US President Donald Trump says the ceasefire agreement with Iran is “over”, blasting the country’s leadership as “scum” and “cuckoo” after fresh exchanges of fire.

Speaking ahead of a Nato summit in Turkey, the president said US negotiators could continue talks “if they want” but said he saw it as “a waste of time”.

Oil prices jumped after Trump’s comments, although are still well below the highs seen during the full closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

Tuesday night into Wednesday saw the worst trading of strikes between the US and Iran since they signed an interim deal in June that called for an end to the conflict and safe passage of vessels through the strait.

“I think it’s over. I don’t want to deal with them anymore they’re scum … they’re led by sick people and they’re vicious, violent people,” Trump said.

“We make a deal. They [Iran] go outside, talk to the press, they say ‘we never even talked about it’. There’s something wrong with them. They’re cuckoo. As far as I’m concerned, it’s over.”

US Central Command (Centcom) said on Tuesday it had launched “powerful” strikes in response to attacks on three tankers in the Strait of Hormuz.

On Wednesday, Iran said it targeted US military sites in Bahrain and Kuwait in retaliation to the US strikes.

The US also said it had revoked its temporary suspension of sanctions on Iranian oil sales.

Iran’s parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf accused the US of breaching their Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on this issue, and others, including the attacks in southern Iran and “violating Iranian adjustments in the Strait”.

“The era of bullying and extortion is over. It leads nowhere. We don’t fold,” he said.

Nato chief Mark Rutte described the American strikes as “absolutely necessary”, saying that Iran was “basically violating the ceasefire”.

It is not the first time strikes occurred after the MoU was signed on 17 June.

The US launched a series of strikes on Iran on 26 June after an Iranian projectile hit a cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz. Further US strikes took place on 27 June, following an attack on a tanker. But later that month both sides had agreed to “stand down”.

Part of the MoU’s 14 points is for an “immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts”.

Iran agreed to use its “best efforts for the safe passage of commercial vessels with no charge for 60 days”.

Both sides had continued negotiations on the terms of a permanent end to the war, but talks were paused during funeral ceremonies for the late Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed on the first day of US-Israel strikes on Iran.

Ceremonies are taking place in Iraq on Wednesday, with the final rites and burial set for Mashhad in north-east Iran on Thursday.

It is not clear when talks will resume after this latest round of strikes, as Trump responded to a question about further negotiations with the comment: “I don’t care”.

“Frankly, I don’t want to waste my time with them. Now, I’ll let our wonderful negotiators keep talking if they want, but I don’t see it,” Trump said.

“As far as I’m concerned, it’s just a waste of time dealing with them. They’re liars.”

Trump also referenced his special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner, calling them “good people” who could negotiate if they wanted to. The pair previously played a role in peace talks.

“I’ll speak to our negotiators, if they want to negotiate they’re good people - Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner - but they have to come back to me, as far as I’m concerned it’s just a waste of time.”

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) says low availability of unnamed “legacy” aircraft has created hurdles for flight testing of the new AGM-181A Long-Range Standoff (LRSO) nuclear-armed cruise missile. The B-52 is the only platform known to be involved in this effort. The fleet of these bombers is highly in demand, underscored by heavy use in strikes on Iran earlier this year, and has also recently suffered a tragic loss. U.S. Air Force officials have previously highlighted how the relatively small number of B-52s in service and the heavy demands placed on them create challenges when it comes to modernizing the aircraft themselves. GAO, a Congressional watchdog, provided new details about flight testing plans and other aspects of the LRSO program in an annual report published last week. The AGM-181A has been in active development since 2020, when the Air Force chose Raytheon to be the prime contractor. “LRSO reported unfavorable cost and schedule changes over the past year,” GAO reported. “For example, flight testing challenges, largely due to the poor readiness rates of legacy aircraft supporting LRSO testing, resulted in a 4-month delay to its initial capability.” The Air Force is now aiming to reach initial operational capability with the AGM-181 in November 2030.

