If you want to know where things stand with the MOU and U.S.-Iranian "ceasefire," have I got a special Saturday afternoon treat for you. Below are excerpts of what J.D. Vance told a group of reporters in a background call yesterday at around 3 o'clock in the afternoon. I wasn't on the call but someone kindly sent me a transcript. As you know, the MOU isn't looking so hot right now. Iran keeps opening fire on commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz and the CENTCOM spent two nights this week retaliating, striking at least 170 Iranian targets, including "air defense systems, coastal surveillance assets, missile and drone storage sites, naval capabilities, and military logistics infrastructure along Iran’s coastline." Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were also on the call yesterday, but Vance, rumored to be the "fall guy" if this tenuous deal collapses, led the conversation. He did it so well that at one point Witkoff professed he had "nothing to add" to a "perfect articulation of where we are today." When asked if perhaps Iran didn't interpret the MOU to mean that Iran was in control of the Strait of Hormuz, the Vice President said: "What happened is they were caught off guard after they signed the MOU by how rapidly traffic was moving, and especially how much traffic was moving through the southern lane of the Strait of Hormuz. So in reality, and we saw this again with many of the pragmatic people within their system, they recognized that our interpretation was not just reasonable, but it was the only plausible interpretation. That some of the hardliners, and you can even see this in some of the social media posts, started to attack [Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas] Araghchi and [Speaker of Iranian Parliament Mohammad] Ghalibaf for making a bad deal. This is not an interpretive difference. What it is is that certain elements within Iran decided, 'Oh wait, we gave up leverage that we didn't want to give up.' They decided to renege on the deal. So I think it's very important to characterize this accurately, and it's not a reinterpretation of the MOU. They they were reneging on the deal because they felt caught off guard by how quickly oil and gas was moving through the southern channel." Paragraph 5 of the agreement states: "Upon the signing of this MOU, the Islamic Republic of Iran will make arrangements using its best efforts for the safe passage of commercial vessels, with no charge for 60 days only, from the Persian Gulf to the Sea of Oman, and vice versa. The traffic of commercial vessels will immediately start, and considering the need for removing the technical and military obstacles, and de-mining by the Islamic Republic of Iran, will be instated within 30 days." Most read this as implicit confirmation that Tehran did indeed control the Strait; otherwise, why would the Iranians have to make arrangements for the safe passage of commercial vessels and why would they have to de-mine a waterway they had no custody over? Vance now says that's not how to read paragraph 5 at all. Rather, the U.S. is simply a victim of its own naval success. By opening the Strait, the "pragmatic" Iranians acknowledged their loss of leverage but the hardline radicals felt bamboozled and started firing at commercial ships and, well, here we are now! Vance is very disappointed in the Iranians, maybe even in the cool new super-friends he's made in the IRGC. "The simple deal was," he said, "we lift the blockade, and the Iranians stop shooting at ships, and that's the easiest but the most important end of the bargain for the Iranians to keep. And so far, I would give them an F on, or at least a D minus, on keeping their end of the bargain." (Earlier in the call, Kushner said: "Iran is showing a lot of signs of wanting to make this deal.") But what if it all falls apart? Not to worry, Vance assured reporters, "it's not a forever war if the Iranians violate the terms of the agreement and shoot commercial shipping, and and we respond to it." They can shoot, we can shoot, and this can go on indefinitely -- but no forever war. Got that? Please don't put in the newspaper this is a forever war. What else did J.D. Vance say yesterday? Remember the Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU), or "nuclear dust" (it's not dust), to which Trump often alludes? Removing or destroying HEU was one of the objectives of Operation Epic Fury. Except Trump suggested weeks ago -- round about the time said it'd be very unfair to leave Iran without an arsenal of ballistic missiles (even though doing so was another stated objective of the war) -- that he might not even bother trying to remove the HEU from Iran at all, as the stuff was not very "valuable." Vance now hints at leaving the HEU right where it is; the U.S. might just entomb it: "You know, look, either they're going to give us the nuclear dust, or we have very low-cost military options to ensure that it remains buried underground forever." (The reporter who asked about this noted that the U.S. might have just used such a low-cost military option earlier in the campaign but didn't because it expected to exfiltrate the HEU somehow.) Vance was also queried about reported Israeli intelligence suggesting that the Iranians are still plotting to assassinate Trump. "On on the question of what Israeli intelligence about assassination slots and so forth," he responded, "I've seen the same public reporting that you guys have seen. I'm not going to comment on, you know, private conversations that have been had between you know leaders in our government and leaders in their government. What I will say with great confidence is Donald Trump is not a person who makes decisions based on fear or based on threats to his personal safety." With great confidence, he says that. Donald Trump posted to TruthSocial last night, about eight hours after this background briefing, about what happens in the event Iran assassinates him or tries to assassinate him: "1000 Missiles are Locked and Loaded and aimed at the Islamic Republic of Iran, with thousands of more to immediately follow, should the Iranian Government act on its threat, pronounced in many corners of the Globe, to assassinate, or attempt to assassinate, the sitting President of the United States of America, in this case, ME!" We are therefore invited to believe that J.D. Vance, who would succeed Donald Trump as president of the United States in the event of Trump's assassination by the Iranian government, is prepared to fire these thousand missiles at Iran. But not in a forever war kind of way, mind you.