Oh well, the transition away from fossil fuel now begins in earnest. Meanwhile, the deadly combo of kicking the can down the road and allowing capitalism to run rampant is coming home to roost. Trump (among others) is the manifestation of the terminal stage of failed Neoliberalism. Its greed infected profit taking only ever flowed upwards concentrating wealth to very few. What trickled down, was societal abuse, broken communities, and massive inequality, which provided the incubation of toxic ideology, which right-wing and fascist political actors have leveraged to advantage the wealthy. The irony hurts.
Result: unrest is rapidly growing, resource depletion impacts are becoming real, supply chains are failing, and extreme geopolitical tension (war, genocide, climate destruction) is becoming just another day of the week.
And don’t forget, the leaders we have chosen to lead us to the future, are mostly captured, often corrupted, and ideologically strapped to the past. And as we’re painfully finding out, it’s a past that no longer exists. To survive and thrive from this point, the world needs nothing short of a revolution. A genuine revolution in collaborative innovation aimed at stabilising all life on the planet. We need the reset and reboot of the millennium. Will that happen? Not until politics serves people before profit. All people, every single one of us standing on the planet.
Politicians have failed us. And we have failed ourselves by letting them get away with murder, literally. We cannot fail again.
The problem is that the unrest will set off more wars and conflicts, possibly the last one with modern weapons ever. If the US uses a nuclear weapon on Iran, it would become a pariah country for decades. Justifiably so. The same applies to Israel.
I agree with everything you have written, including the pipe dream reference. Current leaders are still wedded to the old model of perpetual growth at all costs. The machine must be stopped.
EXACTLY as predicted here, we are now being told that there are ‘work-arounds’ to partially offset the oil and gas that is supposedly not making it to market through Whoremooz. Of course, the work-arounds are not able to completely replace Whoremooz flows, but they are ‘hitting records’ and will prevent the world from collapsing.
The fake Iran War will continue just as the fake Ukraine War never ends.
Oil and gas prices will remain inflated ‘until the war ends’ as will overall inflation. But at least we will not be starving to death in a few weeks! Rejoice by taking a cold shower and be sure to jump a bus to work on Monday.
How did the petrodollar die? Slowly and then all at once. The petrodollar was the golden goose for the U.S. I see no path back. As you wrote, this is epochal. Truly epochal.
B thank you again for your thoughts. I appreciate the toll it takes on one’s soul to lay out these realistic scenarios. It is heavy stuff, but we also need to prepare for what is coming. The hope filled rhetoric of this accelerating the electrification of the world is only giving people false hope.
Your entire post is very cheerful. Since industrial modernity is doomed anyway and a major population dieoff is certain, the sooner it happens the better it will be for the remnant surviving population and the rest of the living world. I can only hope that the collapse of modernity happens faster than you expect. Perhaps it will happen fast enough to avoid nuclear war.
The consequences of this US-Iran war should be a reminder that modern civilization has always been doomed. Most people won't be able to do much about it, but perhaps a few will take impending doom to heart and try to prepare for it. It's not hard to imagine what that preparation involves and there is still a little time left to get going. Better start right away.
Soon enough, I'm almost 78 and will have a hard time dying young.
But snarky replies still don't change the facts of the situation. If you are young(ish), I hope you will take collapse risk to heart and actually do something to help you, your family and your community get ready for it.
siento haber sido rudo, mis disculpas. No estoy de acuerdo en que la muerte masiva de muchos beneficie a los supervivientes y sin embargo es lo que esta ocurriendo. Vivimos unos a costa de otros y todos entre si. Todas las civilizaciones estan condenada al fracaso. Todas colapsaron de algun modo. Es facil que la actual colapse por agotamiento de los recursos, por banalidad intrinseca o por destruccion belica masiva, seguro que caera, no sabemos como. Pero el detonante principal es la fuerza, el uso de la violencia, la intervencion militar con toda su capacidad de destruccion al servicio de la avaricia sin limites. Como raza deberiamos aprender a convivir, a respetar, a considerar al otro. esa es nuestra oportunidad como humanidad. Construir un bunker atomico, comprar un kit de superviviencia, armas o adquirir preparacion militar, emigrar al monte o criar gallinas no soluciona el problema basico. La meta basica es construir la paz mundial. Exigir a nuestros representantes legales la paz mundial.
You are absolutely right that being a prepper does not solve the fundamental problem, a problem that might have been solved very many decades ago, but wasn't. It has now turned into a predicament for which there is no solution, not even world peace.
The lack of world peace is truly indicative of how difficult it is to avoid the predicament. Consider the case of nuclear weapons, which must be the antithesis of world peace: nobody wants to use them, they have no practical value other than war, they are very expensive and drain resources away from better projects, etc.
Yet, here we are in 2026, over 75 years after their first use in war, and nobody has figured out how to get rid of them. And ridding the world of the dangers of nuclear weapons is surely a much easier task than ridding the world of the dangers of industrial modernity. Nobody's life depends on nuclear weapons, but billions of lives depend on modernity.
So now that our collective responsibility has been shirked for at least two mortal dangers, nuclear weapons and industrial modernity, the only path left is for individuals, families and communities to do what they can to avoid those dangers. Blaming people who want to keep their families safe seems a little harsh to me.
el mundo nunca estuvo en paz, siempre hubo conflictos, entre naciones, entre tribus, entre religiones, entre etnias, entre compañias comerciales, entre vecinos, el conflicto es permanente, el beneficio de uno es la perdida del otro. Lo que tiene que cambiar es la forma de solucionar el conflicto. Las guerras tienen que parar y ser sustituidas por acuerdos. ES mas barato, menos costoso, menos doloroso, mas producvtivo. Otrea cosa es que estemos gobernados por sicopatas con una edad mental adolescente y se piensen que son el macho alfa dominando el bosque aunque haya que sacrificar a los machos jovenes y la mitad de las hembras de la tribu. Esamos ahí, en ese punto de la evolucion
Given the current levels of CO2 there is a 99% certainty that global warming with rise to at least 4.5C above pre-industrial levels. There is no way to stop this from happening because there is no way to put the global warming gasses back in the ground within a reasonable time frame. Now that we are about to loose a good part of industrial civilization any high-tech hopium solutions are also gone. There is no way to feed 8+ billion people on this planet without fossil fuels. On top of all of that, as the Earth warms it's carrying capacity drastically diminishes. You should probably keep your 'advice' to yourself and enjoy the last years of your selfish boomer existence.
