The whole world is watching to see if Iran will build a tollbooth on the Strait of Hormuz. It missed that one already stands there, and it belongs to Oman. And by an internal Iranian estimate reported by the Wall Street Journal, the till is worth around $40 billion a year. On the far bank, Oman has charged navigation dues in the strait for years, run from a control center on a mid-channel island, maintained through 167 buoys and a company of former naval officers. The machine that bills ships for safe passage was never missing. It was just Omani, and quiet, and small. Then carefully read the clause everyone skipped. Article 5 of the ceasefire gives 60 days of free passage, then commits Iran to define "the future administration and maritime services" of the strait, together with Oman. Sixty free days, and then a fight over who runs the one lawful machine that can charge the world for a fifth of its oil. And Iran does not need to build a thing. On June 23rd, Iran signed a joint statement with Oman standing up a working group on navigation, "the services to be provided," and, word for word, "the costs associated with them." They never once wrote the word tolls. They did not have to. That folks is the trap inside the big applause. Washington keeps winning the word. POTUS Trump insists the strait stays un-tolled, and Iran/IRGC keeps agreeing, because Iran does not want the word. It wants the fee by another name, a "service" bolted onto a machine that already exists and already bills. None of this is settled. International law forbids blocking the strait, Oman still says toll-free, and US sanctions are a heavy club. However the clock runs to mid-August. And while Washington guards the front door marked tolls, about forty billion dollars is walking quietly toward the side door marked services.