On the topic of a
refined products embargo on Iran, an anonymous and knowledgeable source writes:
A petroleum product embargo on Iran would be devilishly difficult to achieve -- too many porous land borders, especially with Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan -- and very liable to escalate to full-scale conflict. That said, I support the effort by Congress to add that particular card to the President's hand because Iran's petroleum product imports is one area in which the United States has considerable leverage. The very threat of such action could effect change in Tehran's strategic calculus.
The idea makes sense from an economic perspective in that Iran spends quite a bit to subsidize petrol consumption (these price controls are the reason the Iranian refining sector endures chronic underinvestment). A petroleum product embargo would raise the price of petroleum products such that the Iranian treasury would be drained of funds at a greater rate. Tehran could enact stricter rationing of petrol, as is already the case, but this could provoke substantial domestic unrest (as it has in the past). Alternatively, Tehran could slacken its petrol subsidies, causing higher prices at the pump for Iranian motorists, but this is also unlikely to make people happy.
I pushed this person on the feasibility of smuggling:
Granted the land borders you mentioned are porous, but Turkmenistan and Afghanistan are themselves effectively landlocked, and I can't imagine they're long refined products... and if I remember correctly Pakistan is also a net importer of gasoline and diesel. So it seems that, until the new port at Gwadar is online (not sure when that is), the most likely sanction-breaking smuggling path is via Karachi and across Baluchistan, which doesn't strike me as a particularly easy route (particularly with recent unrest in Baluchistan)... and if we are talking about anywhere near 40% of Iran's refined products (which is what I heard they import), that is a huge volume to push through a long, unstable and illicit supply line.
... and they pushed right back:
Your thinking is on the mark. But I wouldn't underestimate human ingenuity. Iraq also subsidizes petroleum products, which has been the source of a great deal of smuggling -- purchase petrol or diesel in Iraq at a low price, re-sell in Turkey, Syria or elsewhere for a large profit. If Iran were under some kind of onerous petroleum product sanctions, there are probably large networks of Shia in Iraq sympathetic to Iran which would smuggle petroleum products across the border for an even larger profit.
As for the Baluchis, they need money to fund their insurgency as well. Getting in on the smuggling business could be very lucrative for them. To a certain extent, I am making the assumption that large shortages of petroleum products in Iran plus long porous borders plus a ton of opportunistic (and economically self-interested) actors in the region will lead to large-scale smuggling. The refined petroleum products will be able to find their way.
So not only difficult to implement, but the military threat to the Strait of Hormuz is substantial:
Think small motorized skiffs, something like the Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden, with rocket launchers or rocket-propelled grenades swarming more cumbersome US naval vessels and/or oil tankers. (There was a war game to this effect and the virtual Iranian forces handed a serious defeat to the US Navy.)
Finally, one more subtle option would be to put pressure on the banks that finance petroleum product importers - apparently "this is what the US has been doing with regards to North Korea for years."
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