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Currently Playing: Iran Answered BESSENT Before He Spoke -SANCTION US and You Are an Enemy China,Russia Told Bessent NO

Iran’s Supreme National Security Council secretary went on state television on 22 August and said that any country joining the American economic war will be treated as an enemy, and that Iran will strike its interests. Two days later, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announces what he has called the toughest sanctions in history, and Field Marshal Asim Munir lands in Tehran. In this episode, recorded off our normal schedule on 23 August, Zulfiqar Ali and Pravin Sawhney walk through what is actually happening: the Makkah Joint Defence Agreement and the reported invitation to Iran, the ten-billion-dollar Pakistan–Iran trade target and the banking channel it does not have, Bahrain’s Crown Prince meeting Pakistan’s intelligence chief while the US Fifth Fleet sits on Bahraini soil, and Iran’s price for reopening the Strait of Hormuz. Pravin Sawhney is one of South Asia’s most experienced strategic affairs editors and has been reading this escalation correctly since it began. In this conversation he argues that the economic campaign will fail for the same structural reasons the air campaign and the two naval blockades did, that Iran is running a defensive offence rather than a war of attrition, and that Washington’s window closes with the November midterms. A note on sourcing, because it matters. This episode separates what is confirmed from what is source-based. Confirmed and publicly reported: the enemy declaration by Mohsen Rezaei on 22 August, Munir’s 24 August Tehran visit, the 7 August Makkah Joint Defence Agreement, China invoking its blocking law against US Iran sanctions, the pending NPT withdrawal bill in the Majlis, the IAEA figure of 440.9 kilograms of uranium enriched to sixty percent, and Iran’s demand for five to seven percent of cargo value at Hormuz. Source-based and not independently verified: the reported decision to enrich to ninety percent, and the reported invitation to Iran to join the Makkah pact. We label the difference rather than blurring it. Transition Protocol — subscribe, and get this in your inbox twice a week on Substack.#Iran #Bessent #Trump #MaximumPressure #EconomicDDay #StraitOfHormuz #Pakistan #Bahrain #FifthFleet #AsimMunir #MakkahPact #China #Russia #NPT #Dedollarization #OilShock #Geopolitics #BreakingNews #MultipolarWorld #TransitionProtocol