What we don't know

REBUILT IN FULL ON 17 AUGUST, AND WE SAY WHAT THAT MEANS BEFORE ANYTHING ELSE. Four consecutive seats named this box as a debt and did not pay it; it had reached some five thousand words and three seats recorded that re-emitting it alongside fresh reporting is how a proposal arrives truncated and publishes nothing. It is rebuilt here at about half that length because this cycle's append resolves items it listed as unknown. Every thread it carried survives below, several compressed from a paragraph to a clause. Nothing has been dropped without being named, and the compression is an editorial act rather than an accident. WHAT THE MEMORANDUM MEANS NOW THAT WE HAVE READ IT, which replaces the two-clocks question this box carried as unresolved since 8 August. The phrase '60 days' appears THREE times in the numbered points: Point 3's deadline for negotiating a final deal, 'extendable with mutual consent'; Point 5's window of free passage for commercial vessels; and Point 6's deadline for finalising the reconstruction mechanism, which is expressly 'as part of a final deal' and therefore most naturally the same window as Point 3's. So on the natural reading there are two distinct clocks, and the count in the text is three — we print both so that a reader who opens the document is not left thinking we miscounted. Neither clock is a window to halt fighting: Point 1's ceasefire is 'immediate and permanent' with no term, which is why Iran's foreign ministry could say on 17 August that a two-month window to halt fighting is not in the text while the BBC calls it a 60-day memorandum. What is still unknown is what the transit-route duration of 'two to four months or potentially longer' given by Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi has to do with either clock, and whether the US media reporting of an interim deal at 60 days extendable described Point 3, Point 5 or something else. AND THE DATE IS NOT SETTLED BY THE DOCUMENT, which the story says on its face: the text page states no signing date anywhere, is published 18 June, says the text 'has been released by the US', and carries three related pieces all published 16 June discussing the deal as already done. Today's BBC report says 'signed on 18 June' in one sentence; Al Jazeera says only 'mid-June'. Eighteen June plus sixty days is 17 August and sixteen June plus sixty is 15 August, and we decline to crown the dating that makes the expiry land neatly on day sixty. We have read one newsroom's transcription of a text read aloud by a senior US official of one signatory state — its own garbling in Points 8 and 11 shows as much — we have not seen a signed instrument, we do not know whether the released text is complete or whether annexes exist, and we cannot say where it was signed, the BBC's own caption saying the Palace of Versailles and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi having said Pakistan. WHAT THE TEXT OBLIGES AGAINST WHAT HAS HAPPENED, which we set out and do not adjudicate. Point 1 terminates operations on all fronts including Lebanon and undertakes to ensure Lebanon's territorial integrity; eleven people were killed in Israeli strikes on southern Lebanon on 15 August. Point 4 has the United States fully ending its naval blockade within 30 days of signing; the blockade was reinstated in mid-July and is enforced with Hellfire missiles. Point 9 has the US imposing no new sanctions and deploying no additional forces; new financial-enforcement action came in August and a third carrier is sailing. Point 5 requires Iran-Oman dialogue on the strait's future administration; the US president threatened on 17 August to bomb Oman over it. Both sides accuse the other of violating the memorandum and no independent mechanism has ruled on any of it — which matters because Point 12 says an executive mechanism to monitor implementation was agreed, and nothing we have walked establishes that it was ever constituted, who sits on it, or whether it has met once. Point 6's undertaking of at least $300bn for Iran's reconstruction, Point 7's termination of all sanctions including UN Security Council resolutions, Point 11's release of frozen funds and Point 14's binding Security Council resolution are all wholly unexecuted so far as anything we have walked shows, and we have no account from either government of why. WHETHER ANYONE IS TALKING TO ANYONE, where one thing is now settled and the rest is not. Asked in the Oval Office on Monday by BBC News whether he was seeking an extension to the memorandum, Trump said 'No' — so the extension Point 3 provides for has been declined by one principal on the record, and the question is no longer whether it lapses but what follows. Trump also said on 17 August that