Thursday Afternoon News Updates: Trump Spirals, Threatens New Strikes, Then Retreats – 6/11/26

Here's the latest

Hi all, Ben here. It’s Thursday, June 11, and there is a lot happening. Let me give you the rundown before we get into the details.

Today’s top stories:

• Trump announces more strikes on Iran tonight and floats seizing Kharg Island and Iranian oil infrastructure

• Iran struck five U.S. military bases overnight in Jordan, Kuwait, and Bahrain — with Patriot missile defense systems failing at alarming rates

• A U.S. long-range radar station in Bahrain is confirmed destroyed

• Iran has been fortifying Kharg Island for months in anticipation of exactly this threat

• The UAE and Iran held their first high-level security meeting since the conflict began

• Pentagon evacuated portions of the building this morning due to a hazmat air quality incident

• Iran places Elon Musk’s regional assets on its target list

• PPI inflation hits 6.5% year over year, the highest since November 2022

• Oil executives privately warn the White House that gas could hit $5/gallon by summer’s end

• Markwayne Mullin defends World Cup visa denials, including of a Somali referee and Iraqi team staff

Trump Is Panicking and Trying to Sell the U.S. on a Ground War

Let’s start with what happened this morning.

Trump posted on Truth Social announcing the U.S. will be hitting Iran “VERY HARD TONIGHT,” claiming Iran’s navy, air force, radar, anti-aircraft systems, and most of its offensive capability are already “GONE.” He then announced plans to seize Kharg Island and assume “total control” of Iran’s oil and gas markets — comparing it to what he’s been doing in Venezuela, which he described as “working out brilliantly.” Not so sure that’s true for the Venezuelan people, who are still ruled by the Maduro regime. But at least Trump and his cronies get some oil money.

Then he rushed to state regime media Fox News to elaborate. And what followed was completely unhinged.

He claimed the U.S. could walk into Iran tomorrow with a small group of soldiers and “take over the whole place.” He said he dropped $250 million in bombs on Iran last night and is bragging about it while Americans can’t afford groceries. He claimed Iranian leaders secretly told him they love the press coverage they’re getting, a claim Brian Stelter immediately and correctly labeled as “preposterously” false. He said Iran is “in submission” but “just doesn’t know it yet.”

And then, when asked directly about U.S. plans to bomb water facilities in Iran, an act that would constitute a war crime, Trump changed the subject. He started ranting about the 2020 election being rigged and Steve Hilton’s primary win in California.

The pattern here is obvious: Trump is rattled. He’s threatening escalation while simultaneously acknowledging the American people don’t have the appetite for what he claims he “really much prefers.” He’s scapegoating the public for his own paralysis. He invoked Vietnam and Iraq, two catastrophic wars, and somehow concluded that he would have finished Vietnam in three or four months. Just him. Would’ve wrapped it right up. The difference between Iran and Vietnam? Trump has a plan to get our of Vietnam.

What he actually needs to do is get the U.S. military out of this situation, pursue something resembling the Obama-era JCPOA, and accept that a deal now will necessarily be weaker than what was available before this war began, because we lost the war. That’s not something Trump is capable of saying out loud, so instead we get Truth Social posts and Fox rants about Venezuela.

After all of his threats, Trump then posted to Truth Social at 1:28 PM ET that he has cancelled the strikes and bombings scheduled against Iran for tonight. He states that discussions have been elevated to the highest levels of Iranian leadership and approved by all parties, listing the United States, Israel, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Turkey, Pakistan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan, and Egypt among those signed on. A formal signing is expected, with time and place to be announced shortly. The naval blockade remains in effect until the deal is finalized. Sure. In other words, it’s Taco Thursday.

Despite Trump saying Israel agreed to an alleged “deal,” a senior Israeli official has told Channel 12 that Israel is not aware of any agreement being reached.

We’ll have much more on the details of this deal as they emerge. Stay tuned and subscribe to the MeidasTouch Podcast for continuous coverage.

The Military Reality Trump Is Hiding

While Trump is on Fox telling Americans that Iran’s defenses are “gone,” here’s what’s actually happening on the ground.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard struck five U.S. military installations overnight: Al-Salt Air Base in Jordan, Ahmad Al-Jaber and Ali Al-Salem Air Bases in Kuwait, U.S. Fifth Fleet Headquarters in Bahrain, and Sheikh Isa Air Base in Bahrain. OSINT reporting confirms Jordan “got seriously hit.”

The Patriot missile defense situation is alarming. Defense analysts report that three out of four Iranian ballistic missiles penetrated Patriot PAC-3 defenses at a key U.S. base in Jordan. Six interceptors were fired to achieve one successful interception. In cost terms, that’s roughly $24 million in interceptors against approximately $150,000 per Iranian missile, a 160-to-1 exchange ratio. One analyst put it plainly: this is not sustainable. Once ballistic missile defense coverage is depleted at key sites, the math becomes nearly impossible.

