US sleepwalking into a real war with Iran

The stage is now set for a disastrous collision between the US and UK navies and Iran in the busy waters of the Strait of Hormuz. The Strait connects the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Sea and is the world's major oil choke point, carrying about 30-35% of total traded oil. The latest moves of the US and UK - to provide "protection" with their warships to merchant vessels in the Strait of Hormuz - is an assertion of imperial rights over Iran's territorial waters. In other words, this is what would have been called, in an earlier era, gunboat diplomacy. Iran will not accept this.

This round of escalation began with the seizure of tankers, first by the UK and later by Iran. Both seizures took place in waterways so narrow that they are within the 12-nautical-mile limit of territorial waters of the countries bordering them. The Strait of Gibraltar is only 7 nautical miles wide, while the Strait of Hormuz is 21 nautical miles wide. If vessels are to transit using only international waters, a waterway must have a width of at least 24 nautical miles plus another 6. The additional 6 miles have to provide two lanes for traffic each way, with each lane 2 miles wide, and a 2-mile channel separating the two lanes.

What happens if waterways such as the Strait of Hormuz are so narrow that they do not have international waters for the passage of ships? Can Iran then claim, as a coastal state, that it has the right to decide who uses the strait, since it falls under its territorial waters? This is one of the issues addressed by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which was adopted in 1982 and came into effect in 1994. It allows innocent passage of ships - both civilian and military - through such straits. The catch is "innocent passage," as defined in Article 19(2). If Iran deems that the US and UK warships "protecting" tankers are, in fact, threatening Iran, or are involved in spying missions, or are interfering with its communication systems, it has the right to bar their passage.

Iran is a signatory to UNCLOS with the caveat that it will not extend the rights under the treaty to non-signatories. The US, though fully involved in the negotiations, refused to sign or ratify UNCLOS. The Paris Climate Change Agreement and the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) are not the only treaties that the US negotiated only to walk out of them.

So what does the US accept as its navigation rights? The US does pay lip service to UNCLOS. But in 1982, the same year UNCLOS was signed, the US drew up a set of rights based on what it calls customary rights. It "implements" these rights under a Freedom of Navigation (FON) Program and conducts Operations (FONOPS) in any part of the world it deems fit. It's as if the US is asserting its "right," as the pre-eminent naval power in the world, to do what it wants anywhere. In the colonial era, "enforcing" such rights of imperial powers used to be called gunboat diplomacy. Now it is called FONOPS.

Simply put, no country can seize Iran's ships, stop its oil exports, and yet claim that it can post a naval armada in Iran's territorial waters under the guise of innocent passage

The attempt by the US and UK to control the Strait of Hormuz with its warships challenges Iran's rights over the strait. Under UNCLOS, Iran can claim that the US and UK warships cannot exercise the right of innocent passage through the strait in the name of providing security to merchant vessels. Simply put, no country can seize Iran's ships, stop its oil exports, and yet claim that it can post a naval armada in Iran's territorial waters under the guise of innocent passage. Of course Iran's larger logic articulated by President Hassan Rouhani is quite simple: either all countries have security for their oil exports through the strait, or no country will.

This brings us back to the start of the new tanker war. It began with the UK's seizure of the tanker Grace I with 2 million barrels of crude oil in the Strait of Gibraltar, claiming EU Sanctions. Iran responded by capturing a UK-flagged tanker, Stena Impero, in the Strait of Hormuz, claiming violations of maritime law.