I've been on Hansen's mailing list for years. His research shows compelling reasons why an earlier collapse is preferable to a later one. Yes, a lot of terrible warming is baked in, but every year of emissions just adds to the damage.
I spent much of my career working on "high-tech hopium" solutions (OTEC, solar, hydro, wind, hybrid village power systems, etc), all through the 70s, 80s and 90s, back when there was some hope, and I am disappointed that Hansen's warnings (starting in 1988) weren't heeded. It seems that collective action just isn't going to happen.
It's been over fifty years since Limits to Growth described what was going to happen. That's when I was in my mid-20s, but nothing was done about it by those older, selfish members of the Greatest Generation and Silent Generation that preceded us boomers. To be honest, I don't see Generation X or Millenials doing much either. I don't think any cohort bears any extra blame; we're all in on it.
You obviously know what's happening and don't need any advice from me or any other "selfish boomer". It's good to know that you've got everything handled just fine.
But there may be others that need a little more convincing, though, so I'll still keep commenting. You can just skip over my comments if they cause you so much anguish.
Well, as someone who has been giving advice and actually working on solutions for over fifty-five years, let me provide a structuralist approach. James Hansen was just describing what everyone who did any reading already knew in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He just got the attention of the lamestream media. One has to take it to the next level.
You are correct that 8+ billion people cannot be fed without fossil fuels. In fact, about 1 billion are not being fed right now, even with fossil fuels. (The WHO and FAO figures are based on an artificially low threshold, since 800 million sounds better than 1 billion.) As the fossil fuels decline in net energy and suffer transport and financial problems, dieoff is a high probability. I would say over 90%. So whatcha gonna do about it? The time for hand-wringing has been OVER for decades. I have been doing research on landraces for 30 years. The operative paradigm is that more adaptable crops will likely provide more flexibility as climate changes. This is not just new crops or mainstreaming indigenous crops or repurposing existing crops, but also selecting for new strains of crops that pop up as mutations. This can be done at scale, but it is better to do individual work in small gardens. In other words, many more people should be doing this. I am in the Pyrenees at 500 meters, but there might be different landraces that would work better in the Alps at 500 meters. Or in the Canadian Rockies at 500 meters. Or in the Australian Outback, etc., etc., etc. The key here is to stop saying, "It's bad" and actually get off your dead ass and DO something. James Hansen has been saying, "It's bad," since 1988. So what? Has he actually put his own time and effort into demonstration projects or starting farmers markets or perhaps starting a foundation to fund indigenous farming practices with all the money he has made as a well-regarded scientist? Somehow I doubt it.
Keep in mind that some of us "selfish boomers" have been fighting the greatest superpower in the history of the world for over half a century.
Perhaps Im being naive but there is another scenario - the US withdraws immediately, Trump is impeached as everyone is now fully aware what they have done but allowing him gain power, and the Straits resume (with significantly less oil and gas due to the shut-in's and damage).
This marks a turning-point for humanity as energy blindness is finally shattered. Suddenly, all the planning and work that needs to be done to unwind industrial civilisational has air-time. Millions of people around the world get to work. Every country devises a systems-wide plan for maintaining basic needs as oil declines. The West reindustrialises out of necessity, embracing new technologies like 3D printing. Community microgrids and polytunnels spring up. A new economic system is born.
This catastrophe has provided an enormous, unprecedented window for action.
Sorry to rain on your parade, but I've worked in 3D printing industry for years. It's nice and fancy, but although it may not appear so, 3D printing industry is extremely complex and resource consuming. It can't be sustained in a context of fossil fuel scarcity, much less expanded...
And where does the material that a 3D printer uses to print come from? Where does the energy that powers it come from? That's it, from fossile fuels.
A 3D printer cannot "print" the material it uses to print, nor can it "print" energy. At the end of the day, without those two external resources, a 3D printer is useless. Like most of the tools we've developed.
We are not going to 0 energy. We're going to much less energy, requiring doing more with that energy. Theres thousands of years of coal, for example. That can be turned into solar panels. Oil will be pumped in 100 years, but it will be an invaluable mineral used in petrochemicals. A technology that short-circuits the 6 continent supply chain like 3D print is going to be huge.
As power at the top fragments, it rolls downhill as it continues to fragment. Of course the local activists have to be able to actually see it first. It reminds me of a little snippet in the North Country Anvil from 1971, "Most hippies wouldn't recognize power if it was lying on the ground in front of them." Replace "hippies" with "progressives" or "activists" and it is still true.
After recognizing the opportunities, it is still a question of how many local activists are willing to do the work instead of just wringing their hands and saying, "It's bad."
'Willing activists' is a tautological inconsistency Walter. "We have in society those who DO and those who teach" my English master once opined. Yes, it's really bad but there's always a silver lining! (pun intended)! Have a good day.
"'Willing activists' is a tautological inconsistency." I got a good laugh out of that one! You must be one of them "armchair philosopher" types. I could parse why tautological inconsistency is a throwaway phrase used in a vain attempt to assert ideological dominance in order to cast shade on another argument without actually engaging in the original argument - all the while blissfully ignoring the vernacular use of original terms. But I won't. They are just words. I have lots of words too. It reminds me of the pseudo-philosophical arguments between Boris and Sonja in Love and Death (1975), one of my favorite movies. LOL
I have known literally hundreds of people who self-identify as "activists" but who don't do anything active. Make no mistake, writing a newsletter is not an active pursuit. An influencer is not an "activist." An activist actually DOES something. It takes manual labor to organize a demonstration or make signs or put yourself in front of an ICE thug and blow a whistle. Sometimes you get teargassed or beaten or even shot. In my case, I can no longer run fast and I gave up the demonstratin' fifty-five years ago for building alternatives. It takes manual labor to grow food for other people or do research on crop landraces to develop strains that will more easily adapt to climate change. It doesn't take much effort to type up something on a computer.
