SCENARIO PROBABILITIES Updated: Jul 12, 2026
The follow-through gap that anchored every prior tree, closure threatened across 134 days and executed zero times, finally broke: a formal IRGC declaration now sits alongside an enforcement strike with a probable casualty, which is why the escalation family (Paths 3-5) carries 50% against the 30% yesterday's fork assigned it. The counterweights come from the same 135 days: casualty-free multi-front barrages have twice functioned as choreographed final salvos before de-escalation, Saudi Arabia was deliberately spared a third time, and both sides committed to continuing talks the day the missiles flew. The vacant-veto dynamic explains the tree's shape rather than picking a side: the IRGC declared the closure while Araghchi was in Muscat negotiating transit mechanisms, so it is either factional posture that erodes or proof nobody in Tehran can call enforcement off. Net: managed outcomes 50%, kinetic escalation 50%, where yesterday's tree ran 70/30 the other way.
Paper Blockade 28%
No successful interdiction inside a week, dark transits resume, Iranian language softens to conditional passage $76-82
The Omani Partition 22%
Washington engages the two-corridor draft, a dated Muscat session lands before Jul 17, enforcement quietly suspended $71-76
Bridges and Power Plants 20%
A confirmed fatality, or a fourth wave naming energy, economic, or leadership targets $88-100
Convoy Collision 18%
US escorts operationalize the southern corridor; Iran fires on the Navy or exposes the closure as bluff $84-92
The Saudi Exception Ends 12%
Saudi territory or Aramco struck, coordinated proxy opening, or mining beyond the strait $90-105+

Washington's deadline expired Saturday night into silence from Muscat, and the silence lasted only hours. On deadline day itself the IRGC struck the Cyprus-flagged container ship GFS Galaxy over what it called an "unauthorized route"; CENTCOM attributes the strike to the IRGC and reports significant engine-room damage with one crew member missing. Hours later came the war's first formal declaration that the Strait of Hormuz is "closed until further notice and until the end of the American interventions." CENTCOM answered Saturday night with a third strike wave of ~140 targets, taking three nights past 300 aimpoints, and Iran answered that on Sunday morning with the widest salvo of the war: Qatar, the UAE, Bahrain, and Kuwait simultaneously, with Jordan reporting three missiles separately. Yesterday's brief gave the escalation fork 30% and specified it as "no statement, third wave inside 24-72 hours"; the weekend delivered that plus a closure declaration, an enforcement strike with a probable casualty, and a four-country barrage. Crude futures reopen ~6pm ET tonight against a $76.01 Friday close that predates every one of those events. This report supersedes the July 8 tree and models the next 7-14 days.