Latest / The President's Daily Brief / September 30th, 2026: Iran’s Hormuz Strategy Is Starting to Break & Russia’s Drone Problem Grows

Transcript

September 30th, 2026: Iran’s Hormuz Strategy Is Starting to Break & Russia’s Drone Problem Grows · The President's Daily Brief

0:13
It's Wednesday,
0:14
the 30th of September.
0:15
Would you look at that,
0:16
the last day of the month.
0:18
This entire year is flying by.
0:20
Um,
0:21
I guess that's what happens
0:22
when the year is chock full of conflicts and crises and kerfuffles.
0:27
Welcome to the President's Daily Brief.
0:29
I'm Mike Baker.
0:30
Your eyes and ears on the world stage
0:32
and,
0:33
uh,
0:33
currently in London,
0:35
where I have it on good authority actually that the King
0:38
is a frequent listener of the PDB.
0:40
Huzzah.
0:41
All right,
0:42
let's get briefed.
0:43
First up,
0:43
Tehran's strategy of using Hormuz as economic leverage
0:48
is starting to falter as Gulf producers find ways around the pressure.
0:52
I'll have the details
0:53
later in the show.
0:54
The Kremlin is pushing Russian companies
0:57
to pay for their own
0:58
drone defenses.
0:59
That's right,
1:00
as Ukrainian strikes increasingly threaten industrial sites deep inside Russia.
1:06
And in a classic communist move,
1:07
if a company there chooses not to pay to protect their property,
1:11
well,
1:11
the state can seize that property
1:14
because,
1:14
uh,
1:15
well,
1:16
yay,
1:16
Stalin,
1:17
plus America's military cyber forces are being brought into the fight
1:21
to protect November's midterm elections from
1:24
foreign hackers and influence operations.
1:27
And in today's back of the brief,
1:28
Seoul says North Korean mines were behind an explosion that
1:32
wounded two South Korean personnel inside the DMZ just last week,
1:36
raising fresh tensions along the border.
1:39
But first,
1:40
today's PDB spotlight.
1:42
For months,
1:43
Iran has worked to turn the Strait of Hormuz into one
1:46
of its most powerful weapons in the conflict with the US,
1:50
basically
1:50
disrupt the flow of oil,
1:52
drive up costs for regional producers and the global economy.
1:56
And use that pressure to extract concessions from Washington,
1:59
and that leverage has worked for them over the past few months,
2:03
but that situation has been changing recently.
2:06
Middle Eastern crude exports rebounded sharply in September,
2:10
reaching their highest level since the war began in February.
2:14
According to data from Kepler cited by Reuters.
2:16
Regional exports climbed to more than 16 million barrels a day this month,
2:21
with nearly
2:21
10 million barrels a day moving through the Strait of Hormuz.
2:25
Saudi exports have more than doubled from August levels,
2:28
and 19 of the largest class of crude tankers
2:31
passed through the Strait just last week.
2:34
In other words,
2:35
Iran has not lost the ability to threaten the Strait of Hormuz,
2:39
but its effort to choke off the waterway is becoming less effective.
2:43
Saudi Arabia and other Gulf producers have spent months adapting.
2:47
Tankers are moving under tighter security.
2:49
Producers are using ship to ship transfers and alternate routes.
2:53
Saudi Arabia has
2:54
restarted its east-west pipeline,
2:56
allowing crude to
2:57
Move across the kingdom and out through the Red Sea.
3:00
The UAE
3:01
has its own pipeline reaching Fujaira on the Gulf of Oman,
3:05
bypassing the Strait of Hormuz entirely.
3:08
These alternatives are expensive,
3:10
imperfect,
3:10
and still vulnerable to attack,
3:13
but they're working well enough to get substantially more oil out of the region.
3:18
And Iran has a much bigger problem.
3:20
Tehran does not have anything comparable to Saudi Arabia's
3:23
Red Sea route or the UAE's bypass pipeline.
3:27
Since the US reinstated its maritime blockade in July,
3:30
Iran has been unable to move newly loaded crude
3:34
through the Strait of Hormuz in meaningful quantities.
3:36
Its oil is effectively trapped behind the blockade,
3:40
and the oil that Iran had prepositioned beyond the reach of the blockade
3:45
has largely been sold.
3:47
According to the Wall Street Journal,
3:49
Iran had roughly 29 million barrels of crude
3:52
aboard vessels outside the blockade earlier this month.
3:55
That's now fallen to around 15 million barrels.
3:59
Kepler estimates those remaining stocks could be depleted by early to mid-October
4:04
if sales continue at the current pace.
