Robert Bell

🇫🇷 🇬🇧 « Ça paraît tellement insensé, au regard de ce sur quoi il a fait campagne. C’est pourquoi beaucoup de gens se sentent trahis, il a prôné la fin des guerres, de ces guerres idiotes et sans raison, et voilà qu’on en a une qu’on ne sait même pas vraiment expliquer. » Tels sont les mots de Joe Rogan, l’un des influenceurs conservateurs américains les plus en vue, dont le soutien à Trump a contribué à son élection en 2024.[1] Quelle qu’en soit la raison, l’attaque de Trump contre l’Iran le 28 février est clairement réprouvée par la majorité des Américains — ce qui est inhabituel aux États-Unis au début d’une guerre. Le 12 mars 2026, le Washington Post relevait : « de récents sondages… montrent que les Américains s’opposent aux frappes américaines à 50 % contre 38 % pour, selon une moyenne du Post portant sur dix sondages depuis le début de la guerre. »[2] L’écart entre partisans et opposants est donc de 12 points. Un mois plus tard, le 10 avril 2026, cet écart atteignait 15 points, selon le très réputé analyste américain Nate Silver.[3] Voici ce que Trump a publié sur les réseaux sociaux le 12 mars, soit près de deux semaines après son attaque surprise : « Les États-Unis sont de loin le premier producteur de pétrole au monde : quand les prix du pétrole montent, nous gagnons beaucoup d’argent. MAIS, ce qui m’importe et m’intéresse bien davantage, en tant que président, c’est d’empêcher ce maître mauvais qu’est l’Iran d’acquérir des armes nucléaires, et de détruire le Moyen-Orient et, en vérité, le monde entier. Je ne laisserai jamais cela se produire ! »[4] Nombreux sont ceux qui soupçonnent Trump de ne pas dire la vérité sur la question nucléaire, et de s’en servir comme simple prétexte à d’autres fins. Il existe des éléments concrets à l’appui de ce soupçon. Le 27 février, lors d’une interview télévisée, Badr Albusaidi, le ministre des Affaires étrangères d’Oman — qui servait de médiateur dans les négociations entre les représentants de Trump et le gouvernement iranien — a déclaré qu’« un accord de paix est à notre portée. » L’Iran « ne possédera jamais, au grand jamais… de matière nucléaire susceptible de fabriquer une bombe. » Les stocks existants d’uranium enrichi seraient « dilués au niveau le plus bas possible » et « convertis en combustible… [ce qui] serait irréversible », a-t-il insisté. L’Agence internationale de l’énergie atomique de l’ONU bénéficierait d’un « accès complet » aux sites nucléaires iraniens pour vérifier l’accord, concluant : « Zéro accumulation, zéro stockage, vérification totale. »[5] C’était le vendredi 27 février. Les deux parties devaient se retrouver le lundi suivant. Trump a attaqué le lendemain, samedi 28 février — en plein milieu des négociations de paix. Le 17 mars, la démission soudaine de Joe Kent, directeur du Centre national de lutte contre le terrorisme nommé par Trump lui-même, a considérablement renforcé ce soupçon. Sa lettre de démission énonce : « En mon âme et conscience, je ne peux soutenir la guerre en cours contre l’Iran. L’Iran ne représentait aucune menace imminente pour notre nation, et il est clair que nous avons déclenché cette guerre sous la pression d’Israël et de son puissant lobby américain. »[6] Bien que le sénateur Mitch McConnell ait critiqué l’« antisémitisme virulent de sa lettre de démission »,[7] Kent a jeté de nouveaux doutes, bien réels, sur la prétendue urgence d’une bombe nucléaire. L’attaque de Trump a fait passer le prix du pétrole américain (le WTI, valeur de référence) d’environ 65,75 dollars le baril le 27 février 2026 à 111 dollars le 20 mars.