GAO says that there have been nine LRSO test flights since October 2024. That is when developmental testing of the missile began. Six of those flight tests, along with seven ground test events, occurred last year. In a report dated December 2022, the Pentagon had previously disclosed nine more test flights as part of earlier phases of the program. Whether additional test flights occurred between December 2022 and October 2024 is unclear. “Since our last assessment, program officials realigned the test schedule, leaving less time to complete the 27 remaining test flights before operational testing starts in September 2027,” the report GAO put out last week also notes. “However, they noted that some re-testing can still be accommodated.” As noted, the B-52 is the only aircraft known to be involved in LRSO flight testing, and certainly meets the definition of a “legacy” platform. The last of these bombers rolled off Boeing’s production line in 1962, though the remaining examples have been upgraded repeatedly since then. The sighting last year of a B-52 carrying a pair of AGM-181s, or relevant test articles, on a pylon under its right wing offered the first public glimpse of the missile. Spotters have caught these bombers supporting LRSO tests on several other occasions since then. The Air Force currently has 75 B-52H bombers in service, in total. The entire fleet is never available at any one time for taskings of any kind, due to routine maintenance and other factors. The mission-capable rate for the bombers has been hovering between 50 and 55 percent in recent years. In addition, only one of the bombers is explicitly set aside to support test and evaluation efforts. B-52s from operational units are also used to support research and development and test and evaluation work on a more ad hoc basis. This is on top of the heavy operational demands put on the fleet, both for conventional combat operations and as a key component of the air leg of America’s nuclear deterrent triad. As mentioned, B-52s were heavily utilized just earlier this year for conventional strikes on Iran, adding to these strains.

Last month, the Air Force also lost one of its B-52s in a fatal crash at Edwards Air Force Base in California, which tragically killed all eight individuals onboard at the time. The aircraft in question was headed out on a flight test in support of a critical radar modernization program for the bombers when it went down, as you can read more about here. The radar modernization effort is part of a slew of major upgrades for the B-52 fleet, which also includes all-new engines, improved communication suites, and more. The upgrades are so substantial that the bombers’ designations will change from B-52H to B-52J in the process. They are also in line to see their arsenals grow, including with the addition of the LRSO. The future B-52Js are set to continue serving through at least 2050. Other aspects of the B-52 modernization plan have also been beset by cost growth and delays. Air Force officials have said this has been compounded by the total size of the fleet and operational demands placed on it. “The challenge with B-52 that I think everybody forgets, it’s such a small fleet that has such a tremendous requirement in terms of readiness,” Air Force Gen. Dale White, the service’s Direct Reporting Portfolio Manager for Critical Major Weapon Systems, told TWZ and others at the Air & Space Forces Association’s (AFA) annual Warfare Symposium in February. “You’ve got to have a certain number on the ramp. That’s a requirement.” The question becomes “how do you get these through the depot while at the same time meeting the operational requirements?” Gen. White further explained at that time. “That choreography, I think, is going to be tough.”

It’s worth pointing out here that both the war with Iran and the crash at Edwards came after the cutoff date for GAO’s report, and further impacts on the LRSO flight test schedule would not have been recorded therein. There has also been a broader surge in demand across the U.S. military for flight test assets. This is being driven by the needs of modernization efforts for several aircraft beyond the B-52, including the F-22 Raptor, as well as next-generation developments, like the F-47 sixth-generation fighter. Going back to LRSO, GAO’s latest assessment also highlights other challenges that the program has been facing that are unrelated to flight testing. “Program officials stated that 12 of 14 software releases are delivered, with the final delivery planned for March 2026. According to program officials, nuclear certification of LRSO software continues to be a risk that they expect to fully address by November 2026. As we reported last year, the program risks delays if additional LRSO software development is needed to satisfy this certification requirement,” per the report. “LRSO cybersecurity testing continues with some delays reported during the past year. Program officials stated these delays did not bring about any cost or schedule changes, with the final cybersecurity assessment still planned for September 2027.” “The missile’s technology maturity has advanced since our last assessment, with only two out of the six critical technologies still approaching maturity. They are both expected to be fully mature in fiscal year 2026, about 5 years after development start. DOE [Department of Energy] also identified critical technologies for the warhead, of which 80 percent are considered mature, more than double the percentage reported last year,” the report adds. “However, DOE may not mature all the remaining warhead technologies until the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2026. As we previously reported, both the missile and warhead started development with immature technologies, requiring parallel technology and design maturity efforts. This method falls short of the best practice to start with mature technologies and would have minimized the risks of future cost increases and schedule delays associated with concurrency during system development.”

There is also cost growth, as well as cost discrepancies. “Program costs increased by $347 million after Air Force leadership directed a 1-year extension to LRSO production due to near-term budget constraints,” according to GAO. “As we previously reported, Office of the Secretary of Defense and Air Force officials continue to work together to resolve a $1.9 billion difference between their production cost estimates for future LRSO production,” the report also says. “While a fully updated estimate is not expected until later in 2026, program officials now agree that OSD’s higher cost estimate provides an appropriate basis for the program’s fiscal year 2027 budget request and future year procurement funding needs.” Buoyed in part by the successful flight testing it has conducted to date, GAO says the Air Force remains confident that it can meet its goal of starting low-rate initial production of the LRSO next year. Hitting that milestone will be key to staying on schedule to start fielding the missiles in 2030.

In the end, the glove endeavor showed how difficult it can be to revive US manufacturing, said Prashant Yadav, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations.

