Iranian Control of the Strait of Hormuz

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/trump-says-us-start-blockading-strait-hormuz-2026-04-12/

April 12 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump on Sunday said the U.S. Navy would immediately start blockading the ‌Strait of Hormuz and would also interdict every vessel in international waters that had paid a toll to Iran.

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We're blocking the Strait of America that we took control of when we won the war that wasn't a war but we also don't care about the Strait or need the Strait and someone else should fix this if they really care about it being open
 
sturg33 said:
Im pretty clueless about things like the strait. What is it that makes iran so uniquely positioned to control it?
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It's the cost of insurance that is keeping the tankers bottled up. But the geography is favorable for the Iranians. Only 20 miles wide. Cliffs on their side. And they own the islands that dot the area leading up to the strait. The shipping lanes themselves are about 2 miles wide. One for incoming and one for outgoing.
 
Iran survived five weeks of punishing U.S. and Israeli bombing with most of the tools it needs to make a nuclear bomb intact, officials and experts say, posing a challenge for U.S. negotiators as the issue once again bedevils talks with Tehran.

Vice President JD Vance pointed to Iran’s nuclear ambitions on Sunday as the core dispute after the two sides were unable to reach an agreement during 21 hours of talks in Islamabad, Pakistan.

“The simple fact is that we need to see an affirmative commitment that they will not seek a nuclear weapon and that they will not seek the tools that would enable them to quickly achieve a nuclear weapon,” he said.

Iran blamed the failure of talks on Washington’s refusal to back down from what it described as maximalist demands.

The problem for the U.S. is that two rounds of fighting have dismantled much of Iran’s nuclear program, but they have not yet delivered blows that would put a weapon out of reach.

U.S. and Israeli strikes in recent weeks destroyed labs and research facilities that the two countries say Iran used for its nuclear weapons-related work, such as gaining the knowledge it needs to build a warhead. They also further damaged its enrichment program, taking out a site for making yellowcake—the raw material that can be turned into enriched uranium.

But Iran still likely has centrifuges and a site deep underground where it may be able to enrich uranium, experts say. Crucially, it held on to its stockpile of nearly 1,000 pounds of near-weapons-grade uranium—half of it buried in caskets in a tunnel deep under its Isfahan nuclear site, according to the United Nations’ atomic agency.

 
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