[sysguest]

idk this move, along with firing missiles even to non-combatant countries, is going to fuk-up iran...

I mean, even before the $2M toll, if you're kuwait/UAE/saudi/etc, what choice do you have? form a coalition against iran

now.. with that $2M toll, iran just learnt it can just toll the ships...

so what choice do all those strait-using countries have? pay $2M or more, even after US leaves?

nope... they'll form a coalition against iran

it's highly unfortunate that trump started the war, but iran's way of things are just making more enemies -- it'll pay with regime change within few months

[klipt]

> now.. with that $2M toll, iran just learnt it can just toll the ships...

But the strait has two sides and Iran only controls one side. The UAE/Oman on the other side could equally threaten to attack Iranian ships unless Iran pays them a toll.

[citrin_ru]

According to this map https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Strait_of_hormuz_full.jpg shipping lines are in Oman's territorial waters. Iran controls the whole area by creating a risk that a ship can be attacked. And if Oman would try to impose payments it would break the UN convention on the Law of the Sea.

[sysguest]

well I guess that makes Iran really fked up...

the strait-using countries are surely going to "make a lesson out of" iran exactly for that reason

[zinodaur]

I think what we should have learned from this is that it's extremely hard to "make a lesson out of" Iran if you depend on moving oil past their borders... the gulf states are much more exposed to this than the US is, and much less powerful.

They are also not neutral - they have been paying in to the US protection racket, and are discovering that their payments haven't bought much.

[sysguest]

> it's extremely hard to "make a lesson out of" Iran if you depend on moving oil past their borders

it's not just gulf states -- look at who are the customers of those gulf states are. the whole asia, europe, and america -- the whole world is their customer.

Even if it's "extremely hard", those countries have no choice but "make a lesson out of" iran -- just like what we did with pirates

why would those "customers of gulf" just leave iran? after US leaves, will iran regime suddenly become nice and stop forcing that $2M-per-voyage bill?

no, and even if iran regime promises "I'll never bill those ships", how could you trust on that promise? the only way to ensure free-ship-passing would be obliterating Iran as an example, even if US backs away.

> They are also not neutral - they have been paying in to the US protection racket

hmm so were they "helping" US bomb iran? "being neutral" means it didn't participate on attacking iran, not whether it paid or not.

[zinodaur]

If Canada and Mexico started letting Iran launch bombing sorties against US cities from within their borders, would the US consider them neutral?

2 Million a ship seems like a pretty cheap price to pay for the damage the us and Israel have inflicted on Iran - they cannot be made to pay it though, so I suppose the rest of us will have to (through marginally higher oil prices in the long term - much less than the spectacularly high oil prices the US war will cause in the short term)

[klipt]

> price to pay for the damage the us and Israel have inflicted on Iran

Well if we're talking reparations, shouldn't Iran pay for the damage Hezbollah inflicted on Israel with Iranian supplied weapons for decades?

[jltsiren]

The value of the oil / natural gas production in the Gulf states is not infinite. Nobody except the US has the force projection capacity to fight a major war against Iran. If they are not interested in fighting that war, the rest of the world will find that the cheapest and least disruptive option is to cut consumption. To assume that nobody is shipping oil and natural gas from the Gulf, until a new status quo emerges in the region.

[klipt]

> the cheapest and least disruptive option is to cut consumption

And good for the environment!

[samus]

Most nations who are affected don't have a blue-water navy or similar means to pose a serious threat to Iran. They have to either back the USA or deal with the toll and the uncertainty that comes with it.

[andriy_koval]

> they'll form a coalition against iran

and do what?

[JumpCrisscross]

> and do what?

Bomb shit. The Saudi and UAE militaries aren't anything to sneeze at. (The area cross the Strait from the UAE is majority Arab [1].)

I think it's generally good strategy to not provoke new belligerents against oneself.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnicities_in_Iran

[Der_Einzige]

The Saudi and UAE militaries are indeed something to sneeze at. Go read the comments about them from anyone in the US military whose worked with them.

https://www.reddit.com/r/WarCollege/comments/19ckc6l/saudi_a...

https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/qhmbog/why_i...

https://www.reddit.com/r/WarCollege/comments/hqfatn/why_are_...

https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/fbd97k/is_...

[sysguest]

well you don't expect them to fight bravely -- well, I don't even expect Saudis to even send their own citizens to iran

rather, you expect them to pay for the missiles and mercenaries like gurkhans

[andriy_koval]

gurkhans are few and already employed, and there is no much substitution.

[andriy_koval]

Saudi and UAE has less air power than US+Israel, whatever could be bombed already bombed.

But Saudi and UAE are ruled by rich regimes who benefit from oil revenue, and very vulnarable to Iran strikes, they more likely will pay those $2m.

[JumpCrisscross]

> Saudi and UAE has less air power than US+Israel

Less plus some is still more.

> whatever could be bombed already bombed

This is plainly untrue. We're still bombing things. Missiles are still being fired. Power plants and refineries continue to run.

> Saudi and UAE are ruled by rich regimes who benefit from oil revenue, and very vulnarable to Iran strikes, they more likely will pay those $2m

That functionally cedes Emirati and Saudi sovereignty to Iran. Today it's $2mm. Tomorrow it's anything else Tehran requires.

[andriy_koval]

> That functionally cedes Emirati and Saudi sovereignty to Iran. Today it's $2mm. Tomorrow it's anything else Tehran requires.

the point is besides full scale invasion which Saudi and UAE won't do, there is no reliable way to remove threat of Iran striking oil infra, they just don't have way to deal with the problem.

[JumpCrisscross]

> full scale invasion which Saudi and UAE won't do

Don't need a full-scale invasion. Just a land grab on the coasts. They can't do it alone. But they can provide troops (and mercenaries) as well as staying power where the U.S. cannot.

> there is no reliable way to remove threat of Iran striking oil infra

Barring invasion: mutualize the damage. Pot Iranian tankers. Seed their ports with mines. Israel locking up the Caspian and the UAE and Saudi Arabia locking up Hormuz to Iran changes the calculus of the war in Tehran and makes suing for peace–not with America and Israel, but with the Gulf–tenable.

[sysguest]

well I don't actually think Saudi & UAE will send their own countrymen...

rather, they'd just use oil money and pay gurkha mercenaries