Iran threatens to tax submarine cables in the Strait of Hormuz, to what effect?

This text corresponds to part of the transcription of the report above. Click on the video to watch it in its entirety.

This Tuesday, May 19, on the construction site of his future ballroom at the White House, Donald Trump once again demonstrates his impatience in the conflict with Iran: “Yesterday, I was an hour away from striking Iran. Everything was ready for me to give the order. The boats were loaded, everything was ready”he assured. The American president finally backed down in the face of this Iranian adversary who is using all weapons to resist.

His latest targets in the Strait of Hormuz? Submarine, fiber optic or electric cables. It is through them that telephone and Internet communication pass, i.e. 17% of international broadband. In all, around ten invisible highways of the world economy. Iran’s idea, according to a spokesperson, is to take advantage of it: “We will impose taxes on Internet cables”a toll on digital. The countries most affected would be its neighbors in the Persian Gulf, which need these cables to communicate with Asia and Europe.

But Iran is mainly targeting the American giants: Google, Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, who benefit from the speed of their flows in these underwater connections. These taxes could total millions of dollars. But would they have a real impact? Experts doubt it: “If you want to pass somewhere other than the Strait of Hormuz, well in fact you can. So the real operational impact of a threat of toll on data passing through submarine cables in the Strait of Hormuz is limited.”explains Mikaa Blugeon-Mered, researcher in geopolitics, teacher at the war school.

Iran is looming over another unprecedented threat: that of cutting these cables and sabotaging the submarine networks. The Iranian government intends to exploit to the maximum what it describes as a treasure in the Strait of Hormuz.

Non-exhaustive list.