4:06
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessett went further over the weekend
4:10
predicting Iran could make its final major deliveries to China
4:14
within roughly 2 weeks.
4:15
That is the administration's assessment.
4:18
Iran has rejected claims that
4:20
Washington has broken its control of the Strait of Hormuz.
4:24
Iran tried to make the Strait a problem for everyone else.
4:27
Increasingly,
4:28
the Strait is becoming a bigger problem for Iran.
4:31
And that has implications for the negotiations that we've been following,
4:35
well,
4:35
such as they are.
4:36
Control of the waterway was supposed to give Tehran leverage.
4:40
Iran could restrict the flow of Gulf oil and
4:42
offer to reopen the waterway
4:44
in exchange for an end to the American blockade,
4:47
sanctions relief,
4:49
unfrozen assets,
4:50
and other concessions.
4:52
The oil market is beginning to reflect the increased traffic through the strait.
4:56
Crude prices moved lower Tuesday as traders
4:59
focused on the rebound in Middle Eastern exports
5:02
and the reopening of Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline,
5:05
although prices do remain elevated
5:07
and the threat to regional infrastructure is still significant.
5:11
Tehran of course says Washington is exaggerating its success.
5:15
The Revolutionary Guard Corps,
5:16
the IRGC,
5:18
argued Tuesday that increased shipping doesn't
5:20
mean that the US controls the strait
5:23
and insisted that Iran still retains substantial leverage there.
5:27
And Iran still has plenty of ways to cause trouble.
5:30
It can attack ships.
5:32
It can target ports,
5:33
pipelines,
5:34
refineries,
5:35
and through the Houthis and other aligned groups,
5:37
the regime can push the fight beyond Hormuz and into the Red Sea.
5:42
That may be the biggest danger now
5:44
because weakening Iran's leverage doesn't automatically make
5:48
Tehran more willing to compromise.
5:50
It could create pressure
5:51
for Iran or whomever is in charge there.
5:54
To prove that it can still disrupt the region,
5:57
especially if its own oil revenues keep shrinking
6:00
while its neighbors get more of their crude to market.
6:03
Coming up next,
6:04
the Kremlin
6:05
tells Russian companies to pay for their own drone defenses
6:09
while US military cyber forces prepare to
6:12
protect the midterm elections from foreign interference.
6:15
I'll be right back.
6:17
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Welcome back to the PDB
7:25
Inside Russia.
7:26
Businesses are scrambling to protect their facilities as
7:29
Ukrainian drones reach beyond the front lines,
7:32
and the Kremlin has a message for business owners
7:35
Pay for defenses or risk losing your property to the state.
7:39
Well,
7:39
how very,
7:40
how very communist of them.
7:42
It's Russian President Putin's latest wartime shakedown,
7:45
with companies left guessing what exactly counts as quote doing enough.
7:49
Putin signed a decree late last month
7:52
allowing his regime to impose what it calls quote temporary management,
7:56
that sounds good,
7:58
at critical infrastructure sites that fail
7:59
to protect themselves against drone attacks.
8:02
According to the Financial Times,
8:04
Kiev's drone campaign has destroyed as much as 20% of Russia's refining capacity
8:10
and set dozens of commercial warehouses on fire.
8:13
Protecting infrastructure spread across the world's largest country is,
8:16
of course,
8:17
an enormous challenge,
8:18
but Russia's intelligence services and military
8:21
want businesses to shoulder more of that responsibility.
8:25
That's according to a former
8:26
Kremlin official who spoke with the Financial Times.
8:29
The official said,
8:30
quote,
8:31
They complained that businesses were sitting on their hands
8:33
and don't want to lift a finger,
8:35
and Putin agreed,
8:36
end quote.
8:38
That complaint followed a long running argument over who should pay.
8:42
Now throughout the war,
8:43
businesses have sought in government help
8:45
with even Alexander Shulkin,
8:47
the head of Russia's Kremlin loyal business lobby.
8:50
Repeatedly urging the state to help finance those defenses.
8:54
Now
8:55
the takeover threat appears to be getting their attention.
8:58
One drone defense expert says business inquiries
9:01
increased fivefold almost overnight after the decree.
9:04
Putin himself sounded satisfied earlier this month,
9:07
saying,
9:07
quote,
9:07
Companies have got involved
9:09
and started putting money in,
9:11
end quote.
9:12
But spending the money is only part of the problem.
9:15
Before a company can satisfy the Kremlin,
9:17
it needs to know what the Kremlin actually requires.
