The term "World War E" was coined by Matt Bracken to describe the global war over energy that connects Ukraine, the Middle East, and beyond (he mentioned the term in our recent interview). I believe this captures the true nature of today's conflict. We are not witnessing random violence; we are watching a coordinated assault on the world's energy chokepoints.

The Houthi blockade of Saudi exports, the systematic targeting of oil infrastructure, and the Iranian response close the Strait of Hormuz are not accidents -- they are deliberate moves in an engineered energy war.

Consider what happened in July 2026. Iran ordered the Houthis to stand ready to close the Red Sea oil route if the United States struck Iranian power infrastructure [1]. The Houthis then declared a maritime embargo against Saudi Arabia, effectively shutting the Bab el-Mandeb Strait to Saudi vessels [2]. As I warned in my article "The Paper Tiger Exposed," the U.S. military's power is a shattered mirage, and these moves expose our inability to protect global energy flows [3].

Energy Scarcity and Famine Are Two Sides of the Same Coin

Here's why this matters: the engineered famine that war correspondent Michael Yon has described is inseparable from the energy war. Without affordable fuel, fertilizer production collapses, and food systems fail. In my interview with Michael Yon, he detailed how the destruction of desalination plants in the Gulf would be a death sentence for millions [4]. That is exactly what the globalist planners appear to want.

I have run the numbers. As I wrote in "Trump's War on Iran Is a War on Global Food Security," closing the Strait of Hormuz for many more months will starve millions [5]. The math is brutal: 20% of the world's oil passes through that chokepoint, about 10% of total global fertilizer production comes out of the Persian Gulf. Dmitry Orlov's "The Five Stages of Collapse" describes how financial collapse leads to commercial collapse, then political collapse, then social collapse, and finally cultural collapse [6]. We are watching stages one and two unfold simultaneously. The propaganda machine will blame climate change or bad luck, but the truth is that this scarcity is engineered to accelerate the final collapse through depopulation and economic chaos.

The Propaganda Machine Keeps Westerners Blind to the Coming Crash

Most people still believe the official narrative of American strength, but the reality is that U.S. bases are being pushed out of the Persian Gulf, and our military cannot protect its allies. Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has plummeted to only 10 to 30 commercial vessels per day (on a GOOD day!), a tiny fraction of normal [7]. Yet the mainstream media yawns. The brainwashing is so thorough that even as the tsunami approaches, few will recognize the event until the shelves are empty and the cities burn.

I have documented the U.S. military's shattered mirage of power in my article "The Paper Tiger Exposed" [3]. Our aircraft carriers are vulnerable, our missile defenses are porous, and our strategic reserves are being drained. The Strategic Petroleum Reserve has fallen to a 43-year low as the Trump administration draws down nearly 96 million barrels since mid-March [8]. Jim Rickards, in "Sold Out," explains how the financial system is a house of cards, with hidden derivatives and liquidity traps waiting to snap [9]. The loss of abundant, affordable energy could readily accelerate that trap being sprung.