Hash and trash—it’s also called fish wrap in some quarters—musing without music on the Internet during the quiet holiday interlude.
Smuggling Persian Style
(h/t Camilla Wright) They move best at night, in a swarm. Twenty, maybe 25, small boats side-by-side. Up to 100 boats at a time: “Waterworld” without Kevin Costner. Simple speedboats, around six meters long, each with a powerful engine, traversing the fabled Strait of Hormuz with precious cargo. Back and forth from Iran to Musandam, Oman, loading and unloading.
If you’ve ever wondered how ordinary Iranians get around US primary sanctions, this is it. This is smuggling, 2024 style.
Some captains disgorge their goods to other boats out at sea under cover of darkness — boats that then head into UAE waters. But most plow on to dock at the busy harbor in Khasab, Musandam.
Musandam lies where the Arabian peninsula spikes into a sharp point, separating the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman, only 21 nautical miles south of Iran. On a clear day, you can see the Iranian coast across the shipping lanes where a quarter of the world’s oil consumption passes through. It looks nothing like the rest of Arabia. Craggy cliffs drop perpendicular to the sea as if the fjords of Norway or Greenland were transplanted to a desert landscape. Barren rock meets blue sea, blue sky.
Almost all spikes are in the United Arab Emirates, except for this tip. In a quirk of history, this is not an Emirate. Musandam is an exclave of Oman, the Sultanate, which is way south of the UAE. Back in 1971, the Brits invaded Musandam and took it from the local tribe, handing it instead to the Omani sultan, whom they’d just backed in a coup. It might be mile upon mile of barren rock, but it is incredibly strategically important barren rock.
Khasab, the only real town in Musandam, is a sleepy fishing village living in quite a different century from the glitz and futurism of Dubai, just 130 miles down the road. By day, goats patrol the sun-drenched streets of the harbor, looking for trash to eat. Ancient dhows line up, hoping to take out the few day-trippers seeking the solitude of the coast. But by night, a hive of activity develops as wave after wave of speedboats dock.
What’s going on, we ask. Fishing boats are the answer, as we see a crane lift a car up and onto a small boat barely larger than the car. The cargo is safely loaded, and it speeds off into the darkness.
Three years ago, you barely saw these boats — certainly not without the cover of darkness. Now, they’re legion. While they may move best at night, the boat captains — men and women — visibly ply their trade in the mornings and evenings.
From Iran comes fish and livestock, sheep and goats, ready for market in the UAE and Oman. Plus, cheap petrol and diesel fuel. Exotic animals bought for private zoos across the Gulf are easily trafficked this way, too, it’s said. Rumors are rife that this is how opium and hashish find their way out.
Everything else heads north. Boxes of white goods are piled high: TVs, fridges, satellite dishes, toiletries, medicines, alcohol, and cosmetics. We spoke with a man with an American accent, whose origin is undetermined. He was selling power tools. For each consignment, he took delivery of two boatloads of diesel fuel, offloaded from the smugglers’ speedboat onto another while still at sea.
The smuggling trade dwindled during the late Obama era as sanctions began to be lifted, but it came back big time, Khasab residents say—bigger than ever, thanks to the regional conflict in which Iran is enmeshed.
By morning, most of the Iranian entrepreneurs had headed home, hoping to evade the Islamic Republic’s coastguards, who patrol their coastline night and day. Despite sometimes losing their goods or paying to get them through, nothing deflected this smuggling swarm. They’ll be back in Khasab again as night falls.
Tariffs work
Mexican president Claudia Sheinbaum just announced that she is stopping the migrant caravans from arriving at the U.S. southern border after President Trump’s tariff threat. She said, “I have the vision that there will be an agreement with the U.S.” With the Mexican Peso in freefall, she has no choice. The Mexican Army will keep the caravans back, and Mexico will crack down on Chinese and Indian fentanyl smuggling, or the Jewish lady’s leadership tour in Mexico will be much more difficult.
Mexico threatened retaliatory tariffs to save face. Exports to the US make up almost a third of Mexico’s GDP — 29%. While US exports to Mexico make up 1.1% of our GDP.”
Am I the only one who has read, “The Art of the Deal?”
Canada PM Justin Castro-Trudeau agreed to work with Trump (who he referred to as Hitler during the campaign) on border security after tariff threats: ‘I had a good call with Donald Trump. We talked about some of the challenges we can work on together. It was a good call. This is something we can do.’ ”
Mass Deportation
Border Czar Tom Homan visited the Mexican border in Texas two months before beginning his job. He said, “We finally got a president. President Trump’s going to come in January. But we’re not waiting until January. We’re already talking. We’re already planning.” “Let me be clear: There is going to be a mass deportation because we just finished a mass immigration crisis on the border. It is a felony to harbor and conceal illegal immigrants from immigration authorities knowingly. Don’t test us.”
Jules’ Winter View
The path stretched ahead, pale and unbroken, leading to the gnarled silhouette of a tree that had stood there for decades. A low fence ran alongside, its posts leaning like tired soldiers. The air was still, the stillness that muffled every sound except the crunch of frosted snow underfoot.
She hadn’t meant to come this way. The decision had been as quiet as the landscape: a turn of her heel, a pull of something unspoken. Now, she stood at the path’s edge, looking at the tree with its bare branches twisting like veins against the graphite sky.
This place had once been hers. She’d run along the fence line as a child, her fingers grazing the rough wood. Later, she’d sat beneath that tree, tracing her thoughts in the dirt, crying over fallouts and lost love. And now she was again, the years behind her like a long, cold breath.
The tree stood unchanged, but it had a new weight as though it had been waiting for years, carrying her memories without complaint. She walked towards it, one step, then another, until the path gave way to the frozen earth beneath its shadow.
