the MoU will officially take place on Friday (19 June). Negotiations for a final agreement will be postponed until after the other side’s commitments are implemented in accordance with the MoU.”  

Trump was also celebrating his 80th birthday at the White House with Stephen Miller, JD Vance, Peter Hegseth, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe.

At that moment, across the Atlantic, operation orders were under way from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer for his military forces to attack a Russian crude oil cargo in the English Channel. The tanker Smyrtos was en route from Ust-Luga, where it had loaded just over  100,000 tonnes of oil, to Port Said, Egypt,  and then to the Indian port of Sikka.   The boarding of the Smyrtos took place in the early hours of Sunday morning, local time. Watch the video record from the UK Defense Ministry.  

“This operation delivers yet another blow to Russia,” announced Starmer, “and reminds those fueling Putin’s war in Ukraine that they cannot hide.”  

Starmer followed not long after with his congratulations to Trump for the “[Iran] breakthrough…attention must now turn to fully implementing the memorandum of understanding to ensure the Strait [of Hormuz] reopens and remains fully and permanently open…We are clear that toll-free freedom of navigation must now be restored in the strait of Hormuz to begin easing the severe economic impacts that have been felt for several months.”  

Neither Starmer nor Trump — nor the other European leaders whom Trump will be meeting at  Evian and Versailles later this week — intend to lift their war on the high seas against Russia,  and against everyone who buys Russian oil. For them, there is no memorandum of understanding – no Anchorage formula, as the Kremlin calls it  – for pausing, let alone ending the war against Russia in Europe, in India, in China.  

Not even after multi-million dollar bribes have been paid by the Indian Ambani family, nor after India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi meets Trump for forty-five minutes next Wednesday (June 17). The Sikka oil terminal, on the Gujarat coast of India, to which the Smyrtos was heading before the British took it, belongs to the Indian Reliance Industries group owned by Mukesh Ambani and his sons.   The Smyrtos oil cargo had been ordered by them at the same time as the Ambanis have been paying protection money in Washington to the Trump family,    and buying influence with the White House deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller.

Not even after the promises of more multi-million dollar bribes from the Russians, nor after the birthday telephone call President Vladimir Putin held on Sunday evening, Moscow time, with Trump. Putin’s chief bribe arranger with the Trump family, Kirill Dmitriev, broke the news by a tweet, getting ahead of the Kremlin spokesman’s public disclosure by an hour.     

“Our president also sent a congratulatory message, in which he noted the exceptional character traits of the honouree that have contributed to his success as a person and as a politician. Donald Trump was touched by these words, expressed his gratitude, and noted that Vladimir Putin was the first foreign leader to call him at the White House,” Yury Ushakov, Putin’s foreign affairs spokesman, announced, according to the Kremlin communiqué.  

Ushakov added an irony: “The Russian President did not send any gifts to mark the US President’s 80th birthday. But, as I have already said, the congratulatory message was very warm, reflecting the nature of the relationship between the two presidents.”  

Steven Witkoff and Jared Kushner “will come back to Russia in the near future”, Ushakov also revealed.

In the new podcast with Dimitri Lascaris, taped at 5 pm Washington time on Saturday, we conclude that so long as Dmitriev negotiates with Witkoff and Kushner on Putin’s direction, there will be no escalation of Russian military operations on the Ukraine battlefield and no end to the NATO war.  

by Editor - Sunday, June 14th, 2026