[1]
By John Helmer, Moscow
@bears_with [2]
The Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, has announced [3]: “Even as we continue to highly appreciate those mediation efforts being provided by the United States we rely on ourselves only and it is us who defend our own interests.” As for the US “mediation efforts” – read Steven Witkoff and Jared Kushner — Peskov added [4]: “Of course, we are assessing the situation and drawing the appropriate conclusions. But we are continuing to work in our own interests.”
Never before has the head of the Russian state felt obliged to add the qualifier “but” to the public reassurance that he is “work[ing] in our own interests”. To whom was Peskov addressing this reassurance, and why? Who doubts that the President’s principal negotiator with Witkoff and Kushner, Kirill Dmitriev, has been “defend[ing] our own interests”?
Dmitriev was the last Russian to negotiate with Witkoff and Kushner less than 48 hours before the attack on Iran began. “We are not commenting on anything”, he said [4] as he left the talks in Geneva.
By then the Russian General Staff knew the attack on Iran was about to begin. Since then Dmitriev has issued several tweets, no Telegram posts. He has said nothing in support of Iran, nothing in criticism of the US and Israel. Instead, he has told [5] the European Union (EU) they should now be regretting their sanctions war. “Not only an oil shock but also a natural gas shock. EU gas prices have already risen 22% since the attack on Iran and could more than DOUBLE soon. The EU’s strategic blunder of avoiding cheap and reliable Russian gas is backfiring. Europe once again will need Russia to survive.” He repeated [6] his hope that there will be “a major shift in the EU’s position as they begin to realize how their disastrous energy decisions created enormous risks, which are now materializing due to the conflict in Iran. Ideologically driven economic decisions pursued by the EU were wrong. The EU’s atonement may be late.”
Dmitriev has also announced [7] his support for the United Arab Emirates (UAE), “one of the truly neutral places in the world, focused on peacemaking and prosperity”.
In the new podcast with Nima Alkhorshid, we discuss what Russian leaders have said, done, not said, not done as the war heads towards the use of nuclear weapons and as Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has explicitly warned. View or listen by clicking: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cds5p875iNs [8]
For an hour-by-hour analysis of Russian decision-making after the Security Council knew the attack was about to begin, read this [9]:
[10]From the telephone call between Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Aragchi on February 28 until they spoke again on the evening of March 3 – this call took place after the podcast had concluded [11] — Lavrov held talks with his counterparts from the UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Oman. No Russian contact has been made public with the US or Israel.
Lavrov’s warning of nuclear war can be read here [12] at his press conference with the Brunei foreign minister, shortly before the podcast began. Lavrov referred several times to Witkoff: “if this war – as Steve Witkoff’s remarks, which I quoted, suggested – was truly launched to deprive Iran of its inalienable right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes (a right enjoyed by virtually every other country in the world), then I can assure you that, if that logic prevails, we will see powerful forces and influential movements emerge inside Iran arguing that they should do precisely what the United States claims it wants to prevent – acquire a nuclear bomb. Because the United States does not attack nuclear-armed states.”
On the credibility of the US in war negotiations, Lavrov said [12] almost contradictory things. On the one hand, in the Iran war, “in order to mediate effectively, there must be clear understanding which direction the parties are moving in. At present, we can see no understanding with respect to the goals of our American counterparts.”
On the Ukraine war, “now, there is talk of the ‘Anchorage spirit’ which is evaporating or vanishing. We should not speak of the spirit. Atmosphere always helps, but in Anchorage, concrete understandings were achieved. These are not ephemeral; they are very specific matters. As I have said repeatedly, it is precisely these understandings that the Trump administration’s European allies – and, of course, Vladimir Zelensky’s Nazi regime – are attempting to undermine. But as far as we can judge, the Trump administration has not deviated from these understandings, from the issue of non-accession to NATO, or from the necessity of recognising the realities on the ground resulting from the people’s wil [12]l.”
Former president and now Deputy Secretary of the Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, is one of those to whom Lavrov was referring [13] who believe the Anchorage Formula is dead.
