On April 23, the US-Iran conflict entered its eighth week. Just days earlier, a breakthrough seemed possible: a ceasefire took hold between Israel and Lebanon, Iran announced the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, and negotiations in Islamabad appeared imminent. However, Trump then declared the US naval blockade would not be lifted and ordered the boarding and inspection of vessels bound for Iran. Iran promptly responded by announcing the strait's re-closure and firmly rejected a second round of talks. This kind of volatility was not a first. From the outset, one word has consistently described this conflict: madness. A 'Mad King' president, reportedly ushered out of the Situation Room by his own staff, is waging an inexplicable war where positions reverse by the hour, creating market chaos that even mainstream media struggles to interpret. Newly revealed insider accounts provide a clearer picture of the origins of this "madness and loss of control" and where it might lead. The 'Mad King' Trump: A President Kept Outside the Door According to recent insider accounts leaked to US media, an incident over the Easter weekend starkly revealed the management style of this war. A US F-15 fighter jet was shot down over Iranian airspace, leaving two pilots missing in action. When the news reached the White House, Trump reportedly yelled at his aides for hours. "The Europeans aren't helping at all," he repeated. With the national average gas price having reached $4.09 per gallon, images from the 1979 Iran hostage crisis reportedly haunted him. "Look at Carter... the helicopters, the hostages, it cost him the election," Trump complained at the time. "It's a total mess." He demanded immediate military action to rescue the pilots. His advisers, however, judged that his impatience was unhelpful at that critical moment. Consequently, they kept the President outside the decision-making room, briefing him only at key junctures. Vice President Vance joined via video from Camp David, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles dialed in from her Florida home, and the team tracked the rescue operation almost minute-by-minute—the aircraft's crash landing in the desert, diversionary tactics against Iranian forces. The President, meanwhile, could only wait outside for updates. One pilot was located quickly. The second wasn't rescued until late Saturday night. Trump reportedly didn't go to sleep until after 2 a.m. Six hours later, on Easter morning, he posted the world-shocking message on social media: "Open the Fuckin' Strait, you crazy bastards, or you will live in hell." He ended the post with an Islamic prayer phrase. This post was not part of any official national security plan. Senior White House officials revealed it was Trump's improvisation. He reportedly said he wanted to appear "as unstable and insulting as possible," believing this was a language Iran would understand. After posting it, he asked his aides, "What's the reaction?" From a leader seemingly consumed by fear to a strategist playing the madman—Trump switched roles within 12 hours. The question remains: which is the real him? Or are both real? International relations scholar John Mearsheimer used one term in a recent interview: mad king. The 'Crazy War': Erosion of Foundational Trust Driven by such extreme emotionalism, US diplomatic moves have exhibited a severe, counter-intuitive regression, directly leading to the collapse of current peace talks. Iran has repeatedly stated that it is the constant threats and volatility from the US that caused them to refuse a second round of negotiations. Mearsheimer pointed out in his analysis that a precious window for a ceasefire emerged last Friday: when Iran had initially reopened the strait as a goodwill gesture, the US should have seized the opportunity to advance the Islamabad talks. Instead, the Trump administration tore up the unspoken understanding: it not only publicly refused to lift the naval blockade but also ordered US forces to intercept, fire upon, and board Iranian vessels. "The result was that the Iranians made a 180-degree turn and closed the strait again." This tactic, devoid of strategic steadiness and characterized by last-minute reversals, has utterly depleted Washington's strategic credibility. In the eyes of Iranian hardliners, the US has become an unpredictable "madman," rendering any negotiation meaningless. The complete collapse of trust has pushed the peace talks toward failure. The 'Mad Strategy': How Israel 'Sold' the War and 'Controlled' Trump The root of this失控 lies in Washington's highly unusual outsourcing of major power strategy to external lobbying. According to Mearsheimer, aside from a very few individuals like Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, most senior US military and intelligence officials were strongly skeptical or even opposed to this war. They clearly foresaw the high risks, including Iran's likely retaliation by closing the Strait of Hormuz. But Trump completely disregarded warnings from his own experts. Mearsheimer stated bluntly, "The Israelis sold him a bill of goods." In the White House Situation Room, Mossad chief David Barnea and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu painted an illusion for Trump: overwhelming US military force would deliver a swift, decisive victory, and there was no need to worry about Iran closing the Strait of Hormuz. Trump, enamored with the experience of a near-bloodless regime change in Venezuela achieved in hours, bought it without hesitation. After the war began, Trump was reportedly shown daily video compilations of explosions inside Iran and clips of "victories." Aides described him as "awed" by the scale of the military power, repeatedly praising the US armed forces. However, battlefield "impressiveness" did not translate into political victory. As the war entered a more critical phase, the loss of strategic control became apparent. On one hand, facing a strait blockade that chokes off 20% of global oil supply, Trump rejected military advice to send ground forces to capture Kharg Island (handling 90% of Iran's oil exports), due