America just grounded every Iranian airline on Earth

America just moved to ground every Iranian airline on Earth.

Starting today.

Scott Bessent, the US Treasury Secretary, told CNBC what was coming, about a day ago. He says quote "all the Iranian airlines will be shut down around the world".

So how do you shut down another country's airlines? You can't ban their planes from foreign airspace. That's not how it works.

So America is going after everyone else instead.

Airports. Fuel suppliers. Ground crews. Ticket sellers. Anyone, anywhere, who helps an Iranian plane land.

Scott Bessent laid out the threat plainly. He says quote "you cannot provide them with fuel, you cannot provide them with landing services, you cannot sell them tickets".

And that last part is the whole trick. Get cut off from the US dollar system, and most banks and businesses on the planet can't function. So nobody wants to risk it.

And it's already working. Before the deadline even hit.

Iran's own Tasnim News Agency says flights from Iran to Baghdad and Muscat were cancelled from midnight, a few hours ago. Iran's Civil Aviation Organization is now scrambling to reroute Baghdad flights through Najaf airport instead. Its spokesman says the agency is negotiating to redirect those flights there.

Oman has stopped letting Iranian passengers into its main airport. Talks are still going on about that.

But here's where it gets messy. Nobody agrees on what Iraq is actually doing.

Reuters says two Iraqi government sources confirm Iraq ordered a halt to Iranian flights into Baghdad from midnight today. AFP says two different Iraqi government sources put that ban a full day earlier, at dawn yesterday. And Iraq's own Ministry of Transport spokesperson, Hussein Ahmed, says none of it is true. He says Iran-Iraq flights are running as scheduled.

Three different answers. Nothing here settles which one is right.

And this didn't come out of nowhere.

Two weeks ago, the US Treasury sanctioned the 27 Iranian airlines that weren't already on its list. That's under a campaign called Operation Economic Outcast. It brought the total to 36 targets.