Some red flags here in what I am responding to here. There are some giveaway tics, a smattering of GPT here and there. I never suggested that the average ship going through the Straits of Hormuz were Supertankers. Your Agent misunderstood. If you are considering the average vessel going through, most of it will be dhows out of Dubai, Muscat, Karachi etc Tiny ships. Big ships do get through; the constraints are mostly height: https://maritime-executive.com/article/largest-ship-in-the-world-transits-bosporus Yes, it seems the VLCC Supertankers won't get through. I picked Supertankers because its a class that came to mind that could be compared. A little additional research shows that "Bosphorus-Max" vessels that are constrained to 300 meter length, and appropriate width and draft https://www.rivieramm.com/opinion/introducing-the-bosphorus-max-35105 Perusal of basic bulk carrier specs: https://www.clarksons.com/home/glossary/v/a-guide-to-bulk-vessel-sizes/ Shows "Suezmax " will get through. 160,000 DWT, so $1.1m per vessel. But are any actually going through? Share how you came up with the estimated average fee, you must have a spreadsheet set up https://www.turkiyetoday.com/business/more-than-9100-ships-passed-through-bosphorus-in-first-quarter-of-2026-3219694?s=1 Handily, the Turks release stats Q1 (3 months) 2026, 9,195 ships went through, total gross tonnage of 135 million tonsl scaled u, suggests 37,000 vessels for the year. Other years indicated around 41,000, but lets go with the lower number. A crude average is $98k per vessel. But the source (Anadolu Agency from the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure) says "288 barges, 984 container ships, 125 livestock carriers, nine warships, 77 passenger ships, 53 Ro-Ro vessels, 1,511 unspecified tankers, 207 liquefied petroleum gas tankers, 57 tugboats, 30 vehicle carriers and 282 vessels of other types" went through. Any tanker going through isn't going to be one of those coastal tankers of 10,000 tons; these are the Volga Canal ships that are sinking in heavy seas. Rather than the Suezmax, lets assumed these are mostly 100,000 ton Aframax vessels, which is the closest to a common workhorse tanker. So a simple $670,000. Again, the Iranian numbers are not a million miles off. Problem is the reports of payments made to iran are vague, eg upto £2m, and the ships are never identified. Iranian tankers are Aframax and Suezmax, so 100-160,000, so 130,000 would be a fair guess. Hmm, sus paragraph. But I'll bite It doesn't matter what the "fees" are for, only if the states concerned think they are necessary. No one is auditing. Meh, another sus paragraph. Your Agent has started with the premise that these fees are genuine (to adopts its jargon speak) "cost recovery mechanisms". Everyone will know they are not that. Your AI didn't consider why the Montreux Convention came about. The Bosphorus was supposed to be demilitarised, but Mussolini had some Greek islands that he fortified, and made the Turks nervous. Europe was heading to a crisis, with Hitler denouncing Versailles and rearming, the Italians sparking the Abyssinia crisis. The world was turning to <deleted>. France and the UK knew what was coming, and convened a League of Nations meeting at Montreux to work out something that would calm Turkey. They needed Turkey not to turn pro-Germany. The negotiations were all about the passage of warships in and out of the Black Sea. Two invited countries refused to turn up; Italy and the then isolationist US. But there was enough international support, and remarkably, the cobbled together plan somehow survived (barely). The deal hammered out was nothing to do with Turkey's concerns about costs, but was a pragmatic approach to trying to calm a conflict. The Treaty of Lausanne was torn up (which had demilitarised the straits), and instead a new regime came in that essentially let Turkey remilitarise the Strait. More AI screw up. The "Transit Separation Scheme" (thats what its called, the AI forgot to capitalise it) was an agreement in 1968 between Oman and Iran. What the AI got mixed up with was a change in mid 2025, when ships shifted into Omani waters only. That's not the TSS. This isn't a decision by Oman; Oman kept quiet about it. This was the reaction of Ships' masters, voting with their feet. https://maritime-executive.com/article/straits-of-hormuz-traffic-separation-scheme-keeps-within-omani-waters To return tom the "status quo" would result in a TSS that passes through both Omani and Iranian recognised territorial waters, as well as disputed international waters (waters in dispute by Iran). Perhaps picked up an Omani source. Remember, there are territorial disputes in the area. Your Agent got confused. Who suggested that Oman should retain proposed transit fees? That would have been me. The purpose is nothing to do with cost recovery. That's plainly just a fig leaf. Its about finding a pragmatic solution to put Iran and the Gulf states into a different mindset. Shipping owners couldn't care less about the reasons. Its just a cost of business. The Agent didn't read my reply. I said specifically a 3rd party should administer the scheme; could even be the US. Another suspicious paragraph, judging by the language employed. Ah, the neat final takeaway.
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