Iran’s been threatening to close the Strait of Hormuz for decades and everyone always said yeah but they never actually will, because their own exports go through it.. well turns out they didnt need to formally close it at all.

A few drone strikes on tankers near the strait, a radio broadcast from the IRGC saying any ship that passes through will be set ablaze, and suddenly insurers pulled coverage and shipping companies just stopped sending vessels. Job done. No mines no naval blockade, just cheap drones and a threat on the VHF frequency that every ship in the area heard and suddenly you had over 150 tankers anchored outside waiting, and the world’s most important oil chokepoint was effectively shut.

The clever bit, and nobody really talks about this enough, is what Iran did in the weeks before. Between February 15th and 20th they tripled their export rate and Iran emptied out oil storage knowing full well what was coming. Saudi did something similar trying to front load shipments. So when the strikes actually hit on the 28th both sides had already moved a chunk of oil out the door which buys everyone a few weeks of breathing room.. but thats all it is. A few weeks.

The retaliation went way beyond Hormuz though. Iran launched missiles and drones at US bases across the Gulf hitting facilities in Qatar Kuwait Bahrain and the UAE. QatarEnergy shut down LNG production completely after Ras Laffan got hit and declared force majeure on natural gas contracts by March 4th. Thats massive because Qatar is one of the biggest LNG suppliers on the planet.. European gas futures went up 45 percent in a day on that news alone. Saudi had to shut units at Ras Tanura after drone debris caused a fire at their biggest domestic refinery.

Iran’s own exports of about 1.6 million barrels a day mostly go to China, and those are now stuck behind the same blockade they created. Kpler tracking showed the only ships still moving through were Iranian and Chinese flagged vessels basically everyone else has walked away. Iraq is having to curtail production in some of its biggest fields because theres physically nowhere to put the oil if you cant export it through Hormuz.

The really scary quote came from Qatars energy minister who warned if this carries on other Gulf producers will have to halt exports too, and that will bring down economies of the world. Not exactly subtle.