The Trump administration is waging an unprecedented campaign to isolate Iran economically, combining a naval blockade with sweeping sanctions as top officials say the pressure will continue until Tehran changes course — or its government does.
“We are running Operation Economic Outcast right now, and this is the greatest economic isolation operation in the history of the world,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Saturday. “We are going to asphyxiate this regime.”
Bessent said the blockade and sanctions are designed to cut Tehran off from the oil revenues and financial networks that have sustained the regime, describing them as “one of the most powerful one-two punches in the history of economic isolation.”
The remaining Iranian crude available to China, Tehran’s largest customer, is also running out, according to Bessent. He estimated that roughly 30 million barrels remain that Beijing has not already purchased, with the blockade preventing Iran from replenishing that supply through new exports.
“So that will run out soon, and there will be no problem with China buying because they have no product,” Bessent said. “The blockade is working. It’s working like nothing we’ve ever seen.”
Energy Secretary Chris Wright made the administration’s intended outcome explicit Sunday, saying the United States is using its military and economic power not merely to reduce Iranian exports, but to force a fundamental change in Tehran.
“The biggest role of our military in the region right now is to stop the export of any Iranian crude or crude-related products, natural gas, whatever,” Wright told CBS News.
“We are strangling their economy to try to bring either a change in policy from the existing regime or a new regime,” he continued. “Their current strategy is slowly failing for them.”
Wright repeated the message across several Sunday programs, saying on Fox News that “either the regime is going to change or this regime is going to change its policy.”
“One of those two things is going to happen,” he said.
The remarks follow weeks in which President Donald Trump has increasingly linked the pressure on Tehran to the future of the regime itself, including urging Iranians to “rise up and fight” as he argued their government may not be able to withstand the mounting pressure much longer.
That pressure is becoming increasingly difficult for Tehran itself to conceal. Three senior Iranian sources acknowledged to Reuters that the blockade and sanctions are sharply restricting the regime’s access to foreign currency, imports, and international financing, with shortages of critical goods including fuel and wheat becoming a growing concern.
Iranian leaders fear worsening economic conditions could reignite domestic unrest as prices surge, trade weakens and household incomes fall. The rial has lost more than 60 percent of its value since March, inflation has climbed above 80 percent, and the International Monetary Fund projects Iran’s economy will contract 6.1 percent this year.
Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf acknowledged Sunday that the struggle now extends to production and the livelihoods of ordinary Iranians, while Iran’s Economy Ministry has established an “Economic War Headquarters” to confront disruptions to businesses, trade and financing.
Trump underscored the economic deterioration Sunday afternoon with a barrage of Truth Social posts highlighting Iran’s collapsing currency, hyperinflation, and plunging oil exports. He also posted a graphic showing Hormuz oil flows reaching 18 million barrels in a day, compared with roughly 20 million before the war.
Commercial tracking services have challenged the administration’s Hormuz figures, with TankerTrackers.com reportedly dismissing them as “math magic.” Wright flatly rejected the criticism Sunday, saying the government knows every vessel and cargo moving in U.S.-guided convoys.
“We’re not guessing. We’re not doing any crazy math,” Wright told Fox News Sunday.
Wright said just under 18 million barrels of crude moved through the southern Hormuz route during one 24-hour period last week, while the running average now exceeds nine million barrels per day. Another four million to five million barrels are moving through pipelines that bypass the strait.
“These are just the facts. These are the numbers. They’re not an opinion,” he said.
As Washington pushes more non-Iranian oil through Hormuz, American forces are simultaneously preventing Iranian crude from getting out. U.S. Central Command said Sunday that U.S. forces enforcing the maritime blockade have now redirected 92 commercial vessels, disabled three and boarded two to ensure compliance.
The updated figures came one day after Iran fired ballistic missiles toward two U.S. Navy warships, prompting American forces to strike three Iranian crude carriers. Two were permanently disabled, and a third was destroyed.
“Let the message to the IRGC be clear: If you shoot at two of our ships, we will impose an even higher economic cost — taking out three of yours,” CENTCOM Commander Adm. Brad Cooper said. “We will not hesitate to defend American forces, and if necessary, destroy Iran’s limited and exposed oil fleet.”
Iran then claimed Sunday that it had struck an unmanned American military vessel in the Strait of Hormuz, an account CENTCOM spokesman Capt. Tim Hawkins dismissed as a “total lie.”
Ghalibaf threatened that future Iranian attacks would be “faster, heavier and more painful,” declaring that the era of “proportionate responses” was over.
Tehran is meanwhile continuing its effort to assert authority over Hormuz. Iranian security chief Mohsen Rezaei said Sunday that Iran and Oman had agreed on maps governing ship passage that would be signed in the coming days, while announcing plans for a new Iranian restricted zone extending into the Gulf. The claims come amid months of negotiations over competing proposals for managing passage through the waterway.
The United States has meanwhile spent months eliminating one of Iran’s principal threats to commercial traffic through the strait.
The Financial Times reported Sunday that Navy SEAL divers, unmanned boats and specialized underwater craft carried out a four-month operation to clear Iranian mines, often working underwater and at night in the shipping lanes.
The report provides new details behind CENTCOM’s announcement last month that Iranian mines had been cleared from international shipping routes, bolstering Trump’s repeated declarations that the United States now controls the Strait of Hormuz.
Wright said other countries could eventually join the effort, but predicted the balance would continue moving against Tehran as long as it refuses to change course.
“Until Iran changes their position or changes their government, we’ll have to deal with them,” he told CNN. “But, slowly, their capabilities are being degraded, and ours are being enhanced.”
Nor is Washington counting on the pressure necessarily producing a negotiated nuclear agreement.
“There may not be a nuclear agreement. It may be simply destroying their capabilities to do it,” Wright told ABC News, suggesting an agreement could instead await a future Iranian government.
Wright later stressed that the administration remains open to negotiations, saying Trump prefers a negotiated settlement to military action unless absolutely necessary. But he made clear that preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon does not depend on Tehran agreeing to a deal.
“You have to destroy their capabilities to do it,” Wright said. “This is not trivial. But the United States will get the job done.”
Trump punctuated the message Sunday with another Truth Social post aimed at the heart of Iran’s oil industry, sharing an image depicting an attack on Kharg Island with the words: “Bye bye, Kharg.”
The post came one day after U.S. forces disabled an Iranian crude carrier off the coast of Kharg Island, Iran’s principal oil export hub and a target Trump has repeatedly threatened during the conflict.
Joshua Klein is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jklein@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter @JoshuaKlein.