And of course I should address the inevitable question. "Why are you then typing on a computer yourself?" Answer: I am metaphorically slapping people upside their heads to get them to actually DO something. Stirring the pot, as it were.
Per your English mentor/master, that is a crap concept. There are plenty of people who do AND teach. They are out there doing in the sunshine right now and they are happy to teach the people who come by and want to learn. As soon as I make my next cup of coffee, I will do the same. Tilling and planting is on the agenda today. Oh, and weeding.
It was /sarc. and meant to be amusing. Anyway, I too have spent many years building my own smallholding and know how hard it is. I am too old to do that now so I waste my time trying to understand what's actually going on in the world and hopefully assisting in others understanding.
The war, started by US-Israeli forces almost three weeks ago, has exposed a number of beliefs as myths. The attack on Iran’s South Pars gas field1 and its Bushehr nuclear power plant, followed by Iran’s retaliation on Gulf refineries and Qatar’s LNG infrastructure—knocking out 17% of their LNG supply for the next three to five years
We have no way of confirming any of this (CNNBBC often lies... usually lies... so they are not a good source).
If the above is true ... stock markets should have already imploded...
EXACTLY as predicted here, we are now being told that there are ‘work-arounds’ to partially offset the oil and gas that is supposedly not making it to market through Whoremooz. Of course, the work-arounds are not able to completely replace Whoremooz flows, but they are ‘hitting records’ and will prevent the world from collapsing.
The fake Iran War will continue just as the fake Ukraine War never ends.
Oil and gas prices will remain inflated ‘until the war ends’ as will overall inflation. But at least we will not be starving to death in a few weeks! Rejoice by taking a cold shower and be sure to jump a bus to work on Monday.
I think it's the end of this world, and, perhaps, the beginning of a new one, once the dust settles. If the nutcases don't let loose a nuclear spasm, we'll know, one way or another, what the outcome is in about 18 months. We still have the overshoot debt to face. That in itself will kill billions. The global financial system is finished. It can't survive a sudden 20% loss of energy. All that debt going bad at once will kill it. The process has already started. That means the just in time system is also finished, as is industrial agriculture. 75% of global phosphate production (one of those essential minimums) comes from Morocco. It requires the sulphur that Qatar and other countries in the Persian Gulf produce to make sulphuric acid or it can't be extracted from the rock. Losing 75% of an essential fertiliser isn't going to help maintain 8 billion people. I don't know how many will pull through this, but I firmly believe that some will. How many depends on how people behave during the process, how chaotic it gets, and how much of nature survives.
"We are part of the Grand Theatre, some willingly, some knowingly," "The meek shall inherent the Earth, if that's alright with you!" (MAD magazine c1960s). At present, the Globalist banksters hold all the cards: https://www.globalresearch.ca/iran-world-stage-theatre/5919158 But that could change if their fiat wealth returns from whence it came.
Apart from fossil fuels, the Strait of Hormuz and Red Sea are the location of subsea cables which handle communications and data between Asia and Europe. 90%+of our data travels by subsea cable and global trade depends on data. These cables can be damaged by sea mines, ship debris from explosions and the like.
Yes John, I have followed Gail for many years. Actuaries are so often right because they rely on physics. But do you think our future is not in our hands but will be decided by powerful people we know not of? https://www.globalresearch.ca/iran-world-stage-theatre/5919158
Those "powerful people" are who George Carlin called "our owners", which is how I refer to them. I look at Global Research several times per week, and I like Peter Koenig pretty well.
I had seen that article when it came out recently and read down to the picture of Lord Balfour's letter to Lord Rothschild.
Yes, if misinformed, we are specators and actors in THEIR play, but if we do our best to be informed, we might just be bit-part actors in history, evolution, The Divine Comedy, etc.
That is what I strive for. I seek Divine Guidance.
Likewise John, I can do no more as I recognise my own powerlessness. All I can do is scribble my views and hope others gain some relief. The truth is very difficult to discern these days.
I like the description "our owners" - it seems to be exactly right for me. I love your postings, most useful and saves my time, thank you for your efforts.
I accept what you are saying even though I really would like to be more optimistic about finding a silver lining. You don't bring up AI as a technology that has a purpose or role in helping guide a way out of this situation. So, I guess AI is done for also. Maybe the silver lining is that humankind doesn't disappear completely but instead becomes more aligned with sustainability at a much-reduced global population level. Maybe we have entered the change phase that would come anyway by year 2100 but the entire timeline has been accelerated by US-Israel greed.
Thanks for the thoughtful article. This war feels like a crazy cowboy started a firefight in an explosives factory, or rather inside the nuclear reactor powering our civilization.
Balaji Srinivasan has repeatedly argued that not only is it is feasible for China to wait a little longer to let the US face modest degradation of their expeditionary assets then join in on the Iranian side in a naval capacity to force scenario #2 to be the guaranteed outcome, but that if this is done and the defense guarantees pivot further to China it buys the globalized fossil fuel system 6-8 extra years.
I don't buy it but I can't articulate exactly how. Does anybody here have any thoughts about it?
China has made it abundantly clear it wants Taiwan. When the US has depleted it's munitions (very soon to happen) what's to stop China from walking into Taiwan?
True Toma, but I am not sure they are motivated to take over Taiwan, at least not yet. My contacts in China think that Taiwan will eventually willingly accept China's direct rule but this is not a certainty. It is yet another area of geopolitics that confound us.
Much of the commentary still treats the Strait of Hormuz as an oil problem. It isn’t.
It is a system problem.
Yes, roughly 20% of global oil and LNG flows through that narrow corridor. That alone would be enough to trigger a crisis. But what is now unfolding goes far beyond energy markets.
Hormuz is a transit point not just for fuel, but for the physical inputs of the global economy: fertilizers, industrial chemicals, metals, and critical materials embedded deep in supply chains. When that flow is disrupted, the shock does not stay in النفط or gas markets. It propagates.
Through agriculture. Through manufacturing. Through transport.
And most importantly—through diesel.
Diesel is not just another fuel. It is the fuel of extraction, construction, logistics, and food production. When diesel tightens, the entire system tightens with it. Not gradually—but all at once.
This Does Not Reset Quickly
There is still a lingering assumption in parts of the debate that once the Strait reopens, normality returns.