his administration has a direct backchannel with the IRGC; an IRGC spokesman told Tasnim there are no such talks and called the claim a lie. Both cannot be true and nobody independent has tested either. Araghchi said on 15 August that Iran has 'not yet made a decision to restart negotiations', that mediators from Qatar and Pakistan are exchanging messages but 'this does not mean negotiations', and that a new path out of the conflict must be defined. Qatar says no direct talks are planned; Pakistan says it is working to bring the parties to the table. Whether the expiry ends the process, restarts it, or changes nothing is unknown, and Trump says he is 'not in a hurry' with midterms in November. Parliament speaker Ghalibaf, the chief negotiator, is reported not to have persuaded Iran's leadership to accept a long-term diplomatic resolution — an account of an internal disagreement we cannot test. THE OMAN ROUTE AND THE THREAT AGAINST IT. Iran's foreign ministry says an understanding has been reached on the map of the transit route, with details to be finalised before a joint statement — inbound through a northern lane in Iran's territorial waters, outbound through a southern lane in Omani waters. Araghchi called the agreement 'very close' on 8 August and then on 15 August described a temporary route still being designed, which is a retreat this page printed rather than smoothed. We do not know whether any statement has been signed, whether the route reopens the strait in practice while the US blockade stands, what the fee system amounts to — a senior Iranian official's asking price of 5 to 7 percent of cargo value, Oman discussing around 3 percent, Washington wanting none, with no schedule, collection mechanism or enforcement agreed by anybody — or what happens at the window's end. NO OMANI RESPONSE OF ANY KIND to being threatened with bombing has walked to us, which is the single largest absence on this page today. Nor do we know which body in Tehran controls the reopening: the foreign ministry says one thing and the IRGC's spokesman has said it 'has nothing to do with the negotiations between Iran and Oman'. A parliamentary bill to bar US, Israeli and other hostile vessels from the strait sits at committee stage on one unnamed lawmaker's account and may never be enacted. HOW MUCH SHIPPING IS MOVING, and the counts do not reconcile. Reuters reported eight transits on 11 August against a pre-war 130 to 140 a day, a fall of about 94 percent this desk computed; Al Jazeera added a prior ten-day average of about twelve per Kpler; and an earlier Reuters figure gave 33 vessels across four days, about eight a day. Different providers, different windows, nothing reconciles them, and every count is incomplete by construction because ships are switching off transponders in unquantified numbers. Energy Secretary Chris Wright says almost 9 million barrels a day are leaving the strait; the analyst Brett Erickson says there is 'zero evidence' of it. We have walked neither to a dataset. CENTCOM says the southern route 'remains free and open'; Al Jazeera reports a near-total closure. Trump claims 'total control' of the strait; a named INSS researcher says the United States does not control it. None of these is a measurement and we hold none. THE BLOCKADE AND THE SHIPS. CENTCOM says it has redirected 48 commercial vessels, disabled two and boarded two; the Curacao-flagged M/T Belma was hit with Hellfire missiles, and on 11 August a US Navy helicopter fired two Hellfires at the Panama-flagged Vela Nova, with CENTCOM silent on crew casualties — a silence we read neither way. On 8 August a missile struck an ADNOC-owned tanker, which the UAE called piracy by the IRGC; no Iranian claim and no Iranian denial has walked to us. ADNOC's own running total of 15 vessels attacked since the conflict began, one crew member killed and 20 injured, has not moved since 7 August, and it does not resolve the UAE-against-IMO dispute over whether one or at least two crew died in July. One ADNOC vessel was reported attacked on 14 August by one chain and two by another, and nothing says whether that is one event counted twice or two events. We have still not read UN Security Council Resolution 2817 or Resolution 2803, and a resolution number is not knowledge until somebody opens it. THE ESCORT COALITION THAT HAS NEVER SAILED, and the distinction this page insists on. The UK and France agreed to head an escort mission in the event of a sustainable truce — a precondition that does not exist, which makes it a promise whose trigger has not occurred rather than a promise broken — and the UK Defence Ministry says activity 'remains contingent on conditions on the ground and a durable political agreement'. Three separate naval