‘VERY HARD’

Trump exercises restraint with Iran: Last night, President Donald Trump said he would hit Iran “VERY HARD.”

“At some point in the not ​too distant ​future, we will be taking ‌Kharg ⁠Island, and other oil infrastructure points, and assume total ​control ​of ⁠their Oil and Gas Markets, ​much like we ​have ⁠with Venezuela,” he said via Truth Social.

Thankfully, Trump walked that all back, calling off U.S. strikes in Iran and saying that a peace deal looked to be “in pretty final shape” (which has not been confirmed by Iran).

Meanwhile, “Israeli airstrikes continued in southern Lebanon on Friday, the Lebanese state-run news agency reported, as the long-running conflict with Iran-backed Hezbollah militants showed few signs of letting up despite Trump’s claims of diplomatic progress with Iran,” reports The New York Times. Iran has said repeatedly that peace deals must include an end to Israel’s strikes in Lebanon, but it’s not clear whether they’ve backed down from that stipulation, fearing more American strikes on Iran.

Pulling out fighter jets: Trump is making good on his years of threats to force NATO to stand on its own two feet by withdrawing one-third of the fighter jets the U.S. had been supplying to Europe.

“The decision would limit NATO’s ability to launch long-range strikes and conduct surveillance,” reports The New York Times. “The planned drawdowns include: Reducing the number of F-16 and F-15E fighter jets from roughly 150 to 100; Reducing maritime reconnaissance aircraft from 26 to 15 and cutting all eight aerial refueling tanker jets previously available to Europe; Reallocating a missile-launching submarine and an aircraft carrier, along with several warships and scores of jets that join the carrier’s missions; Reallocating one of two groups of bombers previously assigned for Europe’s defense.”

This is probably a good thing; Europe is being forced into independence that they’ve long known could be coming. But it comes at a challenging time, given Russian incursions into NATO airspace, and sooner than the Europeans had expected.

Interestingly, Britain’s defense secretary, John Healey, resigned this past Thursday, saying Prime Minister Keir Starmer hasn’t allocated enough to the country’s defense. Another defense official, Al Carns, also quit, saying the government’s current defense budgets were “not built for the threat we face.” Will Britain be forced to step up as the U.S. recedes?

Scenes from New York: New Jersey Transit is preparing backup ferries to help with demand as fans try to make it to the World Cup. I kind of love how they assume public transit will buckle under the pressure.

QUICK HITS

• “When SpaceX starts trading this week, one group will be noticeably absent from the frenzy: investors from China and Hong Kong. They are also likely to miss out on the upcoming initial public offering for OpenAI,” reports The New York Times. “SpaceX, Elon Musk’s rocket maker and artificial intelligence company, has excluded investors in China and Hong Kong from participating in its I.P.O., according to five people with knowledge of the decision, who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly. OpenAI, another leading A.I. company, is likely to impose the same restriction when it goes public this year, said three people with knowledge of the discussion. The company has already barred Chinese investors from participating in private fund-raising rounds, one of those people said.”
• “A small number of firms are set to net tens of billions of dollars in returns from SpaceX’s initial public offering at a nearly $1.8 trillion valuation, marking one of the most significant windfalls in venture capital history,” reports Bloomberg. The firms are Founders Fund, which owns a 3 percent stake, Andreessen Horowitz (stake undisclosed), and Sequoia Capital, which owns a roughly 1.5 percent stake.
• “Los Angeles is a city where Democrats outnumber Republicans roughly 3-to-1, and the results of last week’s primary suggest that the city is getting bluer,” opines Erika D. Smith over at Bloomberg. “How blue? Enough that it could soon become the new standard-bearer for West Coast progressivism—a mantle that has long belonged to San Francisco.”
• Lemonade stand robbed at gunpoint in South Boston. Messed up.
• I highly recommend this article on the matchmaking industry from Stephanie Murray over at Tablet. 

You’d think matchmakers would be happy about the explosion in demand for their services! Alas, many seemed genuinely troubled by it. “Far from helping to revive tradition, many matchmakers sense that they are being asked to fill a gaping social vacuum in modernity.” pic.twitter.com/tldcfFUlwc

— Stephanie H. Murray (@stephmurrayyyy) June 11, 2026

• Good discourse on the above, and technological progress more broadly:

i like jason crawford’s spin on this , which is that progress is the replacement of one set of problems with a better set of problems (which is different than the elimination of problems)

— Derek Thompson (@DKThomp) June 11, 2026