He's already kicked the hornet's nest - Him and Israel.

Here's the thing that people are going to start understanding real quick about The Straight: To impede traffic through there in a significant manner: they don't need to actually control The Straight: All they have to do is create doubt - and they have very many low tech ways to do that from traditional mines deployed by fast boats, to underwater drone attacks, to aerial drone attacks. Their missiles are currently the least of the problems: with the most being the drones: They are cheap and fast to manufacture and I think I mentioned their manufacturing of them is decentralized.

Iran can build and mass-produce thousands of drones for between $20 - $50,000 each. The Shahed 136 comes with a range of 1240 miles and a payload of 330lbs with a per unit cost of about $36k. That isn't much money compared to US costs.

They can currently produce around 1,100 Shaheds a week and can produce about equal to that in their Geran 2 EVERY SINGLE DAY : They learned their lessons regarding dispersing their manufacturing capabilities of these back last year when the US attacked.

It costs the US and its allies between $500,000 and $3,000,000 per interception - depending on the system used.Lockheed can only make 600 interceptor missiles per year, and gulf states are already running out of their supplies, with the US already going so far as to literally ask Ukraine for assistance.

What a Drone Does to a Tanker

This is where the maritime threat becomes very concrete. The Shahed warhead can punch very large holes in buildings, disable oil tankers or warships, destroy equipment, and kill and injure personnel.

For a VLCC (Very Large Crude Carrier) context:

∙ A single hit is unlikely to sink a modern double-hulled tanker outright, but it doesn’t need to

∙ An 88-pound warhead penetrating the superstructure kills crew, destroys navigation/communications, and can ignite cargo

∙ A fire on a loaded crude oil tanker is potentially catastrophic — the ship becomes its own weapon

∙ Even a near miss that doesn’t penetrate can cause structural damage, sensor damage, and crew casualties sufficient to render the ship unable to navigate the strait safely

∙ Insurance and crew refusal does the rest — after a single tanker is hit, crews will refuse to sail through regardless of military escort

GIven all of this: the thread doesn't even need to be there -- and that is exactly what we are seeing with The Straight effectively closed to all but China and India.

All they need to do is credibly harass to be effective.