[8] Il a ensuite oscillé au gré des déclarations de Trump et des comptes rendus d’attaques. Le 11 avril, il était redescendu au prix encore massivement élevé de 95 dollars.[9] Mauvaise nouvelle pour les propriétaires de voitures ? Certes. Mais excellente nouvelle pour les « frackers » — les foreurs pratiquant la fracturation hydraulique — qui avaient financé la campagne électorale de Trump en 2024 à hauteur de 75 millions de dollars, mais s’étaient sentis trahis puisque beaucoup avaient dû stopper leur activité, faute d’un prix du pétrole couvrant leurs coûts, en moyenne 55 à 58 dollars le baril.[10] L’Arabie saoudite, dont le coût de production n’excède pas 27 dollars,[11] avait continuellement augmenté sa production, faisant chuter le cours mondial du pétrole. La guerre de Trump remet ses frackers en territoire bénéficiaire, renversant la logique de « crash ». Si telle est la stratégie de Trump, elle est assez simple : les États-Unis, avec Israël, détruisent l’Iran et laissent l’Iran, en riposte ou par légitime défense, détruire les autres producteurs régionaux de pétrole et de gaz naturel. C’est d’ailleurs ce qui se passe. L’Iran a effectivement fermé le détroit d’Ormuz, par lequel transitent 20 % du pétrole et du gaz naturel mondiaux. Le 17 mars, un drone iranien a embrassé un grand champ de gaz des Émirats arabes unis, le projet Shah.[12] Le lendemain, Israël a attaqué le champ gazier iranien de South Pars — sa principale installation de gaz naturel. Quelques heures plus tard, QatarEnergy, entreprise d’État, annoncerait que l’Iran avait riposté en frappant la cité industrielle de Ras Laffan au Qatar, causant « des dégâts considérables ». La majeure partie du gaz naturel qatari, soit 20 % de l’approvisionnement mondial, y est produite.[13] Trump a alors menacé de « faire exploser massivement » le reste de South Pars si l’Iran attaquait à nouveau le Qatar.[14] Et Trump ne s’est pas arrêté là. Le 21 mars, il a posé un ultimatum : « frapper et anéantir » les centrales électriques iraniennes si l’Iran ne levait pas le blocus du détroit d’Ormuz avant le lundi soir suivant. L’Iran a alors menacé que si Trump exécutait sa menace, les États du Golfe verraient leurs infrastructures énergétiques « détruites irrémédiablement » et que l’Iran fermerait le détroit d’Ormuz indéfiniment.[15] Le Brent a atteint 110 dollars le baril. Le lundi, Trump a indiqué que ses fonctionnaires et l’Iran avaient tenu des « conversations productives », accordant à l’Iran cinq jours supplémentaires pour ouvrir le détroit. Mais l’Iran a nié toute discussion avec les négociateurs de Trump. Le Brent est retombé quand même à 103 dollars. Le lendemain, Bloomberg rapportait des éléments prouvant l’existence de pourparlers indirects,[16]

