Choke Point Great Power Infrastructure Competition in the Red Sea

Key Findings:

This article examines the competition over infrastructure as a central pattern of conflict between great powers, and explores how it is being conducted today in and around the Red Sea. It involves a process in which a great power makes major investments in locations that control and threaten a strategically important transport and connection route. The investments are directed at both ensuring the transport and connectivity needs of the great power and its partners and at establishing the ability to threaten those of its enemies. 

The article begins by laying the theoretical foundation of the various spheres—arrangements and infrastructure—in which the competition is expressed. This is illustrated with a brief survey of the competition in the Indo-Pacific region between China and the United States and their partners. A detailed overview is then provided of the resource-intensive infrastructure competition that is taking place in and around the Red Sea area, with its many participants—Russia, China, the United States, India, the European Union, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and Qatar — followed by a discussion of the possible consequences for Israeli strategy. The discussion ends with a call to consider various supplementary alternatives to Israel’s policy concerning this competition, including establishing partnerships with countries in the Red Sea area and also with the countries of the “Indo-Pacific arc,” especially with India, which has growing interests in this area.