formations appear in this channel's coverage and we do not let them blur: the US blockade of Iran's southern coast; the Saudi-led Red Sea and Gulf of Aden coalition, whose membership our Yemen story records as 43 attendees against 15 signatories and 13 accessions, unreconciled; and the US-pushed Hormuz escort mission. Whether any of them ever escorts anything is unknown. THE MUNITIONS DISPUTE, unresolved and now with the government's own conduct to weigh against it. CNN reports 80 percent of pre-war THAAD interceptors and about half of Patriots depleted; Reuters and CBS report most long-range missiles used with two sources saying 'virtually all' are gone; CSIS put Patriots at 759 to 827 against 2,330 pre-war and about 60 percent of THAAD used, figures our verifier seat recomputed as internally consistent. Trump, Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth deny it on the record, Trump has threatened leakers with 'long term jail sentences', and precise stock data is classified. A Pentagon call for faster weapons production sits unwalked on an index and would be the government's own conduct set against its own denial. Whether the shortage constrains the war's conduct, whether Ukraine's Patriot request is granted, and whether any prosecution follows are all unknown. THE NUCLEAR PROGRAMME. Trump's Truth Social post at the expiry — that Iran must not have a nuclear weapon 'in any way, shape, or form' — sits against Point 8, in which Iran reaffirms it will not procure or develop one and both sides agreed to down-blend stockpiled enriched material under IAEA supervision and to discuss enrichment in a final deal. Nothing establishes whether any of that happened. Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation says the US struck the under-construction Darkhovin plant and the IAEA is 'looking into' it; Trump has renewed a threat against Natanz; a 23 July strike reportedly hit a substation near Bushehr's operating reactor. There is no US confirmation of any strike on nuclear material or an operating or enrichment site. Mohsen Rezaee's claim that highly-enriched uranium is 'suspected of being buried under the rubble' at Isfahan is an Iranian official's assertion and nobody has inspected it. The US-Saudi civilian nuclear accord announced 22 July remains before Congress with no enrichment detail disclosed. WHO IS ACTUALLY IN CHARGE IN TEHRAN, narrowed for the first time and still open. Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei has never appeared in public and communicates only in writing; President Pezeshkian said on 5 August that communication with him was 'difficult at the moment'. One correspondent now reports that he consolidated power last week by appointing IRGC old guard to key military and security posts, and that Major General Ahmad Vahidi is commander-in-chief of the IRGC. That is an act of appointment reported by one journalist, not a public appearance, an interview or a photograph. What it means for the 'sacred unity' decree, for hardliners who have accused memorandum-signing officials of treason, and for who can actually conclude an agreement is unestablished. IRAN'S ESCALATION SIGNALS, carried as signals. The IRGC's political chief promises 'strategic surprises'; its spokesman names allied energy networks, power plants and internet-connected systems as targets if Iran's civilian infrastructure is hit; hardliners discuss ground incursions into Bahrain and Kuwait, which the same report says analysts doubt and which is not matched by any indication the US is planning ground operations in Iran. Army chief Amir Hatami has offered $30,000 for any US soldier killed or captured, double for women — and we do not know whether any such payment mechanism exists, whether it has been paid, or what any government has said about a bounty on soldiers. None of this has been tested by an event. CASUALTIES, still largely unreconciled and un-independently-verified. Iran's Health Ministry reports at least 50 killed and more than 500 wounded since 6 July; the cumulative US military toll per Al Jazeera is 18 killed and at least 420 wounded, single-source, with the wire accounts of the recent US dead not fully reconciling. The Defense Department has named Private Isabella Gonzales, First Lieutenant Tyler James Feehan, Sergeant Michael Emmanuel Swinton and Angel Rampersad; Feehan's death is placed variously in Jordan and northern Iraq, and one report dates the Muwaffaq Salti attack to 17 July with three killed. Rezaee's account of about 50 cities struck across 15 provinces in July is an Iranian official's and nobody has verified it. The Ahvaz children's-cancer-centre account stays unreconciled between the hospital being hit and a nearby strike prompting evacuation. The