Par Bell R.

25 avril 2026

🇫🇷 🇬🇧 “It just seems so insane, based on what he ran on, I mean, this is why a lot of people feel betrayed, right? He ran on no more wars and these stupid senseless wars, and then we have one that we can’t even really clearly define why we did it.” These are the words of top US conservative influencer, Joe Rogan, whose endorsement of Trump helped him to get elected in 2024.[1] Whatever the reason that Trump attacked Iran on February 28, most of the US population clearly doesn’t like it; this is unusual in the US for the start of a war. On 12 March 2026, the Washington Post observed, “recent polls… have found Americans opposing U.S. strikes 50 percent to 38 percent, according to a Post average of 10 polls since the war started.”[2] [Emphasis added] That’s an opposition gap of 12%. One month later, by April 10, 2026, the opposition gap was 15%, according to well-known U.S. poll analyst Nate Silver.[3] Here’s what Trump posted on social media on March 12, nearly two weeks after his surprise attack: “The United States is the largest Oil Producer in the World, by far, so when oil prices go up, we make a lot of money. BUT, of far greater interest and importance to me, as President, is stopping [sic] an evil Empire, Iran, from having Nuclear Weapons, and destroying the Middle East and, indeed, the World. I won’t ever let that happen!”[4] Many suspect Trump is not telling the truth on the nuclear weapons issue, that he is using it simply as a cover for something else. There is real evidence for this suspicion. In a 27 February US TV interview, the Omani Foreign Minister, Badr Albusaidi who had been mediating negotiations between Trump’s representatives and the Iran government, said that “a peace deal is within our reach.” Iran will « never, ever have … nuclear material that will create a bomb. » The existing stockpiles of enriched uranium would be « blended to the lowest level possible » and « converted into fuel…[which] will be irreversible, » he insisted. The U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency would have « full access » to Iranian nuclear sites to verify the deal, he said, concluding, « There would be zero accumulation, zero stockpiling, and full verification. »[5] That was on Friday, February 27. The two sides were scheduled to meet again the following Monday. Trump attacked the next day, Saturday, February 28–in the midst of peace negotiations. On March 17, the sudden resignation of the Trump appointed Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, Joe Kent, seriously reinforced the suspicion. His resignation letter said: “I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.”[6] Although Sen. Mitch McConnell criticized the “virulent anti-Semitism of his resignation letter,” [7] Kent did throw further, very real, doubt on the supposed nuclear bomb urgency. Trump’s attack caused the price of oil in the US (WTI, the benchmark) to go up from roughly $65.75 dollars per barrel on February 27, 2026 to $111 on March 20.[8] It then bounced around based on each Trump remark and/or war attack report. By April 11 it had sagged back to the still massively increased price of $95.[9] Bad news for car owners? Yes. But very good news for the frackers—the oil drillers doing hydraulic fracturing–who had bankrolled Trump’s 2024 election campaign to the tune of $75 million, but felt double-crossed as many had to quit fracking due to an oil price below their costs, averaging $55-58 per barrel.[10] Saudi Arabia, with a break-even cost of no more than $27,[11] had continually pumped more oil, crashing the world oil price. Trump’s War puts his frackers back in the money, reversing who gets crashed. If this is Trump’s strategy, it is quite simple; the US, with Israel, destroys Iran and lets Iran, in self-defense or retaliation, destroy the other regional oil and natural gas producers. This is certainly what is happening. Iran has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20% of the world’s oil and natural gas passes. On March 17 an Iranian drone set ablaze a large UAE gas field, the Shah gas project.[12] Then the next day, Israel attacked Iran’s South Pars gas field—it’s major natural gas operation. A few hours later, state-owned QatarEnergy announced that Iran had retaliated by hitting Qatar’s Ras Laffan Industrial City, causing “extensive damage.” Most of Qatar’s natural gas, 20% of the world supply, is produced there.[13] Trump then threatened to “massively blow up” the rest of South Pars if Iran attacked Qatar again.[14] And Trump kept menacing. On March 21, he issued an ultimatum; he would “hit and obliterate” Iran’s electrical power plants if Iran didn’t stop blocking the Strait of Hormuz by the following Monday night. Iran then threatened that if Trump did follow through, the Gulf states would see their energy infrastructure “irreversibly destroyed” and Iran would close the Strait of Hormuz indefinitely. [15] Brent oil hit $110 per barrel. Then on Monday, Trumps said that his officials and Iran had held “productive conversations” so Iran had another five days to open the Strait of Hormuz. But Iran said that they had not had any discussions with Trump’s negotiators. Brent fell to $103 anyway. The next day, Bloomberg reported evidence of indirect talks,[16] but also of more attacks on Iran and Gulf states’ infrastructure. On April 7, Trump threatened that unless Iran opened the Strait of Hormuz, « a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again.” This was interpreted by many as threatening nuclear annihilation of Iran, and was too much for Pope Leo, who declared, « Today as we all know there was this threat against all the people of Iran. This is truly unacceptable. » Whether a nuclear threat or not, Trump did threaten to blow up the bridges and other civilian infrastructure.[17] On April 11, negotiations, lasting 20

Par Bell R.