“It is frustrating to watch because value chains for any medical product take a while to establish and take root,” Yadav said. “Any back and forth on an earnest attempt to relocate some portion, or a significant portion, of the value chain — it just erodes credibility in future initiatives.”

Reduce government and corporate bureaucracy. The US has too many rent-seekers. I think more austerity against the ruling classes are needed.

Nitrile gloves, as they’re called, are vital in healthcare, protecting patients and practitioners from infection and contamination. Only about 1% of those used in the US are made domestically, in part because medical-grade nitrile butadiene rubber isn’t produced anywhere in the country. The deficiency was highlighted when the Iran war sent petrochemical costs soaring, threatening the foreign medical glove industry and creating shortage risks.

Blue Star received the $123 million under a contract awarded in 2021. Maier said that just wasn’t enough to finish the project after construction costs soared during the pandemic. Other glove-contract recipients either never got going or ceased operations and laid off workers when they couldn’t find buyers. One roadblock: a pair of domestic gloves can cost twice as much as an import from a country with far lower labor and other costs. The difference is pennies, but for a hospital system that purchases millions, it adds up fast.

Americans need to accept the managed decline of high(er) costs and low(er) standard of living. That’s what the Global South has suffered for centuries.

While the glove plan was initiated during Trump’s first presidency, the contracts were awarded after Biden took office in 2021. The current administration’s view is that the program failed because of investments during Biden’s term that didn’t meet expectations, according to a person familiar with the thinking who wasn’t authorized to speak publicly and asked not to be identified.

Tim Manning, the White House Covid-19 supply coordinator under Biden, has a different take. “The truth is, the Trump administration did begin a number of these projects. Those contractors, those manufacturers were identified in the waning days of the Trump administration and we took them over.”

The companies’ appeals for more money after the initial contracts went out gained little traction. The current administration has decided not to put any more money into those businesses, according to the person familiar with policymakers’ thinking.

Instead, it’s rolling out another plan to benefit the few US companies that make nitrile gloves with imported NBR, and didn’t participate in the program. New procurement rules will ensure that federal agencies buy the gloves domestically, a spokesperson for the White House Office of Management and Budget said. “All nitrile gloves purchased by the US government will soon be made in America.”

Wtf - public procurement? Can we get WTO on this unfair non-tariff barrier to free trade?

That would be a welcome development at US Paper Mill Co., a paper mill-turned glove factory in Chillicothe, Ohio. It employs about 150 people and sells under a licensing agreement with US Medical Glove Co.

“If the federal government were to make continuous orders of gloves from this plant instead of China and Malaysia, US Paper Mill could hire more workers,” said Dan Williamson, a spokesperson for the plant, which uses NBR from South Korea and India.

The US goes through some 120 billion nitrile gloves each year. About 30% are used in the medical field and the rest by such industries as food service, auto repair and pharmaceutical production. The government buys around 2 billion annually for federal healthcare professionals, food-service workers in jails and security personnel in airports, among others

While the Malaysian manufacturers get most of their NBR from China, the world’s leading maker of the material, the few US nitrile glove makers must source it elsewhere if they want to do business with federal agencies.

American Armor Gloves in West Columbia, South Carolina, acquires NBR from Italy and South Korea. Dan Adams, the owner, said in May that his factory churns out about 100 million a month and recently struggled to keep up with orders. That’s because the shortage threat linked to the Iran war spurred buyers to scour for new suppliers to bolster stock they had on hand.

“We’re getting calls from all over the country,” Adams said then, saying American Armor heard from hospitals, the military and more. “They’re asking if we have supply.”

According to the OMB spokesperson, the Trump administration believes the new government purchasing plan may lead to a domestic NBR industry down the road.

It’s unlikely to be soon enough for the Blue Star factory, a few miles off Interstate 81 near Wytheville, Virginia, next to railroad tracks in a sparsely populated industrial center. Nothing in the building is operational. The 2,500 jobs Blue Star was to have created in the town of just over 8,000 people never materialized.

Maier said he pulled $10 million from two other small businesses he owns to try to get the plant going. He said he was dedicated to the effort. “This is a critical piece of infrastructure that the country needs,” he said. “You can’t just buy equipment from China and plug it in.”

It’s no easy task to make NBR, a blend of the colorless, petroleum-based butadiene and the chemical acrylonitrile. The plan was for the two to be brought in by rail, mixed and transferred to reactors where the combo would be blasted with heat for 11 hours. After that, the mixture would make its way to a blowdown vessel to be cooled and stripped of unwanted materials. From there, the finished NBR would head to five six-story-tall silos outside, to await transport by truck to manufacturers.

Each of the reactors at Blue Star cost more than $500,000 and getting them up and running would take another $70 million, Maier said. He persuaded the Department of Heath and Human Services last August to provide an additional $10 million, but said that didn’t come close to filling the gap.

