Let’s Be Honest: Nobody Saw the Strait of Hormuz Coming |
“Open the Strait of Hormuz — or there will be consequences unlike anything seen before.”
That was, in essence, the message from the President of the United States on April 5, 2026, delivered bluntly and unfiltered through Truth Social. Two days later, he escalated the pressure, warning that if no agreement was reached, “a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again.”
This harsh, maximalist language reflected a deep frustration in Washington: even the most powerful military on the planet found itself unable to quickly reopen a strait barely 39 kilometers wide, controlled by a regime it had been bombing for over 40 days. It may also have been pure pressure rhetoric, part of a negotiating style that seeks to force outcomes through overwhelming threats. On April 7, Trump accepted a Pakistan-brokered ceasefire. Iran celebrated “victory” on state television. The Strait of Hormuz was supposed to reopen. It did, briefly. Two tankers passed. Then, on April 8, Tehran closed it again in response to Israeli strikes on Lebanon. The White House called the re-closure “completely unacceptable.”
Unacceptable. But unstoppable.
On February 28, 2026, the United States and Israel launched Operation Epic Fury against Iran. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was killed in the opening strikes. The world expected a swift collapse. Within hours, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps issued VHF radio transmissions prohibiting all navigation through the Strait of Hormuz. On March 2, the IRGC officially confirmed the closure and threatened to set on fire any ship that entered the waterway.
It was the first complete closure of the Strait of Hormuz in history.
The numbers are staggering. Before the war, 135 vessels transited Hormuz daily. Between March 1 and March 25, only 116 total crossings were recorded. A reduction of over 90 percent. Brent crude oil surged from a pre-war price of roughly $65 per barrel to a peak of $126. More than 800 freighters remain stuck inside the Persian Gulf. The International Energy Agency launched the largest emergency reserve release in its history.
This is not just about oil. Twenty percent of the world’s liquefied natural gas passes through Hormuz. Thirty percent of globally traded fertilizers. Twenty percent of aluminum exports. One third of the world’s helium. The closure has been described as the largest disruption to the energy supply since the 1973 oil crisis, and the largest in the history of the global oil market.
They Told Us. We Didn’t Listen
Iran had been threatening to close Hormuz for decades. In 2011-2012, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad threatened closure in response to Western sanctions over Iran’s nuclear program. In 2018, after Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal, President Hassan Rouhani threatened to shut the waterway. In 2019, amid escalating sanctions, Iran warned it would block maritime traffic if barred from using the strait itself.
None of them followed through. So the world........