9:20
Which facilities need protection?
9:22
What defenses must they install?
9:24
How does an owner know when enough has been done?
9:27
Those are basic questions,
9:28
but the rules
9:29
still don't clearly answer them.
9:31
In one industry alone,
9:33
officials discussed prioritizing 24,000 critical sites out of
9:37
roughly 700,000
9:39
while keeping the list secret.
9:41
And the answers some companies have received aren't particularly reassuring.
9:45
Shopping mall operators seeking clarification were told they could
9:49
decide for themselves,
9:51
according to a person familiar with the situation who
9:53
spoke with the Financial Times.
9:55
And companies ready to install defenses face another obstacle.
9:59
Destroying or jamming a drone
10:01
generally requires permits from Russia's security services,
10:04
and most companies don't have.
10:06
Those permissions are largely held
10:08
by a handful of major energy and financial firms,
10:11
and bringing in reservists,
10:13
well,
10:13
that doesn't necessarily get a company around those restrictions either.
10:17
A former executive at state-backed oil giant Rosneft
10:20
told the FT that reservists are not allowed
10:23
to carry weapons while protecting the facilities.
10:25
Companies therefore
10:27
need separate arrangements with Russia's military.
10:30
Then there's the price tag.
10:32
A businessman in a Russian region bordering Ukraine
10:35
told the Financial Times he had spent nearly $18 million on air defenses.
10:40
As the former Rosneft executive put it,
10:42
this has become
10:43
yet another tax.
10:45
But the concern goes beyond how much companies will have to pay.
10:48
Business figures worry that the decree could
10:50
give the Kremlin another route to nationalization
10:53
under the cover of national security.
10:56
Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine,
10:58
the state has increasingly seized businesses and assets,
11:02
including property
11:03
formerly owned by Western companies.
11:05
Putin insists that seizing property and facilities
11:08
isn't his intention,
11:09
saying he quote
11:11
never even considered taking anything away.
11:14
Well,
11:14
if he says so,
11:15
I'm sure it must be true.
11:16
Shifting to the US now,
11:18
with early voting already underway in some states,
11:20
Secretary of War or Defense Pete Egseth is calling on America's military,
11:25
cyber and intelligence agencies
11:27
to help keep foreign adversaries out of the midterm elections.
11:31
Under his directive,
11:33
US Cyber Command,
11:34
the National Security Agency,
11:35
and other military agencies
11:37
will prioritize their capabilities
11:39
to identify,
11:40
disrupt,
11:41
and neutralize foreign interference.
11:43
Hegseth laid out that mission in a memo dated the 22nd of September
11:48
and publicly announced on Monday this week.
11:51
He directed defense intelligence officials to mobilize every resource
11:55
to defend our election infrastructure
11:57
from foreign malign influence
11:59
and ensure that every lawful voter can
12:01
cast their ballot free from foreign intimidation,
12:04
coercion,
12:05
or fear,
12:06
end quote.
12:07
So you say to yourself,
12:08
what will that actually look like?
12:10
Well,
12:10
Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell
12:12
gave us some good insight through an interview with the Associated Press.
12:16
He says military cyber intelligence teams
12:19
will work
12:19
in lockstep with federal,
12:21
state,
12:21
and local partners
12:22
to defend voting systems and expose foreign influence.
12:26
Um,
12:27
OK,
12:27
to be fair,
12:28
that was not particularly good insight,
12:30
but you know it's better than nothing.
12:31
The military's assignment is reportedly to
12:33
bring its intelligence and cyber capabilities
12:36
to bear against threats from abroad.
12:38
Military cybersecurity experts have routinely
12:41
helped monitor election systems and
12:43
deter hackers
12:44
since election equipment was designated critical infrastructure back in 2017.
12:49
General Joshua Rudd,
12:51
who leads both Cyber Command and the NSA,
12:53
Says the two organizations are closely partnered and
12:56
regularly counter actions by malicious foreign cyber actors,
13:00
including those intent on
13:02
interfering with America's democratic process.
13:05
What the directive does is put renewed emphasis and
13:07
high-level backing behind that national security mission
13:11
at a time when foreign threats to election systems are growing more sophisticated.
13:15
But the announcement also comes after significant changes to the civilian agency
13:19
that has traditionally helped election officials defend those systems.
13:23
Longtime PDB listeners
13:24
will remember that we've covered
13:26
here on the PDB how the Trump administration reduced staffing and resources
13:30
at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency,
13:34
and you ask yourself,
13:35
is there an acronym for that?
13:36
And you better believe there is.