to an extreme fear of unacceptable US casualties. On the other hand, Israel even acted unilaterally, directly attacking Iran's massive South Pars gas field, forcing Trump to hastily distance the US from the action on social media. This state of being strategically constrained by an ally and tactically hesitant sealed the fate of the war into complete失控. The 'Mad Strait of Hormuz': A Problem No One Planned For When top decision-makers are both unpredictable and influenced by external forces, operational execution inevitably descends into chaos. The Strait of Hormuz is the prime example. Before the war, Trump had reportedly told his team that the Iranian government would likely capitulate on the strait issue, and even if it didn't, the US military could handle it. When tanker traffic ground to a halt soon after the bombing started, some White House advisers were caught off guard. Trump later expressed belated surprise: "One guy with a drone can shut it down." This is the most ironic image in the entire story: those who started the war had not considered what would happen afterward. Commenting on this high-level lack of contingency planning for a critical chokepoint, Jim Bianco, founder of Bianco Research, was more direct at the Hedgeye investment summit on April 23: "My frustration is they had no plan for the Strait of Hormuz, or the plan they had doesn't work. The market really cares about oil flow right now. The market can be patient on nukes; the market is not patient on oil flow." Amid this political back-and-forth, Brent crude oil surged past $102 per barrel, completely reversing the previous week's decline and continuing its upward climb. The 'Deranged Market': "Crude Pricing Mechanism is Broken" When political decisions lose their anchor, financial markets lose theirs too. The first casualty was the pricing mechanism for the underlying commodity. Jim Bianco highlighted an extremely dangerous signal: the global crude oil market's pricing function has become dysfunctional. In normal times, the price differentials between benchmarks like Western Canadian Select, Brent, WTI, and spot Oman crude typically maintain a very narrow spread of $1 to $2, a sign of a healthy global energy supply chain. Today, however, amid the two-way blockade and a "no-timetable" protracted conflict, the spreads between these physical crudes have ballooned to a staggering $60. "If you're extremely bearish, you can find offers at $70; if you're extremely bullish, there are physical offers in the market at $130." Bianco warned that such extreme dispersion proves the physical network of the oil market has been severed by geopolitics. Brent crude breaking $102 is just the surface symptom; the truly致命 issue is that the foundational pricing anchor has vanished. In other words, no one knows what oil is really worth. This isn't market volatility; it's market failure. Yet, facing an abyss for the real economy, US financial markets exhibit a kind of deranged, "end-of-the-world"狂欢. US stock markets continue to hit new highs. Capital chases momentum like meme stocks, executing high-frequency trades based on Trump's emotional tweets. Any slight positive signal from the White House triggers indiscriminate buying. Trump himself, even as the war stalemates, reportedly spends significant time boasting to donors about deserving the "Medal of Honor" and studying renovation plans for the White House ballroom. But illusory stock charts cannot掩盖 the underlying bleeding. The University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index delivered the harshest verdict—this 74-year-old authoritative survey plunged to an unprecedented low of 47.3 in March. The level of despair among the American public about the current economy now far exceeds that seen during the 2008 financial crisis, the 9/11 attacks, and the high inflation of the 1970s. This paints a deeply fractured and utterly失控 K-shaped macroeconomic picture: stock market bulls toast the news flow manipulated by the White House, while gasoline prices of $4.09 per gallon have shattered the survival底线 of ordinary citizens. Is Trump 'Manipulating' the Market? This is the most sensitive question for market participants, and one最难公开讨论. Keith McCullough voiced what many are thinking at the summit: "Trump seems increasingly comfortable moving markets when he wants, in the direction he wants, because people are still too focused on the single factor." He further noted that the correlation coefficients between the US dollar, oil prices, gold, and Bitcoin are now approaching 95%. "It's not complicated," he said. "If you know where oil and the dollar are going in advance, you know where almost every asset is going." More striking was a detail he mentioned: Iranian channels have started posting Lego memes mocking Trump, suggesting that someone shorts oil right before he announces the strait is "about to open." "This is an open secret," McCullough said. "And seemingly no one cares, because everyone wants the same thing—the market to go up. Trump is pulling, good, keep going." The True Risk in This Game One statement from Mearsheimer in his interview is worth反复咀嚼: "The Trump administration should want a deal. For two reasons: one, they can't win on the escalation ladder; and two, they risk pushing the global economy off a cliff. So they should want a deal." "But sometimes Trump acts like he wants a deal, and sometimes he acts like he doesn't." This is the most dangerous aspect of the current situation—it's not a deliberate path to destruction by any single party, but a systemic失控 driven by decision-making chaos. Trump dares not send ground forces to capture Kharg Island, yet constantly issues extreme threats on social media, even sending conflicting signals when aides try to manage the situation. In this game of chicken, both sides are waiting for the other to blink first. The problem is: when one side's decision-maker is himself in an unpredictable state, no one can truly calculate the Nash equilibrium of this game. And once the gears of "失控" start turning, they are very difficult to stop in the short term.
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