Trump has threatened new tolls in the Strait of Hormuz. What if other countries follow?
US President Donald Trump threatened to impose new tolls in the Strait of Hormuz last weekend, which caused concern that the practice of charging to pass through a critical point. waterways could spread – with devastating effects on the global economy.
Iran has blockaded the border in a major war that began in February when the US and Israel launched an offensive. Iran i it only allows certain ships to pass after reportedly charging tolls of up to $2 million US. Iran’s ability to exploit the virus has hurt the US and its allies in part because one-fifth of the world’s oil flows through it and its blockade has caused gas prices to rise.
Last weekend, Trump threatened to impose American tolls on the waterway if a peace agreement is not reached in 60 days, saying the money would be for “services provided as a Guardian Angel to countries in the Middle East.”
Trump had suggested in April that the US, Iran and Oman could jointly collect ffor it to pass, and postpones the study of that program in May.
“Once you start down that road, you don’t know where it leads,” said Joshua Kurlanzick, director of Southeast Asia and South Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations.
The US says it has reached an agreement to end the war with Iran and reopen the Strait of Hormuz – but much remains unclear about how it will work. Andrew Chang breaks down the statements from both sides to explain what we know about the goals, and the factors that might prevent it from going smoothly. Photos provided by The Canadian Press, Reuters, Adobe Stock and Getty Images
He says the tolls pose a “grave threat” to the concept of international waterways and freedom of navigation.
“When you have a global hegemon that exhibits this behavior, other countries are going to be like, ‘We can do it too,'” he said.
Kurlantzick says the widespread adoption of this practice would be “a total disaster for the entire global economy.”
Several chokepoints are vulnerable: expert
The idea is already prevalent elsewhere.
Indonesia’s Finance Minister Purbaya Yudhi Sadewa, speaking at a conference in April, suggested laying roads on ships passing the Strait of Malacca. “If we split it into three parts – Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore – it would be very big,” he said. Sadewa later retracted his statement.
Kurlantzick says a tolling system in the Strait of Malacca, which he calls “the world’s most important interdiction of the world’s most trafficked shipping lane,” would be more dangerous than the Strait of Hormuz.
And unlike Hormuz, he says there are no alternatives.
He said there are many other issues that may cause concern.
Southwest of Hormuz, you are talking about the Bab al-Mandeb Strait between Yemen and the Horn of Africa. Iran threatened to close Bab al-Mandeb in April using its “axis of resistance” coalition that includes the Houthis in Yemen.
Kurlantzick says that Russia may control many of the Arctic’s subduction zones, including the Bear Gap, which is between the Norwegian mainland and Bear Island, west of Russia’s Kola Peninsula.
Norwegian Defense Minister Tore Sandvik warned in an interview in May with The Times that Moscow is threatening a chokepoint and should not be allowed to take control.
‘Opening Pandora’s Box’
There was a time when charging to get through waterways was common.
In the 16th and 17th centuries, Denmark charged tolls when passing through the Sound, a waterway between present-day Denmark and Sweden. Those tolls were the backbone of Denmark’s economy.
Kurlantzick says the concept of free navigation around the world took hold in the late 19th century with the rise of industrial shipping, and was formalized in 1982 by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.
Oman has ratified the convention, while Iran has signed it but has not officially ratified it. The US has not signed, but Kurlantzick says they often comply.
Ian Ralby, who runs a defense company and is also a non-citizen fellow at the Center for Maritime Safety, says Iran and the US toying with tariffs sets a “very dangerous precedent” because 90 percent of the world’s trade takes place at sea.
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“That means everything – our food, our medicine, our goods, our clothes, our technology – goes by boat,” Ralby said.
If that trip starts to cost more, shipping costs will increase.
If Iran and the US are allowed to proceed with charges in the Strait of Hormuz, Ralby suggests that there is nothing to stop countries in other parts of the world from doing the same.
“We are opening a Pandora’s box of increasing the cost of everything beyond what a citizen of any country can afford,” he said.
US, China push to control important waterways
According to Christian Leuprecht, a military expert and political science professor at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont., the potential spread of tolls is a real threat.
He says Iran’s tolls will prove ineffective in the long term because the uncertainty proves that the Strait of Hormuz is a “diminishing asset,” as countries shift their energy strategies to avoid the route. At the same time, he says Iran needs the money it collects from tolls in the short term.
Leuprecht says the problem may end up being overseen by an international regime, like the 1936 Montreux Convention governing the Bosphorus and Dardanelles of Turkey.
He points out that Trump has “long had this fascination” with chokepoints, noting his threats to control the Panama Canal early in his second term as president.
He also notes that China, another world power, has always wanted to control the Taiwan Strait. Just this month, Beijing designated the maritime trade lane as “littoral waters,” declaring it fully under Chinese control, which Taiwan rejected.
“Everyone, I think, is very wary of allowing international law to enter the space where countries have already declared that they control areas that are important to global stability and global prosperity,” said Leuprecht.