That is unlikely.
Oil production cannot simply be switched off and on without consequence. Reservoirs degrade. Logistics chains fracture. Refineries are configured for specific grades of crude that are not easily substituted. Even a temporary shutdown leaves scars that take months—sometimes years—to repair.
In other words: this is not a pause. It is damage.
From Shock to Chain Reaction
What follows is not a single crisis, but a sequence:
Transport costs rise → margins compress
Industrial output slows → supply gaps emerge
Fertilizer shortages → weaker harvests
Energy volatility → investment freezes
Supply chains desynchronise → production stalls
This is how a systems shock behaves. Not as a spike—but as a cascade.
We are already seeing early signs: falling throughput, rising costs, and increasing fragmentation in global trade flows.
Not Collapse—But Not Normal Either
Some voices are now framing this as the beginning of a full collapse of the globalised economy.
That goes too far.
But the opposite mistake—assuming a quick stabilisation—is just as misleading.
What we are likely entering is something more complex:
A world where flows continue, but at lower volume. Where trade persists, but with higher friction. Where energy moves, but not freely.
Not collapse. Not continuity.
Transformation under constraint.
The Strategic Layer
This is also why the military dimension is so difficult.
Keeping Hormuz open is not a technical escort mission. It is an operation inside a compressed, highly contested battlespace dominated by drones, missiles, and asymmetric denial systems.
Which means:
There is no clean military fix. No quick reopening. No cost-free escalation.
And that, more than anything, is what markets—and states—are now beginning to price in.
The Bottom Line
Hormuz is not just a chokepoint.
It is a stress test of the global system itself.
And what it is revealing is not sudden collapse—but something potentially more significant:
The limits of how tightly the world economy can be coupled… before disruption in one place starts to reshape everything.
Yep, it's bad. No, really. It's bad. Did I mention that it's bad? It is likely (>50%) Israel will resort to nuclear weapons. My hunch is that Bibi starts by dropping one on Lebanon first to see what kind of public reaction he gets. But the countervailing argument is that Tehran is further away and the radiation blowback will consequently be further away. The greatest argument for NOT using tactical nuclear weapons is the radiation poisoning the desert sands in the Gulf States - and Israel itself. But Bibi and The Donald are both insane, so rational calculation doesn't count for much.
The nuclear issue is not new. Daniel Ellsberg revealed in 2021 that US war planners considered using a nuclear weapon on China in 1958. During the Vietnam War, Nixon and Kissinger (two more insane demons) were planning on using tactical nuclear weapons against North Vietnam. What stopped them was the Antiwar Movement. So show some respect for us "dirty hippie commie pinkos" once in awhile. Are the current crop of young people in the US and Israel willing to organize and put their lives on the line to stop this madness? Are they willing to give up having a career? Are they willing to commit to alternatives? I doubt it. It would mean adopting a much lower energy footprint and voluntary poverty and manual labor, just for starters.
So . . . IF you are willing to work against the System, you need some advice. Are you willing to listen to us snaggle-toothed old hippies yet? Remember, we didn't get to be elders with our priciples intact without a great deal of effort and even some jail time. As B alludes to, the problem is not just the current iteration of insanity, but the underlying System. This is not new. Many of us have pointed this out for sixty years and there were others before us. If you want to survive (many don't; especially the Christian Zionists who welcome Armageddon as it brings on the "Second Coming") you need to shift your paradigms to a more adaptable set. You need paradigms for adaptation. Here is one that I find useful.
SML. This stands for short-, medium- and long-term. This is a paradigm that allows you to craft solutions (or managed outcomes if your prefer) that hit all the bases. Short-term effects that mitigate the problem (or predicament if you prefer) right now, but then move along a different trajectory to change things for the better in the mid-term; all the while laying down lifestyle changes that last into the future. The classic example is gardening. (Don't get hung up on examples! No obfuscating nitpickers allowed!) Another example is to detach from the System as much as you can. Short-term may be organizing against the War but then mid-term is transitioning out of the Sytem on a timeline. (Get a job that does not involve as much linkage to the overall System, learn a blue-collar skill that has value post-collapse, reduce your energy footprint, don't have children, move out of the city, etc.) Where mid-term ends and long-term begins is itself on a continuum. There are other strategies that you should be able to think up yourself. But you have to get off your dead ass and DO something.
Oh well, the transition away from fossil fuel now begins in earnest. Meanwhile, the deadly combo of kicking the can down the road and allowing capitalism to run rampant is coming home to roost. Trump (among others) is the manifestation of the terminal stage of failed Neoliberalism. Its greed infected profit taking only ever flowed upwards concentrating wealth to very few. What trickled down, was societal abuse, broken communities, and massive inequality, which provided the incubation of toxic ideology, which right-wing and fascist political actors have leveraged to advantage the wealthy. The irony hurts.
Result: unrest is rapidly growing, resource depletion impacts are becoming real, supply chains are failing, and extreme geopolitical tension (war, genocide, climate destruction) is becoming just another day of the week.
And don’t forget, the leaders we have chosen to lead us to the future, are mostly captured, often corrupted, and ideologically strapped to the past. And as we’re painfully finding out, it’s a past that no longer exists. To survive and thrive from this point, the world needs nothing short of a revolution. A genuine revolution in collaborative innovation aimed at stabilising all life on the planet. We need the reset and reboot of the millennium. Will that happen? Not until politics serves people before profit. All people, every single one of us standing on the planet.
Politicians have failed us. And we have failed ourselves by letting them get away with murder, literally. We cannot fail again.
The problem is that the unrest will set off more wars and conflicts, possibly the last one with modern weapons ever. If the US uses a nuclear weapon on Iran, it would become a pariah country for decades. Justifiably so. The same applies to Israel.
As I say, a revolution and global reset is required, which of course resembles a pipe dream.
I agree with everything you have written, including the pipe dream reference. Current leaders are still wedded to the old model of perpetual growth at all costs. The machine must be stopped.
Amen to that. 🤞
Here, here!!!
EXACTLY as predicted here, we are now being told that there are ‘work-arounds’ to partially offset the oil and gas that is supposedly not making it to market through Whoremooz. Of course, the work-arounds are not able to completely replace Whoremooz flows, but they are ‘hitting records’ and will prevent the world from collapsing.
