Bottom Line Up Front

• The Red Sea is becoming the world's most contested maritime artery

• A single disruption can spike global freight rates overnight and there's lots of disruption on the horizon

• It's a data choke point too. Undersea cables through the Red Sea carry about a fifth of the world's internet traffic

• Everyone is there: Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Turkey, and Qatar are locked in a port building race while the US, China, and Iran project power into the Gulf

• If it happens in the Red Sea, you'll feel it in your wallet. When energy, goods, and data can't pass through the contested sea, prices jump

Hey everyone—

In 2017, I was on a very strange road trip from Hargeisa Somaliland to Berbera Port, on the Red Sea. My companions were a retired American sniper turned global cellphone mogul named Robbie, his pastor Bishop Anthony, and David, a philosophy student from China.

If this group doesn't make sense to you now, it didn't make sense to me then. But they offered me a free ride to the coast and I was powerless to refuse.

Robbie and his crew were looking at importing cellphones into Somaliland and selling them onward into Ethiopia through Berbera Port. They needed to see if the port was functioning so they hired two armed guards and a couple Humvees (in Somaliland all foreigners need an armed escort) for a quick trip across the desert. Since I was the only other person in their hotel, they asked if I'd like to join them.

(I wouldn't recommend getting into cars with strangers, but it makes for good bar stories if you don't die.)

8 years ago, cowboy capitalists like Robbie were opening markets in a part of the world deemed to dangerous to consider leaving your hotel. Now, there is a race to build the biggest port in the region, five-star resorts are breaking ground while missiles are flying at oil tankers. Sunburnt tourists are scuba diving in the same sea that the world's navies are ready to fight and die for.

The Red Sea is awesome. Keep reading to find out why.

(Also scroll to the end for a neat tool)

-Eric

P.S. If you wanna hear more about my travels in Somaliland and the strangest road trip ever check out my book You Are Not Here: Travels Through Countries that Don't Exist.

Bab el-Mandeb: Narrow Gate, Global Stakes

On the Red Sea’s southern end lies the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. The name translates to "Gate of Tears” because the 30 kilometer bottle neck between the Middle East and Africa took the lives of so many sailors. This strait is the only maritime gateway to the Suez Canal, which handles about 12% of global trade​. This includes nearly half of Asia-to-Europe container shipments – along with around 60 percent of Middle East oil exports. In short, if Bab el-Mandeb is disrupted everyone in the world will feel it.

Recent Houthi strikes as this chokepoint show how chaos in the Red Sea ripples outward. After the attacks Marine insurers hiked premiums and some lines avoided the region entirely. Dozens of vessels detoured around the Cape of Good Hope. That reroute adds roughly 10 extra days to an Asia-Europe voyage ​and can cost an additional $1 million in fuel per trip. Since both goods and energy pass through the Red Sea, the price of everything jumps when shippers are spooked.

Ports and Power Plays

The fight for the Red Sea isn't just missiles, it's markets. Port infrastructure is a prize for anyone who wants to project power between the Middle East and Africa. Currently, the UAE and Turkey are duking it out to dominate shipping in and out of the Red Sea. While Ankara builds up the port and military of Somalia, Abu Dhabi is splashing out cash and concrete in the breakaway region, Somaliland. Dubai’s DP World and others have spent about $1.7 billion since 2021 on ports from Ain Sokhna in Egypt to Berbera in Somaliland​.

Meanwhile Saudi Arabia is pouring resources into Red Sea projects: its Public Investment Fund is backing the $500 billion NEOM mega-city on the Red Sea​. Meanwhile, Egypt is doubling the Suez Canal’s capacity and modernizing its harbors. All these moves are about more than commerce, they're about geopolitical leverage baby. If you control the ports, you control the flow of goods around the world and the strategic influence that goes with it.

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The Invisible Chokepoint Underwater

It's not just about ports and power, it's about data. Over a dozen fiber-optic cables run through the Red Sea. They carry roughly 80–90% of all internet data between Europe and Asia​. That makes the Red Sea a digital chokepoint for global connectivity. And like ships, these cables are not immune to conflict. During the recent fighting, a damaged vessel dragged its anchor and severed multiple cables on the seabed​, causing outages in parts of East Africa and the Middle East. A deliberate attack or another accident could knock out connectivity for millions of users across many countries.

Great Powers, Tiny Gap

One of the best ways to start a war is to mess with someones money. This region affects the global bottom line, which is why world powers are willing to fight for it. The tiny Red Sea country of Djibouti is packed with bases from 8 different countries. I've never been to Djibouti, but I've heard that for a time, the US and Chinese bases could (allegedly) look directly into one another's hangar bays.

When roughly over $1 trillion worth of goods – passes through these waters each year​ war risk surges. Stability and development cut both ways, while it builds capacity for civilians it generates strategic depth for war fighting.

The UAE and Turkey's competition for the Horn of Africa is about building ports and institutions now, but it could become a flashpoint in the future. The civil war between Somliland and Somalia remains frozen, but If the UAE is successful at helping Somaliland take marketshare and gain recognition on the world stage, its possible that Somalia's Turkish-trained military will step in.

The Red Sea is difficult to predict because everyone is affected by it. There's money and power to be gained and a lot of guns pointed at a lot of people. I'll be keeping an eye on the region, and hopefully you will to.

Eric’s Tinfoil Hat 🎩 

I write and talk about conflict everyday at The RAND School of Public Policy. I have noticed that students who have never been to a region of the world are more comfortable with the use of violence to solve a geopolitical problem in that area. Familiarity breeds empathy. The national security apparatus of the US needs to invest in both.

(Here's a free tool to look at maritime traffic in real time).

About Eric

Eric Czuleger is a journalist and travel writer who has lived and worked in over 47 countries. He holds a masters degree from the University of Oxford and he is completing a National Security degree from the RAND school of public policy. He's the author of You Are Not Here: Travels Through Countries That Don’t Exist, and host of the “This Is Not a PsyOp” TikTok channel. 

📚 Liked today’s brief? Dive deeper—check out my book You Are Not Here: Travels Through Countries That Don't Exist and explore the world’s unrecognized countries.

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