[14]Source: https://t.me/s/medvedev_telegram [15]
[16]Source: https://x.com/MedvedevRussiaE/status/2027671270125363682?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet [17]
Medvedev has not commented in public since the last Security Council meeting on February 28.
In this interval President Vladimir Putin’s public communications have been with Arab leaders; he has not spoken with Iran’s President, Masoud Pezeshkian, or with Russia’s other strategic allies, the heads of government of China, North Korea, or India.
[18]Source: http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news [19]
In the Kremlin read-out of Putin’s conversation with the UAE ruler, Mohammed bin Zayid (MbZ), it was reported that the latter had “emphasised that Iran’s retaliation had directly affected the Emirates, causing damage to the country and posing a threat to civilians. He said these strikes were carried out despite the fact that the UAE was not being used to mount attacks on Iran and were therefore completely unjustified. For his part, Vladimir Putin expressed [20] his willingness to convey these signals to Tehran and, more broadly, to provide all possible assistance in order to stabilise the situation in the region. The leaders agreed to remain in close contact.”
MbZ’s claim was false, as Putin and the Iranians know.
The US airbase at Al-Dhafra, according to open US sources [21], is “a forward-operating platform enabling sustained US air operations across the Gulf, Iraq, Syria, and maritime chokepoints, thereby transforming it into a critical logistics node whose disruption would ripple across CENTCOM’s theatre-wide contingency planning. The concentration of approximately 5,000 US personnel at the installation amplifies the base’s operational output but simultaneously heightens its exposure profile… Its proximity to the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly one-fifth of global oil transits, embeds Al Dhafra within a wider energy security matrix, meaning that any credible threat to its operability inherently intersects with global commodity markets and maritime insurance risk calculations. The integration of advanced aircraft assets, including stealth platforms deployed on rotational basis, elevates the base’s value within US air dominance doctrine while correspondingly incentivising adversarial targeting strategies focused on degrading sortie generation and command continuity.”
Iranian ballistic missile strikes against Al-Dhafra were recorded [22] after Putin’s call.
The remarks by Secretary of State Marco Rubio on the US goals for the war can be read in full here [23].
“The United States conducted this operation with a very clear goal in mind… The United States is conducting an operation to eliminate the threat of Iran’s short-range ballistic missiles and the threat posed by their navy, particularly to naval assets. That is what it is focused on doing right now and it’s doing quite successfully. I’ll leave it to the Pentagon and the Department of War to discuss the tactics behind that and the progress that’s being made. That is the clear objective of this mission…Why now? Well, there’s two reasons why now. The first is it was abundantly clear that if Iran came under attack by anyone, the United States or Israel or anyone, they were going to respond and respond against the United States. The orders had been delegated down to the field commanders. It was automatic, and in fact it beared to be true because, in fact, the – within an hour of the initial attack on the leadership compound, the missile forces in the south and in the north for that matter had already been activated to launch. In fact, those had already been pre-positioned.”
“The third [sic] is the assessment that was made that if we stood and waited for that attack to come first before we hit them, we would suffer much higher casualties. And so the President made the very wise decision. We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action, we knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties and perhaps even higher those killed, and then we would all be here answering questions about why we knew that and didn’t act.”
“Going back to the purpose, the purpose of this is to destroy that missile capability. Why does Iran want that ballistic missile capability? What they are trying to do and have been trying to do for a very long time is build a conventional weapons capability as a shield where they can hide behind, meaning there would come a point where they have so many conventional missiles, so many drones, and can inflict so much damage, that no one can do anything about their nuclear program. That is what they were trying to do, is put themselves in a place of immunity where the damage they can inflict on the region would be so high that no one can do anything about their nuclear program or their nuclear ambitions.”
