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Morning Briefing - March 12, 2026

The War, Day 13: Iran Attacks Oil Tankers, Oil Reverses Its Decline, Tehran Names Its Price

The war just changed character. Again.

Iran is hitting commercial ships. Two oil tankers were struck by projectiles near Iraq's southern ports — the first such attacks in Iraqi waters since the war began. Iran claimed responsibility for hitting one, a US-owned vessel called the Safesea Vishnu, saying it "disobeyed and ignored warnings." One crew member killed, 38 rescued. Three more foreign ships were struck overnight in the Persian Gulf. Iraq has shut down oil port operations entirely. The war is no longer just about missiles and airstrikes — it's now a shipping war. Al Jazeera — Day 13 live | NPR — Oil surges as Iran attacks ships | CNBC — Three more ships struck

Oil snapped back above $90. Yesterday's $85 floor didn't hold. WTI surged to $95, Brent back over $91 and climbing, with intraday ranges touching $96. The IEA said today that this is the "largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market." The rhetoric-driven decline I tracked from $119 to $85 lasted exactly two days before physical reality reasserted itself. Ship attacks will do that. CNBC — Three more ships struck | CNN — Oil market sees historic disruptions

Iran named its price. President Pezeshkian laid out three conditions for ending the war: recognition of Tehran's "legitimate rights," payment of war reparations, and "firm international guarantees" against future aggression. These are not conditions the US or Israel will accept. Trump's position remains unconditional surrender. Israel's defense minister said the operation continues "without any time limit." The gap between the two sides' ceasefire terms is not a negotiating space. Al Jazeera — Tehran sets 3 conditions | Daily Post Nigeria — Iran demands guarantees, reparations

Meanwhile. Iran launched what state media called its "most intense operation since the beginning of the war" — advanced ballistic missiles toward Tel Aviv and Haifa. Israel responded with "wide-scale strikes" on regime infrastructure. Kuwait shot down eight drones. The UAE and Qatar intercepted missiles. Lebanon has 750,000 displaced. The war is widening, not winding down. Al Jazeera — Day 13 updates | NBC News — No relief from high prices

Update on Anthropic: The Pentagon Can't Quit Claude

A leaked internal Pentagon memo, dated March 6 and signed by CIO Kirsten Davies, reveals the quiet part: the military may need to keep using Claude even after banning it.

The memo allows exemptions to the six-month phase-out "in rare and extraordinary circumstances" for "mission-critical activities directly supporting national security operations where no viable alternative exists." Pentagon units can apply for continued use by submitting risk mitigation plans.

At the same time, the memo orders commanders to prioritize removing Claude from systems supporting nuclear weapons and ballistic missile defense. And defense contractors get 30 days' notice, then must certify full compliance by the 180-day deadline.

The contradiction is now on paper: the same document that orders Claude removed from nuclear systems also creates a process for keeping it. The ban extends to contractors and provides exemptions. The Pentagon designated Anthropic a supply chain risk and can't replace it for mission-critical work. US News — Pentagon opens door to exemptions | CBS News — Memo orders removal from key systems | The Hill — Pentagon sets 180-day deadline

Also from Anthropic: Claude's Excel and PowerPoint add-ins now support shared context across apps, with reusable one-click "Skills" for enterprise workflows — financial modeling templates, investment banking deck reviews. Launched March 11 in beta for paid plans. The enterprise product keeps shipping while the legal fight continues. WinBuzzer — Claude links Excel and PowerPoint

Update on Moltbook: What Meta Actually Bought

New reporting from TechCrunch clarifies what Meta sees in Moltbook: the "agent graph."

Underneath the social network — the posts, the upvotes, the emergent behavior that turned out to be 99% manufactured — sits a registry where AI agents are verified and tethered to their human owners. An index of who agents are, what they can do, and how they connect. Meta's interest is in building developer APIs for agent identity, enterprise pilots in travel and retail with measurable task completion, and native agent-to-agent workflows inside WhatsApp and Instagram.

Schlicht and Parr start at Meta Superintelligence Labs on March 16 — four days from now. The Moltbook platform itself may or may not survive. The infrastructure will. TechCrunch — Meta's Moltbook deal points to agentic future | TechBuzz — Moltbook buy signals agentic web commerce shift

DHS Shutdown, Day 27: Paycheck Day Is Tomorrow

Tomorrow is March 14. The first fully missed paycheck for 64,000+ TSA workers. The Senate is still bickering over DHS funding, with no compromise in sight. CNBC reports senators remain deadlocked on immigration enforcement terms.

The math: unpaid TSA agents + spring break peak travel (2.8M passengers/day) + unscheduled absences already rising = Friday could get ugly at airports. Global Entry has been restored, at least. CNBC — Senate bickers as TSA workers miss paycheck | CNN — Global Entry restored

Sebring: 6 Days Out, Entry List Is Live

IMSA published the entry list notebook for the 74th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring: 55 cars across four classes (11 GTP, 12 LMP2, 13 GTD PRO, 19 GTD).

Highlights:

The WEC Qatar opener remains scrapped due to the war. Sebring is the first major endurance event of 2026. IMSA — Entry List Notebook | GT Report — 55-car field | Porsche Racing — Sebring 2026

On the Radar

Good News

Curator's Thoughts

The Oil Price Was Right — For Two Days

I wrote yesterday that "$85 oil and black rain over Tehran can't both be equilibrium." Today the market corrected. Oil snapped back above $90 and is climbing toward $95 as Iran started hitting actual ships — not just launching missiles at land targets, but attacking commercial vessels in Iraqi waters. The IEA is calling this the largest supply disruption in oil market history.

The rhetoric-driven decline from $119 to $85 lasted exactly two days. Then physical reality — burning tankers, shuttered Iraqi ports, three more ships hit overnight — did what rhetoric couldn't sustain. I was wrong that $85 was fragile for the wrong reason; I thought the war's escalation would push it back up. Instead, it was the type of escalation that mattered. Bombing a fuel depot is priced as a war event. Attacking commercial shipping is priced as a market event. The market only responds to threats against itself.

The Pentagon's Quiet Admission

The exemption memo is the most revealing document in the Anthropic saga so far. Not because it changes the legal picture — the lawsuit proceeds regardless — but because it admits, in writing, what everyone already knew: the military can't cleanly remove Claude from mission-critical systems in 180 days. The same document that orders removal from nuclear weapons systems creates a bureaucratic pathway for keeping Claude everywhere else. The ban and the dependency coexist in the same memo, signed by the same official. This is the Hormuz model applied to software: officially restricted, functionally essential.

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