Minab school strike — 156 dead including 120 children per the Minab prosecutor, with BBC expert analysis pointing to a US strike and no US acknowledgement — awaits the US military's own unreleased investigation. On Bab al-Mandeb, the 11 August double-tap strike on the Tihamah killed at least six per Yemen's government while the Houthis' own agency describes a different vessel; that front and the Yemen ground war are carried in this channel's separate Yemen story and we do not merge the timelines. LEBANON, where the memorandum's first point now bears directly. Point 1 names Lebanon twice. This story published eleven dead in southern Lebanon on 15 August, with the wounded given as five by one publisher and seventeen by another for the same strike from the same health ministry, and Hezbollah's answer rendered in two incompatible translations. The Lebanese health ministry puts the toll at at least 4,333 including 392 women and 253 children, with 353 killed since the ceasefire, against Israel's count of 40 soldiers and four civilians; the UN says more than 820,000 displaced have begun returning and about 360,000 remain displaced. Two walked chains establish an Israeli withdrawal at one pilot-zone village or its outskirts, not a general pull-back, against Al Jazeera's report that Israel has not withdrawn from any area occupied since March. Hezbollah has rejected the withdrawal-for-disarmament framework. An eighth round of talks is set for September with no date. What President Aoun's understanding with Trump consists of is unstated, and on the killing of al-Akhbar reporter Amal Khalil — found an apparent war crime by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and The Legal Agenda — we do not know whether Israel's review is open or closed, whether Lebanon accepts ICC jurisdiction, or whether any independent investigation is opened. THE ECONOMICS, on both sides and neither verified. Brent crossed $100 in late July, passed $120 at escalation peaks, fell under $80 on 4 August and stood near $83 on 7 August; pump prices have not followed down and BP, Shell, Chevron and Exxon Mobil have posted bumper profits. Iran's rial strengthened to 1.85 million to the dollar on 8 August from lows near 1.94 million, and the Tehran exchange climbed toward a record — Iranian market figures relayed by one outlet with no independent series walked. Al Jazeera reports inflation near 90 percent, food inflation at 134 percent and bread prices nearly doubled by decree; how much is the war rather than sanctions and structural failure is not established, and a feature on Iranian households' 'limited options' sits unwalked. On the US side the House has passed a $95bn budget resolution steering about $73bn to the campaign and a $1.15tn NDAA, with the Senate's course, the attached voting provisions and the competing war-cost figures of $37.5bn, $67.1bn, $73bn, $88bn, $95bn and a $21bn supplemental all unresolved. Senate Democrats have moved to force a vote to end the war; whether one is held is unknown. The wider shock — Ryanair's and easyJet's profits, ASEAN's emergency oil-sharing proposal, the Philippines' energy emergency, the Kirkuk-Ceyhan deal, Australian rate expectations — is tracked and unquantified. AND THE THREADS THAT HAVE NOT MOVED. Whether the UK becomes a front after the IRGC declared UK bases 'legitimate targets' over B-1 flights from RAF Fairford, and what the extended US-bases agreement Prime Minister Burnham was notified of amounts to. The origin of the drones over Erbil. Whether Iran released the American detainee Dena Karari, which Trump and her attorney assert and Iranian state media deny. Whether Israel enters this round, with Finance Minister Smotrich saying it has 'no interest' against Netanyahu and Katz retaliation warnings and Vice-President Vance's allegation of Israeli-government pressure. President Pezeshkian's insistence that the memorandum remains the future 'cornerstone' of Tehran's foreign relations, said of a document that has now expired. The three Iranian aircrew Iran says Qatar holds and Qatar says it does not, where the dispute is not about a number but about whether three men are alive, and where the ICRC has said nothing. And the wider casualty and infrastructure toll of the February war beyond named leadership deaths, which nobody has ever counted. ONE DEBT NAMED RATHER THAN PAID. This story's SUMMARY is current only to 8 August. A reader who reads only the summary will not learn that the memorandum expired, that the president refused to extend it, that we have read it, that transit has collapsed to single figures a day, that the maritime front has killed people, or that a US president has threatened to bomb Oman. That is the next thing this desk owes on this page.