Does control of the Strait of Hormuz set a worldwide precedent?

0:00On the latest NPR Politics podcast, we separate fact from fiction in President Trump's primetime address on election security. Two things can be true at the same time. We have ignored vulnerabilities in our voting systems for a long time, and there is no evidence the election was rigged in 2020. The truth and the politics behind President Trump's claims about voter fraud on the latest episode of the NPR Politics podcast. Today on State of the World, does control of the Strait of Hormuz set a worldwide precedent? You're listening to State of the World from NPR. We bring you the day's most vital international stories up close where they're happening.

0:40I'm Greg Dixon. The stated reasons for the U.S. launching a war with Iran have shifted over time. But regardless of why the war started, the fighting between the U.S. and Iran now is largely over control of the Strait of Hormuz. Before the war, about a fifth of the world's oil passed freely through the narrow international waterway. Now, Iran controls the strait. NPR's Jackie Northam looks at this threat to the freedom of navigation and whether it sets a dangerous precedent for other waterways. In late June, shortly after the U.S. and Iran agreed on a ceasefire, the International Maritime Organization announced an operation to move trapped ships and more than 11 ,000 seafarers out of the Strait of Hormuz.

1:28John Kanias is a former seafarer, now with the International Transport Workers Federation. Over 100 ships out of the 600 plus that it was in the area. So they managed to get out. Kanias says the ships took a route along the southern side of the Strait of Hormuz, hugging Oman's coastline, rather than using a route close to Iran's coastline. Tehran criticized the operation because it was done without any kind of Iranian involvement. Kanias says the operation lasted only a couple of days because a vessel came under attack. Ship traffic around the Strait of Hormuz stalled again. And this is almost like a groundhog day, right?

2:07There is a potential opening and there isn't. Since then, Iran has struck several ships for not using its designated route. Gregory Brew is a senior analyst at Eurasia Group, a global political risk research and consulting firm. He says Tehran sees itself as having the upper hand in the conflict with the U.S. and is trying to impose a new status quo in the strait. Where any ships coming and going have to coordinate with them, have to get clearance from them, and they're pushing back against any effort by the United States to undermine that position. But the Strait of Hormuz is considered an international waterway, critical for the global economy.

2:44Todd Huntley, director of the National Security Law Program at Georgetown University and a retired Navy lawyer, says trying to claim ownership of the strait goes against the long tradition of freedom of navigation. The entire reason the U.S. Navy was reformed after the Revolutionary War was to ensure that U.S. commercial vessels and then other vessels were free to transit anywhere on the oceans. Huntley says officially recognizing Iran as having control of the Strait of Hormuz could set a dangerous precedent. Other countries could also claim important waterways. What now, you know, the U.K. or Morocco claiming control over the Strait of Gibraltar or Malaysia claiming control over the Balakon Strait and then, you know, either start charging or imposing restrictions.

3:35Countries with unilateral control could also use strategic waterways to settle territorial disputes and as weapons, says Ami Daniel, the CEO of Windward, a maritime intelligence group. Russia could say, well, we're not going to let U.S. ships go through the northern passenger or the Arctic. Or China could say, well, you know, if you're an American business, we're not going to ship through the Taiwan Straits. Nitya Lab, a fellow in the international security program at Chatham House, a London-based think tank, says threats to waterways have existed throughout history. But she says many waterways have mechanisms in place to avoid conflict.

4:12The Turkish Straits are managed by something called the Montreux Convention, which was specifically designed to protect those waterways during conflicts. The Malacca Straits are really carefully managed through a series of agreements between the regional countries in Southeast Asia because there were worries about threats. There are international norms and treaties to help govern global waterways, such as the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, which neither Iran nor the U.S. have ratified. Lab says maritime law means little to a country like Iran, or to non-state actors like Yemen's Houthis, who attacked more than 190 commercial ships in the Red Sea a couple of years ago, causing major disruptions to global trade.

4:55Lab says there's concern about how to protect international waterways. I think the world is coming to terms with the fact that this international order, these trading rules, these maritime laws, didn't necessarily deliver more security the way that they were supposed to. And President Trump's assertion, which he quickly backed away from, that the U.S. could control the Strait of Hormuz and collect tolls itself, only added to concerns about the independence of international waterways. That's NPR's Jackie Northam. And that was Jackie's last story for NPR. She is retiring today. Jackie has covered world events for NPR for decades, from nearly every continent and just about every global conflict.

5:38You can hear Jackie reflecting on her remarkable career on the Consider This podcast from July 11th. And we'll link to that in our episode notes. Congratulations, Jackie. Best wishes on your retirement.

5:56That's the State of the World from NPR. Thanks for listening.

6:04This week on Consider This, what more have we learned about Todd Blanche, President Trump's pick for attorney general? Are you and President Trump friends? I'm his lawyer, was his lawyer, and now I'm the deputy attorney general. We unpack that slip of the tongue and other takeaways from Blanche's Senate hearing on consider this. You can listen on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. Everyone wants to know if AI is conscious, but consciousness is really hard to define. It's the experience we're having right now. What it is like to eat chocolate or to look at the blue sky. So how do we know who or what is conscious?

6:42Check out the new ways scientists are finding to measure the elusive phenomenon on Shortwave. Listen on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.