Australia looks brave, and even a little lonely, at the moment because, besides us, only the US and Britain are devoting military resources to securing freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz.
This US-led deployment is in direct response to Iran illegally seizing a number of tankers sailing lawfully through the waterway.
However, the allied operation to protect freedom of navigation is so clearly within international law, and so obviously a security good, that other nations could join in. Notwithstanding the general European dislike of US President Donald Trump, it would not be surprising if France and Germany, in particular, as the strategic leaders of continental Europe, eventually decide to offer some support to the operation.
Their economies benefit prodigiously from uninterrupted seaborne trade.
Even though Paris and Berlin disagree with the Trump administration’s decision to withdraw from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action — the Iran nuclear deal — they have an overwhelming interest in freedom of navigation.
It is important to realise that London and Canberra also disagree with Washington’s position on the JCPOA, but have distinguished that disagreement from the need to keep trade flowing freely through the Strait of Hormuz. Iran has been seizing tankers ostensibly in retaliation to the British in Gibraltar seizing an Iranian tanker. But the Brits did this in pursuit of enforcing EU sanctions.
Read the article by Greg Sheridan in The Australian.