China’s commodity production data for May captured the divergent ways the world’s largest producer and consumer of raw materials has navigated the Gulf conflict, with oil refining collapsing to a near-four-year low as crude imports plunged, aluminum output hitting a record as smelters exploited the global shortage, and coal production trimmed by the safety inspections that followed the country’s worst mining disaster in years.

The figures illustrate the selective adaptation that has characterized China’s response to the crisis, retreating from the markets the conflict made expensive while exploiting the opportunities it created and managing the domestic disruptions that compounded its effects.

The framework agreement between the United States and Iran to end their war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz sent oil prices tumbling as traders anticipated the return of flows, but industry officials caution that a full return to pre-war production and refining levels will take weeks, months, or even years.

The deal marks the beginning of the end of the acute crisis, yet the gap between the diplomatic resolution and the physical recovery of the energy system defines the central reality of the post-conflict period: the supply that the conflict removed cannot be restored at the pace that the price collapse implies.

With a US-Iran peace deal expected to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, the reckoning over the conflict’s lasting significance begins: was this a watershed moment that permanently alters the global energy system, or merely another blip from which the world will recover and revert to its prior patterns?

The question, posed as the acute crisis draws toward resolution, cuts to the heart of what the conflict will mean for the long-term trajectory of energy markets, the energy transition, and the behavior of consumers and governments across the world.