The last time an Iranian regime was overthrown, the resulting oil crisis eventually saw Americans lining up at gas stations and paying double what they'd spent a few years earlier to fill their tanks. So far, Donald Trump's new Iran war hasn't caused anything close to a 1979-type crisis. But the longer the conflict goes on, the likelier such an outcome becomes. In response to the strikes that killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran announced that it would attack any ship that attempted to cross the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway off the country's southern coast. For decades, this move has been widely considered the doomsday scenario for the global energy system. About a fifth of the world's oil passes through the strait every day, carried by ships bringing Middle Eastern output to the rest of the world, and virtually no alternatives exist for getting all of that oil to market. Several experts told me that if the strait were to remain closed for more than a few weeks, the price of...
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