The fake Iran War will continue just as the fake Ukraine War never ends.
Oil and gas prices will remain inflated ‘until the war ends’ as will overall inflation. But at least we will not be starving to death in a few weeks! Rejoice by taking a cold shower and be sure to jump a bus to work on Monday.
And just like that, Iran is the new Ukraine.
https://fasteddynz.substack.com/p/and-the-morons-sigh-with-relief
I TOLD YOU SO.
DUNCES.
HURRAH - The World is NOT Ending (yet)
https://fasteddynz.substack.com/p/two-weeks-to-flatten-the-curve
How did the petrodollar die? Slowly and then all at once. The petrodollar was the golden goose for the U.S. I see no path back. As you wrote, this is epochal. Truly epochal.
By suicide, apparently.
If the USA would have been art least polite about….anything. But no, the rejection and sense of righteous consequences will be resounding…
B thank you again for your thoughts. I appreciate the toll it takes on one’s soul to lay out these realistic scenarios. It is heavy stuff, but we also need to prepare for what is coming. The hope filled rhetoric of this accelerating the electrification of the world is only giving people false hope.
More power to you sir.
"I wish I could end on a more cheerful note"
Your entire post is very cheerful. Since industrial modernity is doomed anyway and a major population dieoff is certain, the sooner it happens the better it will be for the remnant surviving population and the rest of the living world. I can only hope that the collapse of modernity happens faster than you expect. Perhaps it will happen fast enough to avoid nuclear war.
The consequences of this US-Iran war should be a reminder that modern civilization has always been doomed. Most people won't be able to do much about it, but perhaps a few will take impending doom to heart and try to prepare for it. It's not hard to imagine what that preparation involves and there is still a little time left to get going. Better start right away.
vete muriendo tu ya, el resto del mundo te lo agradece
Soon enough, I'm almost 78 and will have a hard time dying young.
But snarky replies still don't change the facts of the situation. If you are young(ish), I hope you will take collapse risk to heart and actually do something to help you, your family and your community get ready for it.
siento haber sido rudo, mis disculpas. No estoy de acuerdo en que la muerte masiva de muchos beneficie a los supervivientes y sin embargo es lo que esta ocurriendo. Vivimos unos a costa de otros y todos entre si. Todas las civilizaciones estan condenada al fracaso. Todas colapsaron de algun modo. Es facil que la actual colapse por agotamiento de los recursos, por banalidad intrinseca o por destruccion belica masiva, seguro que caera, no sabemos como. Pero el detonante principal es la fuerza, el uso de la violencia, la intervencion militar con toda su capacidad de destruccion al servicio de la avaricia sin limites. Como raza deberiamos aprender a convivir, a respetar, a considerar al otro. esa es nuestra oportunidad como humanidad. Construir un bunker atomico, comprar un kit de superviviencia, armas o adquirir preparacion militar, emigrar al monte o criar gallinas no soluciona el problema basico. La meta basica es construir la paz mundial. Exigir a nuestros representantes legales la paz mundial.
You are absolutely right that being a prepper does not solve the fundamental problem, a problem that might have been solved very many decades ago, but wasn't. It has now turned into a predicament for which there is no solution, not even world peace.
The lack of world peace is truly indicative of how difficult it is to avoid the predicament. Consider the case of nuclear weapons, which must be the antithesis of world peace: nobody wants to use them, they have no practical value other than war, they are very expensive and drain resources away from better projects, etc.
Yet, here we are in 2026, over 75 years after their first use in war, and nobody has figured out how to get rid of them. And ridding the world of the dangers of nuclear weapons is surely a much easier task than ridding the world of the dangers of industrial modernity. Nobody's life depends on nuclear weapons, but billions of lives depend on modernity.
So now that our collective responsibility has been shirked for at least two mortal dangers, nuclear weapons and industrial modernity, the only path left is for individuals, families and communities to do what they can to avoid those dangers. Blaming people who want to keep their families safe seems a little harsh to me.
el mundo nunca estuvo en paz, siempre hubo conflictos, entre naciones, entre tribus, entre religiones, entre etnias, entre compañias comerciales, entre vecinos, el conflicto es permanente, el beneficio de uno es la perdida del otro. Lo que tiene que cambiar es la forma de solucionar el conflicto. Las guerras tienen que parar y ser sustituidas por acuerdos. ES mas barato, menos costoso, menos doloroso, mas producvtivo. Otrea cosa es que estemos gobernados por sicopatas con una edad mental adolescente y se piensen que son el macho alfa dominando el bosque aunque haya que sacrificar a los machos jovenes y la mitad de las hembras de la tribu. Esamos ahí, en ese punto de la evolucion
I am not sure how familiar you are with Dr. James Hansen's research on climate sensitivity. Here: https://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2026/Super_El_Nino.2026.03.20.pdf
Given the current levels of CO2 there is a 99% certainty that global warming with rise to at least 4.5C above pre-industrial levels. There is no way to stop this from happening because there is no way to put the global warming gasses back in the ground within a reasonable time frame. Now that we are about to loose a good part of industrial civilization any high-tech hopium solutions are also gone. There is no way to feed 8+ billion people on this planet without fossil fuels. On top of all of that, as the Earth warms it's carrying capacity drastically diminishes. You should probably keep your 'advice' to yourself and enjoy the last years of your selfish boomer existence.
I've been on Hansen's mailing list for years. His research shows compelling reasons why an earlier collapse is preferable to a later one. Yes, a lot of terrible warming is baked in, but every year of emissions just adds to the damage.
I spent much of my career working on "high-tech hopium" solutions (OTEC, solar, hydro, wind, hybrid village power systems, etc), all through the 70s, 80s and 90s, back when there was some hope, and I am disappointed that Hansen's warnings (starting in 1988) weren't heeded. It seems that collective action just isn't going to happen.
It's been over fifty years since Limits to Growth described what was going to happen. That's when I was in my mid-20s, but nothing was done about it by those older, selfish members of the Greatest Generation and Silent Generation that preceded us boomers. To be honest, I don't see Generation X or Millenials doing much either. I don't think any cohort bears any extra blame; we're all in on it.