25 avril 2026

🇫🇷 🇬🇧 I. BIG OIL AND RENEWABLE ENERGY Big Oil is owned and controlled by big institutional investor funds. In fact, for each of the five oil majors often referred to as “Big Oil” (ExxonMobil, Chevron, TotalEnergies, Shell, BP),  the controlling stock ownership is in no more than 25 of these institutional investors—not always the same funds, but with huge overlap.[1] Most of these funds (and families of funds) declare themselves to be “passive investors,” which means they supposedly don’t actively interfere in the management of the company, and supposedly robotically copy the components of an index they claim to be tracking, such as the S&P 500 (which contains the two US oil majors, ExxonMobil and Chevron, but not the others). S&P stands for Standard & Poor’s, “an American financial intelligence company that [provides] … investable indices, [such as the S&P 500] and credit ratings for companies…”[2] The “500” part of the index refers to the largest 500 US companies, not simply listed in the index, but listed by the total number of outstanding shares multiplied by their current selling price. The jargon for this is their “market capitalization.”[3] The institutional investment funds that “track” this index are set up by banks, such as JP Morgan Chase, or investment companies such as Fidelity, Blackrock, etc. Individuals or pension funds then buy these passive funds with the belief that they are then buying a slice of the entire stock market. The overwhelmingly held popular view, expressed even by major columnists on financial markets, is that the institutional fund managers are almost like stenographers taking down the dictation of the Standard & Poor’s index compilers—the popular view is that they must, based on the funds own prospectus, which is a contractual obligation to their own investors, i.e., the individuals or organizations that buy their fund, replicate their fund with the exact components and in the exact percentages as in the index. This supposedly allows the ordinary investors to buy the whole market “as is,” not as interpreted by a fund manager. So, no matter what the management of one of these 500 companies does that the fund manager thinks is bad for the holders of the fund, the fund manager supposedly can’t sell the stock. This myth simply does not square with reality; the fund managers can and do sometimes sell the shares of the individual companies in the index. The details are described in a meticulously researched, 2024, detailed analysis in the Yale Journal on Regulation, which bills itself as “The Nation’s Top-Ranked Administrative Law and Corporate Law Journal.” According to the article, “Discretionary Investing by ‘Passive’ S&P 500 Funds,” by Peter Molk and Adriana Robertson, “Common language [in the fund’s prospectus] like holding 80 % of assets in S&P 500 companies gives [passive] index funds considerable flexibility in their investment decisions.” [4] This means the tracking fund doesn’t promise, i.e., isn’t legally committed, to replicate 100 % of the S&P 500, only 80 %; they could sell the Big Oil companies (or others) and not be in violation of their contractual commitments. In other words, holders of the fund could not successfully sue the fund for misleading them by selling ExxonMobil or Chevron. On some funds, the managers have even more wiggle room. The same article notes that many funds, including major ones, use sampling to replicate the reference index : “Fidelity’s S&P 500 fund, for instance, states that “the fund may not always hold all of the same securities as the S&P 500® Index’ and that it ‘may use statistical sampling techniques to attempt to replicate the returns of the index”.  This means that the fund managers’ legal, contractual, commitment is not to provide a carbon copy of the index, but to use only some of the stocks in the index to attempt to provide at least as much money, in the form of stock appreciation and dividends, as a total carbon copy of the index might provide. These two types of wiggle room (80 % and sampling) are precisely how the various funds from the rival institutions compete with each other by offering rival S&P 500 funds. How much do the holdings vary from the index? According to the article, “…even among the largest S&P 500 funds, holdings differed from the index by a total of between 1.7 % and 7.5 % in the fourth quarter of 2022.” ExxonMobil, weighted by market capitalization on the S&P 500 index constitutes 0.87 % of the index. Chevron constitutes 0.53 %.[5] Together they make up 1.4 % of the index.  With these percentages, a fund manager could certainly reduce its holdings in ExxonMobil and Chevron, even sell all of their holdings in them, and still meet the proclaimed requirement of the fund. So, passive or not, the fund manager’s control still remains the implicit ability to sell the stock. They don’t sell if the company serves their purpose—to provide an adequate dividend return and maintain the stock price. The funds will keep holding the stock if they simply get their share of the “free cash flow,” defined by a common source, Investopedia, as “The cash a company generates after accounting for cash outflows to support operations and maintain its capital assets.”[6] The extra money then goes into dividends, special dividends, and stock buybacks. From Big Oil, when the companies overwhelmingly stay in oil, the funds get their money. Here’s an analysis of ExxonMobil from a common source, Investing.com : “… the 3.3 %+ dividend plus buybacks north of $20B per year create an embedded return floor… [ExxonMobil] at current levels and with current data, deserves a clear, data-backed rating : it is a BUY rather than a Hold or a Sell.”[7] This analysis illustrates why Big Oil won’t go into renewable energy in a big way; the controlling funds simply want all of their proportion of the available, extra cash. So, of course, do the hundreds of thousands of small investors, and the smaller institutional investor funds. But if some of the

Par Bell R.

14 mars 2026