forgot link https://archive.ph/0veXE

Iran rejects US proposal, lays out five conditions for ending imposed war: Source to Press TV

https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/03/25/765835/iran-rejects-us-proposal-lays-out-five-conditions-ending-imposed-war-source

Some backdrop from Suan Foo might explain Trump’s ‘song and dance’ …

Trump’s Iran playbook was written in the 1980s
From oil threats to ultimatums, the US president has a decades-old view of how to confront Tehran

Alex Barker in London
Published Mar 23 202

An ultimatum to the Ayatollah: comply within days or face consequences. A threat to seize Iran’s most important oil facilities. A readiness to retaliate massively. And, running through it all, a conviction that one decisive blow will force Tehran to yield.

These might sound like the operating assumptions of Donald Trump’s 2026 war on Iran or the US president’s most recent Truth Social posts. They aren’t. They come from the late 1980s and Trump’s first shortlived flirtation with a White House campaign.

It would be a stretch to call this a war foretold. But the Trump playbook on Iran has long been in plain sight.

He sketched out the first outlines in 1987, spending $94,801 to place a full-page advert in three US newspapers. Trump declared the world was “laughing” at America’s leaders over the Gulf crisis triggered by the Iran-Iraq war.

As the US then escorted tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, Trump said Washington was trying to “protect ships we don’t own, carrying oil we don’t need, destined for allies who won’t help”.

It is a line that echoes his tirades today. But back then, as he tested the waters for a possible presidential run, Trump had concluded the problem was a lack of “backbone”.

Appearing a few weeks later at a New Hampshire rotary club event in 1987, Trump sneered at how the Iranian navy — “little runabouts with machine guns” — had held America to ransom. “Why couldn’t we go in there and take some of their oilfields near the coast?” he asked.

The then 41-year-old businessman put it even more starkly in a 1988 interview with the Guardian: “One bullet shot at one of our men or ships, and I’d do a number on Kharg Island. I’d go in and take it.”
…
“What is the purpose of military strength if you don’t use it occasionally to set things straight?” Trump reportedly asked. “We ought to tell Iran, ‘Folks, you have one week to give us back all our hostages or all bets are off’.”

This is what the war is really about: the energy infrastructure at the heart of the region

🛢 Mapping key Gulf oil & gas sites

This is what the war is really about: the energy infrastructure at the heart of the region pic.twitter.com/IP4e5nQmF8

— Sputnik (@SputnikInt) March 24, 2026

🚨IRAN: We explicitly declare:

Until our will exists, no situation will return to the previous state; this will is created when the thought of action against the Iranian nation is completely erased from your filthy minds.

Our first and last word has been, is, and will be from… https://t.co/Wyph0txkEw

— Middle East Observer (@ME_Observer_) March 25, 2026

Amarynth … Resistance is building …

The Iraqi resistance, the Popular Mobilisation Force, has mobilised 250,000 fighters to cleanse Iraq of American terrorists.

Decolonisation project is underway.

— Sentletse 🇿🇦🇷🇺🇵🇸🇱🇧 (@Sentletse) March 24, 2026

relevant article from island reporter based in the uk

Goldman Sachs Just Confirmed What They Don’t Want You to Know:

This Is the Biggest Oil Shock in History

https://islanderreports.substack.com/p/goldman-sachs-just-confirmed-what