I think this is incorrect. The point is to show that if Iran does this, then they will not be the only ones that can do it. The last thing that should happen is to reward Iran for rent seeking on the Strait. Others can also seek rent then, and the whole strait gets shut down..which encompassed around 90% of all Iranian oil exports, which in turn was about 90% of their economic exports.
There is truth to this but it's basically we'll hurt ourselves to hurt you more. This is a lose-lose strategy.
I am not sure if in the long term it is our interest to allow Iran to extract rent from this trade route, which would only strengthen China. It seems to me that the hurt is spread around the world quite widely, with inordinate impacts on Iran and China, not the U.S. or Europe [1].
[1] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-oil-trade-through-t...
I have nothing against china, and I have no interest in the companies operating from our soil. They certainly view us with contempt.
I am talking about geopolitical security.
It's not really in my interest for a cabal of pedophiles to win this one. I dispute the conflation of the interests of the capitalist class with the american people.
Wow. You know, I think Trump is dangerous to our Republic, almost certainly committing graft and fraud using the Office of the President for personal gain, probably a rapist and maybe a pedophile. I don't know. But that has nothing, I repeat, NOTHING to do with our national security and the geopolitical reality of the Russian-Iranian-Chinese-North Korean Axis and the threat that axis poses to the democratic free-world. Separate your concerns, walk and chew gum, and face the real world.
Those countries are all very different with very different interests in their respective regions. China doesn't care about Ukraine, Russia doesn't care about Taiwan, and both were very muted in their reaction to the attacks on Iran.
The major thing they have in common is not respecting American trade embargoes against themselves, which, of course they don't.
They had muted (visible) reaction because they could do little about it.
An axis would have shown a lot more solidarity. Hezbollah/Hamas/Iran for example.
Why is it so bad that countries want rent over the areas they control?
It's not a matter of good or bad. Innocent passage through national waters (including straits) without paying tolls has been a fundamental principle of maritime law for a long time. Allowing Iran to charge a toll for passage through the Strait of Hormuz would set a bad precedent and encourage other countries to do the same. Iran might be able to get some of the weaker countries to pay up but the USA has no incentive to agree; more likely they would just continue the blockade, and possibly impose secondary sanctions against any entities that send money to Iran.
Yeah, and "don't launch wars of aggression or bomb girls' schools on a whim" has been a principle for about the same amount of time.
Iran has been pretty clear that they'll open the strait if the USA lifts the blockade. How can we complain about fair passage while maintaining a blockade ourselves?
Straits have always been points of local control. This isn't new. We will have to pay if we want to play. For all people bluster about the US being exempt, I don't see what leverage we can use that isn't more expensive than just paying up. Marinetime law is only as meaningful as can be enforced.
Bullshit. The right of innocent passage has long applied to straits. But as a practical matter very few US flagged merchant vessels even go through there, so if anyone actually pays it's going to be someone else.
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What's your point? Innocent passage never applied to artificial canals. You seem to be unclear on the basics of maritime law.
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