“They are producing, by some estimates, over 100 of these missiles a month. Compare that to the six or seven interceptors that can be built a month. They can build a hundred of these a month, not to mention the thousands of one-way attack drones that they also have. They’ve been doing this for a very long time. And by the way, they’ve been doing it under sanction. You see the attacks they’re conducting right now. They’re attacking airports. They’re attacking hotels. They are hitting, not just military bases; they’re attacking our embassies directly. They’re attacking facilities that have nothing to do with war or with military. And that’s a weakened Iran. That’s an Iran despite years of sanction. Imagine a year from now or a year and a half from now the capabilities they would have to inflict damage on us. It’s an unacceptable risk, especially in the hands of a regime that’s run by radical clerics. The ayatollah is a radical – was a radical cleric. That entire regime is led by radical clerics who don’t make geopolitical decisions; they make decisions on the basis of theology – their view of theology, which is an apocalyptic one. That has to be taken very seriously as well [23].”
When Rubio identified the destruction of the Iranian navy as a US war goal, he meant that this is a precondition for keeping the Strait of Hormuz open, and for avoiding a major disruption in Persian Gulf oil supplies.
Here is the report of Russian military blogger, Boris Rozhin, on the closure of the Strait:
Before:
[24]After:
[25]Source: https://t.me/s/boris_rozhin [26]
In response, President Donald Trump has issued [27] a tweet: “Effective IMMEDIATELY, I have ordered the United States Development Finance Corporation (DFC) to provide, at a very reasonable price, political risk insurance and guarantees for the Financial Security of ALL Maritime Trade, especially Energy, traveling through the Gulf. This will be available to all Shipping Lines. If necessary, the United States Navy will begin escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, as soon as possible. No matter what, the United States will ensure the FREE FLOW of ENERGY to the WORLD. The United States’ ECONOMIC and MILITARY MIGHT is the GREATEST ON EARTH.”
In the short run, who is gaining in the US from the war?
SHARE PRICE TRAJECTORY OF LEADING US FRAC OIL PRODUCERS
[28]KEY: Grey=Halliburton, orange=SLB (Schlumberger), brown=Liberty Energy, yellow=Baker Hughes, green=ProFrac. Source: https://markets.ft.com/data/equities/tearsheet/charts?s=HAL:NYQ [29]
SIX-MONTH SHARE PRICE TRAJECTORY OF LEADING US SHALE OIL PRODUCERS
[30]KEY: grey=Expand Energy, brown=Devon Energy, orange=Diamondback. Source: https://markets.ft.com/data/equities/tearsheet/charts?s=EXE:NSQ [31]
Who is losing already in the US from the war?
[32]Source: https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/gasoline [33]
[34]Source: https://www.realclearpolling.com/polls/approval/donald-trump/issues/inflation [35]
[36]Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/just-one-four-americans-support-us-strikes-iran-reutersipsos-poll-finds-2026-03-01/ [37]
The consequences of India’s alliance with Israel and the UAE have been an immediate loss of oil supplies, requiring a change of policy towards the purchase of Russian oil; and the risk of nuclear fallout if Israel attacks northern Iran with nuclear weapons. When Prime Minister Narendra Modi uttered [38] a Jewish war cry to the applauding Knesset last week, he appears not to have anticipated what risks he was exposing his countrymen to. Modi’s tweets [39] since the war began reveal he remains committed to the war against Iran.
[40]In the last segment of the podcast, we discussed the evidence of China’s public performance compared with the reported evidence of secret military assistance:
[42]“Q: Global Times: Foreign media recently reported that Iran is close to a deal with China to purchase the CM-302 supersonic anti-ship missile. If delivered, the missiles would be among the most advanced military hardware to be transferred to Iran by China in recent years. Can you confirm this? Mao Ning: The report is not true. As a responsible major country, China always abides by its international obligations. China opposes ill-intentioned association and the spread of disinformation, and hopes relevant sides will choose the course of action conducive to deescalating the tense situation.”
Source: https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/xw/fyrbt/lxjzh/202603/t20260302_11867202.html [43] Compare this Russian report of secret military assistance here [44] and here [45].
Click to watch:
[46]Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cds5p875iNs [8]