Trump says he wants Strait of Hormuz as US territory after Iran conflict

Donald Trump has declared an ambition to make the Strait of Hormuz "territory of United States", according to GB News, following recent military operations against Iran. The Independent reports Trump also said a record-setting Navy deployment to support Iran operations was "not nearly long enough".

The Strait of Hormuz is the narrow waterway between Iran and Oman through which roughly a fifth of the world's oil supply passes. It has never been under the sovereignty of any single nation - it's international waters, governed by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, with a three-mile territorial limit on either side belonging to Iran and Oman respectively.

Trump's statement isn't a policy proposal with a mechanism. The United States doesn't annex international waterways by declaration, and no treaty or Security Council resolution could transfer the Strait to American sovereignty without the consent of Iran and Oman - neither of which is forthcoming. What it does is reframe the terms: if the Strait is American interest made geographic, then any Iranian move in its own waters becomes an incursion on American space. That's the work the language is doing.

The record-setting deployment Trump referenced appears to involve carrier groups and support vessels operating in the Gulf and Arabian Sea, though the exact composition isn't detailed in the captured headlines. The complaint that it's "not nearly long enough" suggests he wants a permanent forward presence, not a surge.

What to watch: whether the administration attempts to formalise any kind of exclusion zone or patrol corridor in the Strait, and how Iran responds to the framing of its own coastline as contested space.