You obviously know what's happening and don't need any advice from me or any other "selfish boomer". It's good to know that you've got everything handled just fine.
But there may be others that need a little more convincing, though, so I'll still keep commenting. You can just skip over my comments if they cause you so much anguish.
CO2 is saturated
https://ipa.org.au/read/explaining-the-physics-of-carbon-dioxide-will-happers-tour-down-under
Well, as someone who has been giving advice and actually working on solutions for over fifty-five years, let me provide a structuralist approach. James Hansen was just describing what everyone who did any reading already knew in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He just got the attention of the lamestream media. One has to take it to the next level.
You are correct that 8+ billion people cannot be fed without fossil fuels. In fact, about 1 billion are not being fed right now, even with fossil fuels. (The WHO and FAO figures are based on an artificially low threshold, since 800 million sounds better than 1 billion.) As the fossil fuels decline in net energy and suffer transport and financial problems, dieoff is a high probability. I would say over 90%. So whatcha gonna do about it? The time for hand-wringing has been OVER for decades. I have been doing research on landraces for 30 years. The operative paradigm is that more adaptable crops will likely provide more flexibility as climate changes. This is not just new crops or mainstreaming indigenous crops or repurposing existing crops, but also selecting for new strains of crops that pop up as mutations. This can be done at scale, but it is better to do individual work in small gardens. In other words, many more people should be doing this. I am in the Pyrenees at 500 meters, but there might be different landraces that would work better in the Alps at 500 meters. Or in the Canadian Rockies at 500 meters. Or in the Australian Outback, etc., etc., etc. The key here is to stop saying, "It's bad" and actually get off your dead ass and DO something. James Hansen has been saying, "It's bad," since 1988. So what? Has he actually put his own time and effort into demonstration projects or starting farmers markets or perhaps starting a foundation to fund indigenous farming practices with all the money he has made as a well-regarded scientist? Somehow I doubt it.
Keep in mind that some of us "selfish boomers" have been fighting the greatest superpower in the history of the world for over half a century.
Perhaps Im being naive but there is another scenario - the US withdraws immediately, Trump is impeached as everyone is now fully aware what they have done but allowing him gain power, and the Straits resume (with significantly less oil and gas due to the shut-in's and damage).
This marks a turning-point for humanity as energy blindness is finally shattered. Suddenly, all the planning and work that needs to be done to unwind industrial civilisational has air-time. Millions of people around the world get to work. Every country devises a systems-wide plan for maintaining basic needs as oil declines. The West reindustrialises out of necessity, embracing new technologies like 3D printing. Community microgrids and polytunnels spring up. A new economic system is born.
This catastrophe has provided an enormous, unprecedented window for action.
Sorry to rain on your parade, but I've worked in 3D printing industry for years. It's nice and fancy, but although it may not appear so, 3D printing industry is extremely complex and resource consuming. It can't be sustained in a context of fossil fuel scarcity, much less expanded...
Are you aware of open Source Ecology? they are building the 50 machines required for an industrial civilisation, mostly with 3d printers
And where does the material that a 3D printer uses to print come from? Where does the energy that powers it come from? That's it, from fossile fuels.
A 3D printer cannot "print" the material it uses to print, nor can it "print" energy. At the end of the day, without those two external resources, a 3D printer is useless. Like most of the tools we've developed.
We are not going to 0 energy. We're going to much less energy, requiring doing more with that energy. Theres thousands of years of coal, for example. That can be turned into solar panels. Oil will be pumped in 100 years, but it will be an invaluable mineral used in petrochemicals. A technology that short-circuits the 6 continent supply chain like 3D print is going to be huge.
All right. We'll see soon enough, that's for sure...
Yes Mark, its a great opportunity to reshape the world but will our rulers allow it? China has a model of governance that could make your dream come true, if allowed: https://austrianpeter.substack.com/p/the-financial-jigsaw-part-2-65-in?r=hhrlz&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&triedRedirect=true
As power at the top fragments, it rolls downhill as it continues to fragment. Of course the local activists have to be able to actually see it first. It reminds me of a little snippet in the North Country Anvil from 1971, "Most hippies wouldn't recognize power if it was lying on the ground in front of them." Replace "hippies" with "progressives" or "activists" and it is still true.
After recognizing the opportunities, it is still a question of how many local activists are willing to do the work instead of just wringing their hands and saying, "It's bad."
'Willing activists' is a tautological inconsistency Walter. "We have in society those who DO and those who teach" my English master once opined. Yes, it's really bad but there's always a silver lining! (pun intended)! Have a good day.
"'Willing activists' is a tautological inconsistency." I got a good laugh out of that one! You must be one of them "armchair philosopher" types. I could parse why tautological inconsistency is a throwaway phrase used in a vain attempt to assert ideological dominance in order to cast shade on another argument without actually engaging in the original argument - all the while blissfully ignoring the vernacular use of original terms. But I won't. They are just words. I have lots of words too. It reminds me of the pseudo-philosophical arguments between Boris and Sonja in Love and Death (1975), one of my favorite movies. LOL
I have known literally hundreds of people who self-identify as "activists" but who don't do anything active. Make no mistake, writing a newsletter is not an active pursuit. An influencer is not an "activist." An activist actually DOES something. It takes manual labor to organize a demonstration or make signs or put yourself in front of an ICE thug and blow a whistle. Sometimes you get teargassed or beaten or even shot. In my case, I can no longer run fast and I gave up the demonstratin' fifty-five years ago for building alternatives. It takes manual labor to grow food for other people or do research on crop landraces to develop strains that will more easily adapt to climate change. It doesn't take much effort to type up something on a computer.
And of course I should address the inevitable question. "Why are you then typing on a computer yourself?" Answer: I am metaphorically slapping people upside their heads to get them to actually DO something. Stirring the pot, as it were.
Per your English mentor/master, that is a crap concept. There are plenty of people who do AND teach. They are out there doing in the sunshine right now and they are happy to teach the people who come by and want to learn. As soon as I make my next cup of coffee, I will do the same. Tilling and planting is on the agenda today. Oh, and weeding.
