Late last week, Kevin Hassett, the top economist in the White House, told Fox Business administration officials were “very, very hopeful” about the negotiations between the U.S. delegation and Iranian officials in Pakistan. Hassett added, “We’ve got the A team going.”

His idea of the “A team” was difficult to take seriously. The U.S. delegation was led by Vice President JD Vance, a young and inexperienced politician with no background in diplomacy or international affairs; Steve Witkoff, a wealthy New York real estate developer who’s clearly in over his head; and Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law and a businessman with brazen conflicts of interests.

To the extent that anyone thought this hapless trio would show up at the negotiating table and oversee a breakthrough in less than a day, the world quickly learned otherwise. After 21 hours, Vance said there would be no deal because, as he put it, the U.S. delegation “could not get to a situation where the Iranians were willing to accept our terms.”

The New York Times reported Iranian officials came to believe Vance and his colleagues came not to negotiate the terms of a compromise, but simply to tell Tehran what the White House expected them to do. Hours later, Trump spoke to Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo and as much as confirmed that Iranian impressions were correct.

“I told my people, I want everything,” the president said in on-air comments. “I don’t want 90%, I don’t want 95%. I told them, ‘I want everything.’”

Iran, evidently, did not want to give them “everything,” so Vance and his “A team” went home empty handed.

This prompted a new round of speculation about what might happen next. Would there be additional diplomatic talks? Would the war begin anew? Was the Republican administration prepared to try to use force to reopen the Strait of Hormuz?

The American president took steps toward answering these questions by announcing a Navy blockade of Iran’s ports, which took effect on Monday morning.

To the surprise of no one, Trump’s policy immediately pushed oil prices higher, following their decline last week in response to the tenuous ceasefire announcement.

The strategy, by all accounts, is to leverage the blockade to limit Iran’s oil exports and further damage Tehran’s economy. That might have some effect, but this same policy risks making the global energy crisis worse, opens the door to additional violence, and further risks agitating major Iranian trading partners, such as China.

Complicating matters, no one seems to have any idea what Trump’s endgame is — or whether he has one.

All the while, Trump, when he’s not going after Bruce Springsteen, continues to pretend he doesn’t really care about the Strait of Hormuz, despite the obvious evidence to the contrary, while simultaneously pretending not to care about the doomed talks with Iran, which he deployed Vance to oversee with impossible directions.

There’s one week remaining on the two-week ceasefire. Watch this space.

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