On Tuesday 16 June Donald Trump did the one thing 110 days of war had waited for. He put his electronic signature to the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding, the US-Iran instrument formalising the ceasefire and a 60-day nuclear window, issued a written authorisation for the "immediate removal" of the US naval blockade of Iranian ports, and declared the Strait of Hormuz "completely open". For most of this war the through-line was a president who signed nothing. He has now signed, and within a day the order collided with the thing it described.
By Wednesday 17 June the US military confirmed the blockade remains active until the formal signing on Friday 19 June1. US Central Command (CENTCOM), the command that runs the port interdiction, has not stood down. The signed order to lift the blockade and the operational posture that keeps it running point in opposite directions on the same calendar day. No executive order or Federal Register entry formalises Trump's authorisation, and the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), the US Treasury sanctions bureau, recorded no Iran action, its ledger blank as it was when he first declared the deal complete.
Trump issued a written authorisation, not an enforceable executive order, and the two carry different legal weight. Declaratory authority over a blockade does not transmit to a fleet without a written directive through the chain of command, which is why CENTCOM can lawfully hold its line while the President says the strait is open. JD Vance co-signed for Washington. On 17 June only the signature exists; the deed it describes does not. The fleet held its line.
