For those who savour the confluence of geopolitical affairs and modern history, the significance of the Straits of Hormuz will not have gone unnoticed. And for those who live in the Gulf, its strategic importance cannot be understated. For decades, the narrow gap of water between Oman and Iran was the key waterway through which most of this region’s crude production flowed in a procession of tankers to storage facilities, refineries, ports and the global marketplace.
For all of its strategic importance, the Straits of Hormuz was a bottleneck that Iran, in its narrow-minded pursuit of influence, irritation and isolation, targeted in acts of desperation and revolution.
And as long as Iran threatened, there was little option but to ensure that its sabre-rattling words were met by a force that negated its verbiage. For too long, this region and its critical energy exports were held as potential hostage to Tehran whims.
Earlier this week, in an interview with WAM, His Highness Shaikh Hamad Bin Mohammad Al Sharqi, Supreme Council Member and Ruler of Furairah, highlighted the strategic and important paradigm shift that has occurred as a result of the completion of the Habshan-Fujairah oil pipeline.
This pipeline now allows oil to flow overland to the port on the Arabian Sea, bypassing the bottleneck. An estimated 70 per cent of the UAE’s oil exports can be transported now through the pipe, and it will have the potential to take all of the region’s production.
In effect, the perennial threat coming from Tehran to choke the Straits no longer holds any water — with a bold strategic stroke, Iran has moved from importance to impotent.
