https://apple.news/Al1zrdtZaSsK55sbcIKiZSw

US strikes Iran after cargo ship attack in Strait of Hormuz

7 minutes ago, 3NUMBAS said:

https://apple.news/Al1zrdtZaSsK55sbcIKiZSw

US strikes Iran after cargo ship attack in Strait of Hormuz

Who cares anymore....gas prices have dropped significantly. Isn't that what all the fuss was about a few months ago ?

I don't see anyone posting about that.

4 minutes ago, blaze master said:

Who cares anymore....gas prices have dropped significantly. Isn't that what all the fuss was about a few months ago ?

I don't see anyone posting about that.

Lots of people care, whether they realise it or not.

This isn't just about oil prices. Around 20% of the world's oil consumption and roughly 20% of global LNG exports pass through the Strait of Hormuz. It is arguably the most important maritime chokepoint on the planet.

Iran's objective has long been to use that position as leverage. Reports indicate the Omani side of the recognised shipping lanes has been mined, forcing vessels towards Iranian-controlled waters. If ships are effectively compelled to seek Iranian permission, pay "security fees", or face delays, the cost of moving goods rises immediately.

Those costs don't stop at the fuel pump. Every container ship, tanker and LNG carrier pays more for insurance, security, fuel, crew time and freight. Those increases ripple through the global economy.

That means higher prices for plastics, fertilisers, chemicals, food production, pharmaceuticals, medical gases such as helium, manufactured goods, and ultimately almost everything that has to be transported.

This is also why freedom of navigation matters. The Strait of Hormuz is an international waterway. Under international maritime law, it isn't supposed to become a geopolitical toll booth controlled by whichever state happens to border it. If that principle is allowed to disappear, the consequences extend far beyond the Middle East.

Imagine if Singapore or Malaysia suddenly decided every ship passing through the Strait of Malacca had to pay them $2 million simply because the ships passed their coastline.

Or Denmark decided to charge every vessel using the Danish Straits to enter or leave the Baltic Sea.

Or Indonesia decided to impose a toll on ships transiting the Lombok or Sunda Straits.

Or Spain and Morocco started charging vessels to pass through the Strait of Gibraltar.

Or The UK and France charged for shipping though the English Channel.

The world wouldn't tolerate it for five minutes. These are international waterways, not private toll roads. Countries bordering them don't get to monetise them simply because geography put them there.

The Strait of Hormuz is no different. If nations were allowed to charge whatever they liked, or threaten to close strategic waterways whenever they wanted political leverage, global trade would become a hostage to geography.

That's precisely why international maritime law protects freedom of navigation through these straits and why Iran 'needs' to be controlled and stopped - its precisely why they were prevented from leveraging their position with nuclear capability in the first place.

8 minutes ago, richard_smith237 said:

Imagine if Singapore or Malaysia suddenly decided every ship passing through the Strait of Malacca had to pay them $2 million simply because the ships passed their coastline.

Or Denmark decided to charge every vessel using the Danish Straits to enter or leave the Baltic Sea.

Or Indonesia decided to impose a toll on ships transiting the Lombok or Sunda Straits.

Or Spain and Morocco started charging vessels to pass through the Strait of Gibraltar.

Or The UK and France charged for shipping though the English Channel.

Why are you trying to compare any of these nations to what has happened with the Iran situation?

9 minutes ago, richard_smith237 said:

That's precisely why international maritime law protects freedom of navigation through these straits and why Iran 'needs' to be controlled and stopped - its precisely why they were prevented from leveraging their position with nuclear capability in the first place

Was Iran blocking the strait before the US bombed them ?

17 minutes ago, blaze master said:

29 minutes ago, richard_smith237 said:

Imagine if Singapore or Malaysia suddenly decided every ship passing through the Strait of Malacca had to pay them $2 million simply because the ships passed their coastline.

Or Denmark decided to charge every vessel using the Danish Straits to enter or leave the Baltic Sea.

Or Indonesia decided to impose a toll on ships transiting the Lombok or Sunda Straits.

Or Spain and Morocco started charging vessels to pass through the Strait of Gibraltar.

Or The UK and France charged for shipping though the English Channel.

Why are you trying to compare any of these nations to what has happened with the Iran situation?

Because the geography is directly comparable. These are natural maritime chokepoints through which a significant proportion of global trade passes. The difference is that no other nation has seriously sought to assert unilateral control over an international waterway in order to extract political or economic concessions.

For decades Iran has used the Strait of Hormuz as leverage, repeatedly threatening to restrict or close it whenever sanctions or military pressure intensified. Until the recent conflict, the discussion centred almost entirely on disruption rather than monetisation. The idea of charging for passage was rarely discussed publicly, but the strategic concern has always been the same: if Iran could establish effective control over the Strait, it could dictate the terms of access.

Recent events simply represent that strategy evolving from threatening to deny passage to attempting to regulate, and potentially profit from, passage itself.

The sanctions that prompted many of these threats were not imposed in isolation. They stemmed from Iran's nuclear programme, ballistic missile activities, and its support for armed proxy groups across the region, including the Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), Houthis / Ansar Allah, Kata'ib Hezbollah, Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq, Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba.... Iran has repeatedly used the Strait as one of its principal strategic bargaining chips in response.

17 minutes ago, blaze master said:

29 minutes ago, richard_smith237 said:

That's precisely why international maritime law protects freedom of navigation through these straits and why Iran 'needs' to be controlled and stopped - its precisely why they were prevented from leveraging their position with nuclear capability in the first place

Was Iran blocking the strait before the US bombed them ?

Yes. Iran has spent decades using the Strait of Hormuz as a strategic bargaining chip. While it did not maintain a continuous blockade before the US strikes, it repeatedly threatened to close the Strait whenever sanctions or military pressure increased, and regularly interfered with international shipping.

During the 1980-88 Tanker War, Iran attacked commercial shipping and laid naval mines. More recently, similar threats and acts of coercion occurred in 2008, 2011-12 (following Western oil sanctions), 2018 (after the US withdrew from the nuclear agreement), 2019 (during the tanker crisis), and repeatedly between 2023 and 2025.

Iran's methods included seizing commercial tankers, boarding vessels accused of sanctions violations, temporarily detaining ships, conducting aggressive inspections, harassing merchant vessels with IRGC fast attack craft, laying mines, and using GPS jamming and electronic interference. While these actions fell short of a complete closure, they were designed to disrupt shipping, raise insurance costs, and demonstrate Iran's ability to threaten one of the world's most important maritime chokepoints.

One of the best-known examples occurred in July 2019, when Iran seized the British-flagged tanker Stena Impero as it transited the Strait of Hormuz. The seizure was viewed as retaliation for the UK's detention of the Iranian supertanker Grace 1 off Gibraltar two weeks earlier, which British authorities suspected was carrying oil to Syria in breach of EU sanctions.

So, while Iran was not physically blocking every vessel before the US bombing campaign, it had a long-established pattern of threatening to close the Strait and using selective coercion against international shipping whenever geopolitical tensions escalated. That strategy long predates the recent conflict.