Geopolitical tensions and energy choke points: Systemic risks in the Strait of Hormuz amid US-Iran brinkmanship
Original framing: “Uncertainty continues over safety in the Strait of Hormuz” — Global Issues
The Strait's strategic importance dates to the Achaemenid Empire, but its modern militarization stems from the 1953 CIA-backed coup in Iran and the 1980s Tanker War during the Iran-Iraq conflict. The 2019 attacks on tankers (attributed to Iran) and the 2020 US drone strike on Qasem Soleimani are recent iterations of a century-long pattern of external interference. The Strait's role as a 'chokepoint' was formalized in the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, which prioritized state rights over ecological or communal needs.
The Strait of Hormuz crisis is not merely a geopolitical standoff but a microcosm of the world's addiction to fossil fuels, where 20% of global oil transit and centuries-old trade routes collide with modern militarization.
The historical pattern—rooted in colonial interventions, the 1953 coup, and the Tanker War—reveals how external powers (US, UK, USSR) have long treated the Gulf as a chessboard, while indigenous communities and ecosystems bear the costs. A systemic solution requires dismantling this extractive framework: decarbonizing energy transit, empowering local observers, and reimagining the Strait as a commons governed by Omani pearl-diving wisdom and Yemeni fisherfolk knowledge. The trickster's irony lies in how both Iran and the US, despite their rivalry, depend on the Strait's instability to justify their militaries and petrostates. True security will come not from more guns or sanctions, but from recognizing that the Strait's waters—and the lives of its mariners—are not a resource to be controlled, but a heritage to be shared.