It was /sarc. and meant to be amusing. Anyway, I too have spent many years building my own smallholding and know how hard it is. I am too old to do that now so I waste my time trying to understand what's actually going on in the world and hopefully assisting in others understanding.
Go well gardening...
Isn't there a Armageddon choice? Plagues, droughts, fires, famine, you know, the one Heagseth is so excited about.
The war, started by US-Israeli forces almost three weeks ago, has exposed a number of beliefs as myths. The attack on Iran’s South Pars gas field1 and its Bushehr nuclear power plant, followed by Iran’s retaliation on Gulf refineries and Qatar’s LNG infrastructure—knocking out 17% of their LNG supply for the next three to five years
We have no way of confirming any of this (CNNBBC often lies... usually lies... so they are not a good source).
If the above is true ... stock markets should have already imploded...
If the above is correct this is what will soon happan https://fasteddynz.substack.com/p/collapse-and-cannibalism
I’m scared to look! Plus you’ve got Marty Feldman Eyes!!
EXACTLY as predicted here, we are now being told that there are ‘work-arounds’ to partially offset the oil and gas that is supposedly not making it to market through Whoremooz. Of course, the work-arounds are not able to completely replace Whoremooz flows, but they are ‘hitting records’ and will prevent the world from collapsing.
The fake Iran War will continue just as the fake Ukraine War never ends.
Oil and gas prices will remain inflated ‘until the war ends’ as will overall inflation. But at least we will not be starving to death in a few weeks! Rejoice by taking a cold shower and be sure to jump a bus to work on Monday.
And just like that, Iran is the new Ukraine.
https://fasteddynz.substack.com/p/and-the-morons-sigh-with-relief
And Marty Feldman hat.
I think it's the end of this world, and, perhaps, the beginning of a new one, once the dust settles. If the nutcases don't let loose a nuclear spasm, we'll know, one way or another, what the outcome is in about 18 months. We still have the overshoot debt to face. That in itself will kill billions. The global financial system is finished. It can't survive a sudden 20% loss of energy. All that debt going bad at once will kill it. The process has already started. That means the just in time system is also finished, as is industrial agriculture. 75% of global phosphate production (one of those essential minimums) comes from Morocco. It requires the sulphur that Qatar and other countries in the Persian Gulf produce to make sulphuric acid or it can't be extracted from the rock. Losing 75% of an essential fertiliser isn't going to help maintain 8 billion people. I don't know how many will pull through this, but I firmly believe that some will. How many depends on how people behave during the process, how chaotic it gets, and how much of nature survives.
Well said Joe, I agree and write often about this transmogrification. The globalists know and are planning to survive. What happens to the herd will depend on how/what they decide methinks. https://austrianpeter.substack.com/p/the-financial-jigsaw-part-2-67-wartime?r=hhrlz&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&triedRedirect=true
Option 5: US and Israel fall apart, the people reclaim the governments from their pedophile overlords and declare worldwide peace.
"We are part of the Grand Theatre, some willingly, some knowingly," "The meek shall inherent the Earth, if that's alright with you!" (MAD magazine c1960s). At present, the Globalist banksters hold all the cards: https://www.globalresearch.ca/iran-world-stage-theatre/5919158 But that could change if their fiat wealth returns from whence it came.
Apart from fossil fuels, the Strait of Hormuz and Red Sea are the location of subsea cables which handle communications and data between Asia and Europe. 90%+of our data travels by subsea cable and global trade depends on data. These cables can be damaged by sea mines, ship debris from explosions and the like.
Or deliberate action. All you need is a dhow and an anchor to drag along the seabed.
This is a very good follow up to Gail Tverberg's Reaching-Limits-to-Growth piece from 11 months ago: https://gailtverberg.substack.com/p/brace-for-rapid-changes-in-the-economy-the-world-economy-is-reaching-limits-to-growth
Yes John, I have followed Gail for many years. Actuaries are so often right because they rely on physics. But do you think our future is not in our hands but will be decided by powerful people we know not of? https://www.globalresearch.ca/iran-world-stage-theatre/5919158
Those "powerful people" are who George Carlin called "our owners", which is how I refer to them. I look at Global Research several times per week, and I like Peter Koenig pretty well.
I had seen that article when it came out recently and read down to the picture of Lord Balfour's letter to Lord Rothschild.
Yes, if misinformed, we are specators and actors in THEIR play, but if we do our best to be informed, we might just be bit-part actors in history, evolution, The Divine Comedy, etc.
That is what I strive for. I seek Divine Guidance.
Likewise John, I can do no more as I recognise my own powerlessness. All I can do is scribble my views and hope others gain some relief. The truth is very difficult to discern these days.
I like the description "our owners" - it seems to be exactly right for me. I love your postings, most useful and saves my time, thank you for your efforts.
Yes John. I agree and work away as you do at another story that can be told. It only comes true in groups so let's all support each other.
"Moral support" is what it will mainly have to be between Texas and Australia,,, Appreciating you.
;-)
I accept what you are saying even though I really would like to be more optimistic about finding a silver lining. You don't bring up AI as a technology that has a purpose or role in helping guide a way out of this situation. So, I guess AI is done for also. Maybe the silver lining is that humankind doesn't disappear completely but instead becomes more aligned with sustainability at a much-reduced global population level. Maybe we have entered the change phase that would come anyway by year 2100 but the entire timeline has been accelerated by US-Israel greed.
AI cannot function without electricity. The 24/7/365 grid cannot function without fossil fuels. Oops.
I think Ed, the globalists have already decided not to wait until 2100. This conflict is designed to accelerate the preordained failure of the global (western) financial system. What comes next is in their hands now https://austrianpeter.substack.com/p/the-financial-jigsaw-part-2-51-next?r=hhrlz&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&triedRedirect=true
Thanks for the thoughtful article. This war feels like a crazy cowboy started a firefight in an explosives factory, or rather inside the nuclear reactor powering our civilization.
Thanks for an interesting article. Good to see Israeli and American psychopaths so frustrated. I say that as an American myself.
Balaji Srinivasan has repeatedly argued that not only is it is feasible for China to wait a little longer to let the US face modest degradation of their expeditionary assets then join in on the Iranian side in a naval capacity to force scenario #2 to be the guaranteed outcome, but that if this is done and the defense guarantees pivot further to China it buys the globalized fossil fuel system 6-8 extra years.
