The Strait of Hormuz leverage now sits at the centre of Iran’s strategic playbook, not only because of the waterway’s geography but because of how quickly disruptions there can send shockwaves through oil, gas and shipping markets.
The Strait remains the world’s most important oil chokepoint, with more than one-quarter of global seaborne oil trade and about one-fifth of world oil consumption tied to it, according to recent EIA assessments.
Hormuz as a kind of “geographical weapon,” arguing that Tehran has discovered how much pressure it can create without needing to cross a nuclear threshold. That argument gains force from the sheer scale of the route: the EIA says roughly 23.2 million barrels a day moved through Hormuz in the first half of 2025, equal to 29% of total maritime oil flows.
The chokepoint matters for more than crude. Around 20% of global LNG trade also passes through the Strait, largely from Qatar, so disruption there can affect oil and gas consumers across Asia and beyond.
Iran’s strategy relies on disruption, not total closure
Tehran does not need to physically seal the Strait to create economic pain. Even warnings, selective attacks or elevated security risks can drive insurers, shippers and energy markets into panic. That reading aligns with official maritime concern: the IMO said in March that attacks on merchant ships had forced urgent calls for a safe-passage framework in the Strait of Hormuz.
EIA’s April outlook also described a “de facto closure” of Hormuz, saying the disruption had already forced major Gulf producers to shut in millions of barrels a day of output.
Iran’s claim that parts of the Strait fall within its territorial waters and notes Tehran’s long-running disagreement with wider interpretations of transit rights. Public U.S. legal material has challenged Iran’s maritime claims, arguing that restrictions on navigation in the Strait exceed what international law permits.
That legal dispute matters because the postwar argument is no longer only about ships getting through. It is also about who gets to define authority over one of the world’s most sensitive trade corridors.
The ceasefire has raised hopes that traffic can resume more normally, but the UN has described the truce as shaky and linked it directly to hopes for reopening the Strait. That makes Hormuz not just an energy issue but also a core bargaining point in ongoing diplomacy.
Iran may have found its strongest deterrent in geography itself. Nuclear capability has long dominated headlines, but the immediate global pressure created by Hormuz disruption shows why the waterway could remain Tehran’s most powerful card even after the current fighting cools.
