Strait of Hormuz: The War of Nerves Politique étrangère, Vol. 86, No. 2, Summer 2021

In the event of a major conflict, Iran could decide to close the Strait of Hormuz, which would cause a global energy crisis.

The Islamic Republic has the military resources to temporarily enforce such a blockade, but its ability to sustain this in the long term is doubtful. It would probably have to resort to other aspects of its “deterrence triad”: terrorism and regional unrest by its proxies to deal with the resulting escalation from such a decision.

Morgan Paglia is a PhD student at the Institut catholique de Paris and at the École pratique des hautes études.

Article published in Politique étrangère, Vol. 86, No. 2, Summer 2021