I don't buy it but I can't articulate exactly how. Does anybody here have any thoughts about it?
Neither do I Steven, China is uniquely placed to sit back and watch: https://jerrygrey2002.substack.com/p/china-isnt-suffering-for-or-over?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1744413&post_id=191562362&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=hhrlz&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
I don't see any advantage for China to move in this arena. The thinking in the West is distorted by its culture and history https://austrianpeter.substack.com/p/the-financial-jigsaw-part-2-64-the
China has made it abundantly clear it wants Taiwan. When the US has depleted it's munitions (very soon to happen) what's to stop China from walking into Taiwan?
True Toma, but I am not sure they are motivated to take over Taiwan, at least not yet. My contacts in China think that Taiwan will eventually willingly accept China's direct rule but this is not a certainty. It is yet another area of geopolitics that confound us.
The sea
Response to The Honest Sorcerer:
Hormuz Is Not an Oil Story
Much of the commentary still treats the Strait of Hormuz as an oil problem. It isn’t.
It is a system problem.
Yes, roughly 20% of global oil and LNG flows through that narrow corridor. That alone would be enough to trigger a crisis. But what is now unfolding goes far beyond energy markets.
Hormuz is a transit point not just for fuel, but for the physical inputs of the global economy: fertilizers, industrial chemicals, metals, and critical materials embedded deep in supply chains. When that flow is disrupted, the shock does not stay in النفط or gas markets. It propagates.
Through agriculture. Through manufacturing. Through transport.
And most importantly—through diesel.
Diesel is not just another fuel. It is the fuel of extraction, construction, logistics, and food production. When diesel tightens, the entire system tightens with it. Not gradually—but all at once.
This Does Not Reset Quickly
There is still a lingering assumption in parts of the debate that once the Strait reopens, normality returns.
That is unlikely.
Oil production cannot simply be switched off and on without consequence. Reservoirs degrade. Logistics chains fracture. Refineries are configured for specific grades of crude that are not easily substituted. Even a temporary shutdown leaves scars that take months—sometimes years—to repair.
In other words: this is not a pause. It is damage.
From Shock to Chain Reaction
What follows is not a single crisis, but a sequence:
Transport costs rise → margins compress
Industrial output slows → supply gaps emerge
Fertilizer shortages → weaker harvests
Energy volatility → investment freezes
Supply chains desynchronise → production stalls
This is how a systems shock behaves. Not as a spike—but as a cascade.
We are already seeing early signs: falling throughput, rising costs, and increasing fragmentation in global trade flows.
Not Collapse—But Not Normal Either
Some voices are now framing this as the beginning of a full collapse of the globalised economy.
That goes too far.
But the opposite mistake—assuming a quick stabilisation—is just as misleading.
What we are likely entering is something more complex:
A world where flows continue, but at lower volume. Where trade persists, but with higher friction. Where energy moves, but not freely.
Not collapse. Not continuity.
Transformation under constraint.
The Strategic Layer
This is also why the military dimension is so difficult.
Keeping Hormuz open is not a technical escort mission. It is an operation inside a compressed, highly contested battlespace dominated by drones, missiles, and asymmetric denial systems.
Which means:
There is no clean military fix. No quick reopening. No cost-free escalation.
And that, more than anything, is what markets—and states—are now beginning to price in.
The Bottom Line
Hormuz is not just a chokepoint.
It is a stress test of the global system itself.
And what it is revealing is not sudden collapse—but something potentially more significant:
The limits of how tightly the world economy can be coupled… before disruption in one place starts to reshape everything.
Yep, it's bad. No, really. It's bad. Did I mention that it's bad? It is likely (>50%) Israel will resort to nuclear weapons. My hunch is that Bibi starts by dropping one on Lebanon first to see what kind of public reaction he gets. But the countervailing argument is that Tehran is further away and the radiation blowback will consequently be further away. The greatest argument for NOT using tactical nuclear weapons is the radiation poisoning the desert sands in the Gulf States - and Israel itself. But Bibi and The Donald are both insane, so rational calculation doesn't count for much.
The nuclear issue is not new. Daniel Ellsberg revealed in 2021 that US war planners considered using a nuclear weapon on China in 1958. During the Vietnam War, Nixon and Kissinger (two more insane demons) were planning on using tactical nuclear weapons against North Vietnam. What stopped them was the Antiwar Movement. So show some respect for us "dirty hippie commie pinkos" once in awhile. Are the current crop of young people in the US and Israel willing to organize and put their lives on the line to stop this madness? Are they willing to give up having a career? Are they willing to commit to alternatives? I doubt it. It would mean adopting a much lower energy footprint and voluntary poverty and manual labor, just for starters.
So . . . IF you are willing to work against the System, you need some advice. Are you willing to listen to us snaggle-toothed old hippies yet? Remember, we didn't get to be elders with our priciples intact without a great deal of effort and even some jail time. As B alludes to, the problem is not just the current iteration of insanity, but the underlying System. This is not new. Many of us have pointed this out for sixty years and there were others before us. If you want to survive (many don't; especially the Christian Zionists who welcome Armageddon as it brings on the "Second Coming") you need to shift your paradigms to a more adaptable set. You need paradigms for adaptation. Here is one that I find useful.
SML. This stands for short-, medium- and long-term. This is a paradigm that allows you to craft solutions (or managed outcomes if your prefer) that hit all the bases. Short-term effects that mitigate the problem (or predicament if you prefer) right now, but then move along a different trajectory to change things for the better in the mid-term; all the while laying down lifestyle changes that last into the future. The classic example is gardening. (Don't get hung up on examples! No obfuscating nitpickers allowed!) Another example is to detach from the System as much as you can. Short-term may be organizing against the War but then mid-term is transitioning out of the Sytem on a timeline. (Get a job that does not involve as much linkage to the overall System, learn a blue-collar skill that has value post-collapse, reduce your energy footprint, don't have children, move out of the city, etc.) Where mid-term ends and long-term begins is itself on a continuum. There are other strategies that you should be able to think up yourself. But you have to get off your dead ass and DO something.
Yep, it's bad. What are ya gonna do about it?