Diplomacy may prove faster than military action at increasing the flow of ships through the war-closed straight of Hormuz, as a handful of countries negotiate directly with Iran to allow safe passage.
The narrow waterway that hugs part of Iran's coast has been largely closed to traffic since the US and Israel attacked Iran on 28 February. The strait provided passage for 20pc of global crude and LNG flows prior to the war. But Iranian strikes on some ships and the threat of mining has squeezed traffic through it to just a trickle — largely shadow fleet vessels carrying Iranian cargoes and a few other ships.
But Iran has said it is willing to work with countries not allied with the US and Israel's attack to grant safe passage. In addition to Iranian cargoes some Indian, Chinese and Pakistani cargoes have also gone through.
"Reducing Iran's motivation to attack may prove easier, at least with regards to certain merchant ships,"said Jakob Larson, head of maritime security at shipping association BIMCO. "Influencing Iran's motivation can be done through diplomatic means."
Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said the strait is only closed to tankers and other vessels belonging to Iran's enemies and their allies. "Others are free to pass," he said early this week.
Two India-flagged LPG tankers passed through the strait on 13 March, as did three so-called "shadow fleet" very large gas carriers (VLGCs) carrying Iranian LPG bound for China. The Indian government is in talks with Iran to ensure safe passage for six more LPG tankers, which could lead to more India-linked crude tankers crossing the strait. Iran has also not interfered with the passage of two Pakistan-bound tankers, including one on 15 March.
President Donald Trump has called on allies to provide military ships to provide escort through the strait, but so far the request has been met with limited commitments. Several US allies on 19 March expressed their "readiness to contribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage through the strait," including UK, France, Italy, Japan, Canada, Germany and the Netherlands.
But in a social media post Friday, Trump called allies "cowards" for not stepping in quickly, and said reopening of the strait was just a "simple military maneuver… so easy for them to do, with so little risk".
Using the military to reopen traffic will be anything but simple, however, shipping and military analysts say.
"Securing a narrow strait in active conflict against missiles, drones, and mines is a technically complex evolution that is likely far riskier than any allies would be willing to accept in a conflict to which they are not a party," Joshua Tallis, research program director at the Center for Naval Analyses, told Argus.
A successful military operation would have to involve actions over 500km of coastline to locate, identify and neutralize Iranian threats, Larson told Argus, which is a substantial and potentially risky task.
The only vessels seen transiting the strait on 20 March are mostly crude tankers traveling the Iranian coastline between the islands of Larak and Hormuz, according to automatic identification system data. There is no confirmation that Iran has deployed mines in the strait of Hormuz so far. But if the country did deploy mines in the southern portion of the strait, it would make passage between the two islands a narrow checkpoint for Iran to approve vessels.