13:38
It's better known as
13:39
CISA,
13:39
CISA.
13:41
The agency sits inside the Department of Homeland Security
13:43
and has served as a key federal partner for state and local election officials.
13:48
Now,
13:48
so CISA is still involved.
13:51
Last week it released an election infrastructure security plan
13:54
outlining potential threats and the services that it
13:57
will continue offering officials ahead of November.
14:00
With election day on November 3rd,
14:02
just weeks away,
14:03
some Democrats are questioning the timing of both announcements.
14:06
Really,
14:07
Democrats questioning what Republicans do,
14:09
suggesting the short timeline
14:11
makes the effort look more like political theater
14:13
than a genuine push to protect elections.
14:16
Others argue that the administration would not have needed to scramble
14:20
if it hadn't dismantled the
14:21
federal government's election cyber security capacity
14:25
and dismissed its experts earlier in 2025,
14:28
but from a national security standpoint,
14:30
having the full weight of the military's cyber and intelligence apparatus
14:34
focused on protecting the election,
14:36
well,
14:36
that is significant.
14:38
And in today's back of the brief,
14:40
South Korea
14:41
says last week's explosion at the DMZ was
14:44
caused by North Korean landmines reopening an old and
14:48
dangerous source of tension on the peninsula.
14:51
More on that
14:52
when we come back.
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In today's back of the brief,
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South Korea says it now knows what caused last week's explosion inside the DMZ,
17:14
that would be North Korean landmines.
17:16
The blast happened on the 21st of September in the western section of the DMZ,
17:21
where South Korean troops were operating near the military demarcation line
17:24
that separates the two Koreas.
17:26
At the time,
17:27
it wasn't immediately clear whether the explosion
17:30
involved old mines already in the area.
17:33
Mines that had shifted over time or something more recent.
17:36
Now Seoul says it has an answer.
17:39
South Korea's defense minister says a
17:41
joint investigation with the United Nations command
17:43
found an additional North Korean anti-personnel mine near the blast site.
17:48
Investigators also concluded
17:49
the mines did not drift into the area,
17:52
and they were located clearly south of the military demarcation line.
17:56
In other words,
17:57
Seoul says North Korean mines ended up on the South Korean side of the line.
18:02
South Korean officials believe they were likely placed
18:04
during North Korea's recent effort
18:06
to reinforce and fortify the border.
18:09
Pyongyang has spent months building barriers,
18:12
laying mines,
18:12
and hardening positions
18:14
along parts of the frontier as relations between the two Koreas
18:18
have deteriorated.
18:19
The biggest unanswered question of course is intent.
18:23
South Korean Defense Minister
18:24
Kang Shin-jul says investigators still want to determine
18:28
whether North Korea knowingly placed the mines in an area
18:31
where South Korean troops could enter and be injured.
18:34
North Korea has not publicly commented on the incident,
18:38
but Seoul says responsibility rests with Pyongyang
18:41
and argues the placement of those mines
18:43
violated the armistice agreement
18:45
that halted fighting in the Korean War back in 1953.
18:50
Kang says South Korea has response options available
18:53
and plans to implement them in stages,
18:55
although he
18:55
declined to say exactly what those measures might be.
18:59
At the same time,
19:00
Seoul
19:00
says it wants North Korea to come to the
19:02
table so both sides can examine what happened.
19:05
Well,
19:05
that creates a difficult balancing act for South Korean President Lee Jae-yong,
19:09
who has been trying to reopen some form of dialogue with Pyongyang
19:14
even as North Korea increasingly treats the South as an enemy state.
19:18
A similar incident in 2015 left South Korean soldiers badly
19:21
wounded after North Korean mines exploded inside the DMZ.
19:26
Seoul responded by restarting loudspeaker broadcasts across the border.
19:30
Pyongyang threatened military action,
19:32
and the two sides quickly slid into a tense standoff before senior officials
19:37
eventually reached an agreement.
19:40
And that my friends,
19:41
is the president's Daily Brief
19:43
for Wednesday,
19:43
the 30th of September.
19:45
If you have any questions or comments,
19:46
please reach out to me at PDB@thefirstv.com.
19:50
And if you think that an ad-free PDB experience sounds like the cat's pajamas
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or whatever the kids say.
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Nowadays just become a premium member of the President's Daily Brief
20:00
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It's really that simple.
20:04
I'm Mike Baker and I'll be back later today with the PDB
20:07
afternoon bulletin.
20:08
Until then,
20:09
stay informed,
20:10
stay safe,
20:11
stay cool.