The Iranian regime is flooding the world with crude oil once again, knowing that the urgent needs of the West are far beyond its fear to decline into a third world war. Ever since Iranian oil was first sanctioned in 1995, its industry knew ups and downs based on the sanctions implied, but mostly on sanction enforcement.
Although sanctions are still in place today, Iranian oil sales are at their peak with 2 million barrels per day. Iran is offloading its crude mostly in China, South Korea, the US and the EU, using dead letter boxes or hubs to disguise the origin of the crude.
The two main hubs are in the UAE and Oman, where all the product papers, including the Certificate of Origin, are tempered with, and in some cases, oil is mixed with local crude. From these two hubs, the crude is shipped to four other hubs off the coasts of Malaysia, Indonesia, India, and Nigeria.
From Malaysia and Indonesia, the crude is shipped mostly to the Far East (China), from India to the US, and from Nigeria to South America and the Mediterranean (EU). The oil meant for the Mediterranean is also fed directly from the UAE and Oman through the Suez Canal.
Apart from the oil Iran is allowed to export under sanctions, including specific and binding wavers, Tehran is using these hubs to smuggle enormous numbers of barrels. NIOC, who is in charge of the official production of crude in Iran uses the UAE hub on the first level, whereas the IRGC exports their illegal product or from Iran to the hubs in the UAE, from specific Iraqi wells, and then mix their product of other Iraqi wells with Iranian crude underway to the UAE hubs.
Both of these sophisticated systems, under the regime and by the IRGC, are running in parallel. The tankers used are in different sizes, from small and MR1 tankers, through Panamax and Suezmax, and up to VLCC. Usually, the small ones feed the bigger ones which takes the long hauls, yet, some of the smaller ones do the whole journey.
Iran is using also mixer tankers which refine some of the crude on the way to the destination and deliver products.
STS (ship-to-ship) plays a major role in this activity, not including the first upload in Iran and sometimes in the UAE. These STS are done undercover with shutting off the AIS, which generates an enormous hazard to human lives directly involved, and a very high risk of oil contamination endangering all life on a regional level. In some cases, this might cause the closing down of global shipping routes.
Evidently, the world oil market is actually trading with Iran despite the sanctions and violations, thus allowing the regime to thrive, enabling Iran to equip itself with arms and to increase the support to its violent proxies.
Some of the reasons the West is still buying the Iranian oil is it’s being cheap, available, and helps them to stabilize and control the global oil market prices. Another reason is a containing policy introduced by the West, suggesting that if the stability in Iran will not be threatened, Iran will restrain its activity. On the other hand, Iran is much more dependable on the Western market since it’s its main source of income.
Surprisingly enough, the Iranian regime even managed to threaten the West with this oil and warfare capabilities. Should the West act against Iran’s oil resources, they would retaliate with their warfare capabilities and advance their nuclear agenda. In this, they are supported behind the scene by China and Russia.
The West which is buying the oil, is terrified of the possibility of a world war, so they are letting things go on as they were, thinking that they have kept their deterrence. But have they?
When the Iranian regime is attacking Israel, well actually the West, with more than 350 launches of missiles, and drones controlling the entrance to the Red Sea with its proxies who keep attacking the global shipping route, and supplying Russia with suicide drones against Ukraine, is there any deterrence?
When the Iranian regime keeps its nuclear project alive and kicking, conquers parts of the Middle East, and infiltrates Africa, is there real deterrence?
This might lead to a third World War, sooner than we think, in which case the West might be caught off guard unless the West wakes up right now and does something about it.
The first thing to do is to cut off the Iranian regime from selling its oil. This will bring the regime to its knees, as almost happened ten years ago, and bring back deterrence.