Standing outside the factory, he said he may need to sell the reactors and other equipment, likely to an NBR maker in China. “I don’t want to sell,” he said, “Seeing taxpayer dollars get sold off for bits and pieces, every bone in my body does not want to do that.”

You can print more tax dollars buddy. But you can’t print out an industrial ecosystem. Sad.

For the past few years their has been a bit of a race between the various Chinese launch companies to successfully recover the first stage of a rocket for reuse. The race has currently narrowed down to the ZQ-3 developed by LandSpace, the most successful “private” Chinese commercial launch provider, and the Long March 10B, developed by the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALT) which is wholly state owned. CZ-10B is currently scheduled to launch around on July 10th at 06:00 UTC and ZQ-3 is expected to launch sometime this month. This will be the second launch of ZQ-3, the first one successfully launched a mass simulator, but first stage recovery failed, likely due to a failure to relight the engine for landing, resulting in the stage exploding near the landing pad. This will be the second launch of a CZ-10 derivative vehicle after a test launch back in February intentionally splashed down next to the recovery barge.

CZ-10B

(CZ-10B sitting at LC-2 at Wenchang Space Launch Site)

The success CZ-10B would not just be an important milestone for reusability, but also for China’s Crew Lunar program, which relies on what is essentially three CZ-10B first stages strapped together. Originally the first launch of CZ-10B was scheduled for late April, but their was an issue with the hydraulics on Launch Pad 2. Also the recovery barge ‘Ling Hang Zhe’ (Chinese for Pathfinder) underwent some additional modifications. CZ-10B’s recovery method is unique in that the stage will be caught using cables instead of landing on legs like other Falcon 9 does. This has the advantage of saving mass from not needing landing legs. CZ-10B has a payload capacity of 16 tons in its reusable configuration, which is slightly less than a Falcon 9.

ZQ-3

(ZQ-3 conducting it’s static test fire)

LandSpace’s ZQ-3 is also looking to recover it’s first stage around mid-July if the weather cooperates. ZQ-3 is a somewhat smaller vehicle compared to CZ-10B, about 5 meters shorter and 1/2 a meter less in diameter, but ZQ-3 will eventually be upgraded to ZQ-3E, which will be somewhat larger than CZ-10B. ZQ-3 utilities landing legs similar to the Falcon 9, but instead of landing at a barge downrange, they plan on landing on a landing pad 390km away from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center. ZQ-3 completed it’s static test fire on June 30th after experiencing some delays after it was erected (don’t laugh) in mid-june. Although ZQ-3 shares some similarities to Falcon 9 in concept, don’t let the western press tell you that it is a copy of the Falcon 9, they use completely different engines and propellants, the only real similarity is that they both have 9 engines and a recoverable first stage. Their will also undoubtedly be talk about how LandSpace is a private company, but it is important to remember that ‘private’ enterprises are not private in the same way companies are private in the west.

Qianfan, also known as Spacesail, is a satellite internet provider looking to build a constellation of up to 15,000 satellites to provide internet service around the globe. Qianfan is partially backed by the municipal government of Shanghai. So far they have launched 238 satellites, the last hundred coming in four separate launches on July 4th and 5th. They look to start internet services for areas such as China, Brazil, Malaysia, Kazakhstan, Turkey, and airlines by the end of this year. In the past year we have seen how important satellite internet-guided drones have become in both the Ukraine and the Ramadan War, so it is important that China is able to develop a similar system. Russia is also developing a similar system called Rassvet, but deployment remains limited for now. Reusable rockets are important for launching these constellations as it greatly reduces cost and increases frequency of launches.

(2016HO3/469219 Kamo’oalewa as seen by Tianwen-2 in July 2026 at a distance of about 20 kilometers, with an image of Tianwen-2 and a human for scale)

The Tianwen-2 spacecraft, which was launched aboard a CZ-3B in May 2025, has arrived within 20km of the asteroid Kamoʻoalewa. Tianwen-2 will scan the surface of the asteroid until it finds a suitable landing site, whereupon it will collect a sample of the asteroid, which it will return to Earth in November of 2027. After dropping of the sample, it will use a gravity assist to reach the asteroid 311P/PanSTARRS in 2035. Kamo’oalewa is the newest discovered object to be visited by a man made object, only being discovered just over a decade ago in 2016. It is named from the Hawaiian chant Kumulipo for an oscillating celestial object as it was discovered by an observatory in Hawai’i. Kamo’oalewa is a small asteroid, with a mean diameter of 27 meters, so Tianwen-2 isn’t really orbiting it so much as is matching it’s orbit around the sun as the asteroid is not massive enough to orbit. The origin of Kamo’oalewa is not yet known, it is hypothesized to be formed from lunar ejecta, but could have some other origin.