🏴☠️ 🇺🇸 🇮🇷 The Strait of Hormuz Crisis: Week 8 Recap: Competing Blockades and Piracy Surge
April 27, 2026
In this episode of What's Going on With Shipping?, Sal Mercogliano dives into the eighth week of the intensifying maritime conflict between the United States and Iran. As both sides enforce competing blockades across the Strait of Hormuz, the Gulf of Oman, and the Arabian Sea, the "choke points" are truly being choked, with significant implications for global trade and oil prices.
00:00 – Intro: Staged Takeover Analysis
01:25 – JMIC Update: Somali Piracy Surge
01:58 – "PEG LEG" & The Pirate Action Groups
03:05 – Regional Threat Overview: The Mine Question
05:41 – The "Umpire's" Data Check: Cargo vs. Tankers
07:22 – The "Donut Hole" & Global Impact
16:04 – Stateless Vessels & Article 110
27:50 – Soapbox: Why No LCS Surge?
33:18 – Economic Fury: Sanctions & Global Trade Shifts
📎 What's Going on With Shipping
IN 2006, RESEARCHER CLEVE BACKSTER — THE MAN WHO INVENTED THE CIA'S LIE DETECTOR PROTOCOLS — PUBLISHED 36 YEARS OF EXPERIMENTS PROVING THAT PLANTS, BACTERIA, AND HUMAN CELLS IN PETRI DISHES RESPOND INSTANTANEOUSLY TO HUMAN THOUGHT AND EMOTION — EVEN AT DISTANCES OF HUNDREDS OF MILES. THE SIGNAL IS FASTER THAN LIGHT. IT DOES NOT DIMINISH WITH DISTANCE. IT IS NOT ELECTROMAGNETIC.
In 1966, Cleve Backster was the world's foremost expert on polygraph technology. He had developed the interrogation techniques used by the CIA, FBI, and U.S. military. He understood galvanic skin response — the electrical conductance of biological tissue — better than anyone alive.
One morning, on a whim, he attached polygraph electrodes to a Dracaena plant in his office. He watered it and watched the tracing. Then he thought: "I wonder what would happen if I threatened this plant." He decided to burn a leaf with a match.
The instant he formed the intention — before he moved, before he lit the match, before any ...
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