Hormuz in play: How maritime pressure is redrawing the boundaries of power

What has happened is not a traditional escalation but a qualitative shift in the nature of the conflict. The United States did not merely protect freedom of navigation, as it claimed, but went further into the practical exercise of selective control over passage, by disrupting ships, redirecting others, and imposing what resembles an undeclared naval blockade on Iran. This shift places Washington in a different position—from a guarantor of the international system to a party redefining it according to the requirements of power.