Her hand reached out, brushing the old bark, and the world seemed to relax for a moment. The frost glittered like quiet stars, and she felt the faint hum of belonging. Nothing spoke, but nothing needed to. She had returned, and the silence was enough.
Prints of “Winter’s View” are available in various sizes in the catalog gallery; for more information, please click here.
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WSF Reports that his 7-11 has run out of hot Coffee!
Parting Shot
Who would have guessed that (bama would curtail smuggling. Now for the obligatory music:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LSXKyHM133c
RIP Glenn Frey – yes, the music is necessary for the vibe.
Good one Fredrick….that one, Ballard’s ‘Voices’, and In The Air Tonight…MV perfection.
The MV episode that opened with Crokett and Tubbs in a Scarab, blasting across the ocean, with “Voices” as the music, was just spectacular.
The Trump Effect ™- Yup…no quarter given…as it should be…and the rats, cheats, and cowards are running for the hills or cowering…as they should. Holman is on the warpath, and God love him for it.
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Beth, like TTE ™, would cause all the Screeching View Hens to back off their standard demented rhetoric. It would be the highest rated in the shows history.
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Thanksgiving tomorrow, mine is a little different…but it’s not about the individual, so enjoy as you all see fit. God bless America, and may we be “the light” to the world (now that aspect I can also possess myself, Matt 5:14).
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Sidebar: Angel Studios just released “Bonhoeffer”.
Liked this take on an old saying – Keep your friends close, and your enemies running for their lives.
Sorry, I do not watch TV. Who is Beth?
Character on the TV program “Yellowstone”. A woman not to be messed with. Played by Irish actress Kelly Reilly.
Same here, I didn’t know who Beth is either. If it wasn’t for my brother and Mike_C I wouldn’t know much of what is on the idiot tube. An early FCC Commissioner exclaimed TV is a vast wasteland and he was right…
This is Beth being nice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxHlYfk1c4g
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And that guy had it coming. Actually what people like that guy ought to have coming I shouldn’t say for legal purposes.
The character is Beth Dutton, daughter of rancher John Dutton (Kevin Costner) with whom she has a difficult relationship, but to whom she is also fiercely loyal. Beth is a finance person (not a bar hooker as she seems to imply in this scene) but has no hesitation throwing down either with words, like here, or with fists.
Thing is she’s from The Motherland, proving even Brit’s like The Western lifestyle, even if it’s make believe on a multimillion dollar legacy ranch.
A ranch in Montana where it never snows.
They only filmed in the good weather…all about optics.
They paid their Climate Tax…..
Besides the dealing with our borders and the leaders on the other side of them, I was reading that Trump has finished his cabinet picks and a whole slew of lesser picks (don’t need confirmation), and they are working on the EOs. Hit the ground running!
It looks like he learned a lot the first time….
Pres. Trump learned from last time. Trump 47 is not a rehash of Trump 45. There were lessons learned and between the terms the Deep State tried to imprison him for the rest of his natural life on charges that were nonsense. Persecution leads to lessons learned and a sense of resolve that is difficult to generate under other circumstances.
I’ll add as a post-script that the FBI sought and received the authorization to use lethal force (to kill President Trump) during the Mira Lago raid. They claimed to be after nuclear weapon keying material. They didn’t find anything like that after a 12 hour search. Imagine that. If they’d murdered Pres. Trump there would have been high fives all around but he was out of town.
What judge, with a shred of ethics, would authorize a lethal force search warrant?
I don’t think that ethics is involved. Cunning, perhaps, malicious proactive regime change. They failed to kill him, failed to imprison him, failed to prove a legitimate felony, and he returned with a mandate to “fundamentally change the Swamp.” Most interestingly, he formed alliances with conservative Democrats to create (in a sense) a bipartisan administration that absorbed much of the voting base that the democrats counted on.
Amen.
“Winter’s View” is beautiful, but pales in comparison to your story of the picture.
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I get the feeling I’m supposed to know who Beth is, but I have no idea, even looking at her picture.
See Mike_C above.
Coffee crisis. The 7-11 in question is one of the new model 2,000 sq ft mega stores. Full service deli. Truck parking, etc. Maybe ten dispensers for soft drinks and coma inducing sugar concoctions. No, repeat no, hot coffee or even machine cappuccino. I’m not a fan of truck stop coffee but, after four hours of hanging paper, a cup to see me home was wanted. This, on top of seeing an iridescent pink Telsa with California plates, irritated me.
It’s a brave new world, WSF
Life is too short and unpredictable to have bad coffee….but the pink Tesla is worse…had to be an on purpose after market paint job – or- Mary Kay has gone EV because ‘Elvis has left the building’.
In WSF’s case, there is no coffee. They likely have hot water. I’ll bet the Tesla driver had their own selections of tea bags in a box in the bonnet or the boot (aren’t there two in a Tesla?). Like I said, Brave New World.
At the moment, back from hanging paper, drinking a fresh hot cup made the way I like it; brave new world be damned.
Both I believe, as the batts are under the driver and passenger…which means iffn you go off a bridge in Ocean City and land in the bay, not only do you go straight to the bottom but the thing catches on fire and incinerates you in the process. One upside, you save the cremation fees.
Always an upside
The agreed upon term for the storage space under what used to cover an engine, is “Frunk”, for FRont trUNK”
The irony of Castro’s kid calling anyone Hitler is delicious. Schadenfreude Pie is best served cold, after a heapin’ helpin’ of crow. Eat up, kid. Plenty more where that came from.
Beth is NOT a lady you want to cross…much like a lot of the real life ladies I know!
There appears to be a significant design problem with the side trim on the
monkeymobile. Presumably the work of the various sad expert system
software.
*
– Kle.
Have a Happy healthy Thanksgiving to everyone on the blog.