The U.S. long-range radar station at Jabal al-Dukhan in Bahrain? Confirmed ablaze. OSINT accounts geolocated the strike and matched smoke imagery to the AR-327 Long Range Radar site. A billion-dollar radar system, gone. Visual confirmation available for anyone who wants to look. CENTCOM and the Trump administration have been running cover on this, but the footage doesn’t lie.

And about those plans to seize Kharg Island: CNN is now reporting that Iran spent months fortifying the island specifically in anticipation of a U.S. attack. After U.S. strikes in March, Iran moved in additional troops, air defense systems, shoulder-fired MANPADS surface-to-air missiles, and deployed anti-personnel and anti-armor mines along the beaches where American forces would most likely land. China reportedly supplied significant portions of that technology.

So when Trump says we could “walk in there tomorrow,” what he actually means is: we could attempt a ground assault on a heavily mined, heavily fortified island that Iran has been preparing to defend for months.

Iran Is Strengthening Its Position

Iran’s senior leadership is not in the panic mode Trump is describing. Mohsen Rezaee, a direct aide to the Ayatollah, responded to Trump’s statements by saying the bombs won’t get him out of the quagmire he himself created, and that Iranian missiles will only sink him deeper. Iranian parliament speaker MB Ghalibaf warned that wrong strategies and impulsive decisions will reset the entire board, explode energy markets, and create an endless quagmire lasting years.

These are not the statements of people who believe they’re losing.

Meanwhile, the EU’s top foreign policy official, Kaja Kallas, is now in direct bilateral talks with Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi. Europe isn’t waiting around for U.S. leadership on this. They know the U.S. can’t be counted on right now.

Even more telling: the UAE, one of America’s staunchest regional allies, a founding participant in the Abraham Accords, held its first high-level face-to-face security meeting with Iran since the conflict began. The UAE views Iran as a regional threat and has been targeted by Iranian attacks, and yet they’re now prioritizing a path to stability because they can’t rely on the U.S. security umbrella. That is a significant signal. Iran is strengthening its diplomatic hand while the U.S. weakens its own.

CENTCOM posted this week that the Strait of Hormuz “remains open for transit.” It is not open. It has been closed by Iran since late February. The fact that Admiral Brad Cooper is putting his name on that statement is an embarrassment to the institution.

The Economic Damage Is Mounting Fast

This morning’s Producer Price Index report came in hotter than expected: PPI rose 1.1% month over month, bringing the year-over-year figure to 6.5%, the highest since November 2022 and above pandemic-era stimulus levels. The odds of rate hikes are rising.

PPI is wholesale inflation, in other words, what businesses pay before passing costs on to consumers. Consumer inflation (CPI) is currently running at 4.2%. If PPI is rising 1% per month, we could be looking at PPI in the 10-12% range by year’s end, with consumer inflation hitting 6% or higher. That’s not a prediction designed to scare you — that’s just math.

On the energy front: oil executives are privately warning the White House that gasoline prices, already at $4.13/gallon nationally, up over 40% year-over-year, could break $5 this summer. The Strategic Petroleum Reserve is at 349.2 million barrels, approaching lows not seen since 1983. One industry official who regularly interacts with the administration said, according to reporting: “The White House knows and understands the severity of the potential situation… They are politically constricted from saying that publicly.”

There it is. They know. They just won’t tell you.

Some Quick Hits

Pentagon Hazmat Incident: A shelter-in-place order was issued at the Pentagon this morning after air quality monitoring detected a hazardous materials issue affecting corridors 4-7, floors 2-5, A-E rings. Arlington Fire & EMS Hazmat Team was on site. Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell confirmed precautionary measures were in place. The cause was reportedly a malfunctioning sensor. Normal operations have since resumed.

Iran Targets Musk: Iran’s state-backed Fars News Agency announced that Iranian decision-makers have expanded their target list to include all interests associated with Elon Musk’s economic holdings across West Asia, including in Arab countries and “occupied territories.” Iran claims Musk-linked companies aided U.S. military strikes.

Musk Inflatable in Times Square: A 40-foot inflatable likeness of Elon Musk has been unveiled in New York City ahead of SpaceX’s IPO, criticizing Musk’s AI chatbot Grok for its creation of child sexual abuse material.

A giant inflatable caricature of Elon Musk stands in Times Square criticizing Grok, the artificial intelligence chatbot developed by xAI, in New York City, U.S., June 11, 2026. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

Kushner Resort/Albania: Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama addressed ongoing protests over the Kushner resort deal by blaming Iran, citing an ongoing cyber war between Iran and Albania. Convenient framing.

World Cup Visa Denials: Senator Markwayne Mullin defended the denial of entry to World Cup attendees, including a Somali referee and Iraqi team staff, by saying the U.S. won’t allow people “perceived to have criminal ties” entry. The word “perceived” is doing a lot of heavy lifting there.

That’s where things stand on Thursday afternoon. The gap between what the administration is saying and what is actually happening grows wider by the hour. Subscribe to the MeidasTouch Podcast for continuous coverage as this develops, and we will see you later for more updates.