15JUN

Paris conference, 40 nations, no US

3 min read

12:23UTC

Emmanuel Macron and Keir Starmer chaired a 40-nation Hormuz Maritime Freedom of Navigation Initiative conference in Paris on 17 April; the United States was explicitly absent.

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Key takeaway

Europe wrote the preamble to post-war Hormuz governance while Washington stayed off the invite list.

Forty heads of government joined Macron and Starmer on a video link from Paris on 17 April to stand up the "Strait of Hormuz Maritime Freedom of Navigation Initiative" . Friedrich Merz and Giorgia Meloni attended in person. The list of what the conference produced is short: no signed framework, no published rules of engagement, a mission characterised as "strictly defensive" and deployable only "when conditions are met", meaning after a ceasefire or end of hostilities. The list of who was not there is shorter still: the United States. Washington will be "briefed on the outcome". Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council did not confirm participation.

No framework was signed, no rules of engagement published, and deployment was deferred to “when conditions are met”, meaning after a ceasefire or end of hostilities. But in international maritime law the first credible multilateral framework usually holds, and subsequent arrangements negotiate against it rather than displace it. The initiative rests on legal ground the European Union laid down when it rejected Trump's Hormuz toll joint venture on UNCLOS transit-passage grounds , and on the flag-state protests France and Japan filed after their vessels appeared on Trump's toll-interdiction list . That is a pre-existing legal spine, not an improvised one.

Starmer's pre-conference line, that "the unconditional and immediate reopening of the strait is a global responsibility", frames the initiative as a post-war reconstruction instrument rather than a live-conflict intervention. The "when conditions are met" trigger binds the 40-nation mission to whatever ceasefire architecture emerges, which in practice locks the European timeline to whoever holds the end-of-war pen. That is Washington. But the text being drafted is European.

Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain did not confirm participation, leaving the six states that border or control access to the strait off the signatory list. A Hormuz initiative without Saudi Arabia, the UAE or Oman on the paper is still an aspirational document. The Paris conference will be judged on whether insurance-industry engagement, the line most likely to unlock the P&I freeze that has paralysed the strait since day one, becomes a working text out of Northwood next week. Paris wrote the preamble. Whether the operational annex lands with a British signature or waits for the GCC to sign on is the near-term question.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Forty countries met by video conference on 17 April to discuss sending ships to escort oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has been blocking. France and the UK chaired the meeting. But the conference ended without a firm plan: no country committed ships, no rules were agreed for what to do if Iran tries to stop them, and the whole idea was described as happening 'when conditions are met' , meaning not yet. The US was not invited and was told it would be 'briefed on the outcome' afterwards.

Deep Analysis

Root Causes

The conference produced no signed framework because the three key structural conditions were unmet. First, the US , the only power with the carrier strike group capacity for sustained Hormuz air-defence operations , was absent and 'would be briefed on the outcome'. A European-only Hormuz mission has no credible air-defence umbrella against IRGC anti-ship missiles without US participation.

Second, GCC states , whose cooperation is essential for basing, bunkering, and over-flight rights , had not confirmed participation. Without Saudi or UAE basing access, a European Hormuz mission cannot be sustained logistically.

Third, the 'when conditions are met' formulation is structurally designed to prevent premature commitment: European governments will not deploy ships into an active minefield threat (the Larak-Qeshm channel danger chart published by IRGC-linked media on 9 April) without a ceasefire guaranteeing Iran has stood down its coastal-defence posture.

Escalation

Neutral to marginally de-escalatory. The conference keeps a multilateral diplomatic track alive and prevents unilateral US Hormuz authority from being the only framework. It does not reduce Iranian naval or mine-threat posture.

What could happen next?

Consequence
Without GCC participation, a European-only Hormuz mission has no viable basing or logistics chain; the conference's operational output depends entirely on Saudi and UAE decisions not yet made.
Short term · High
Precedent
A 40-nation coalition operating independently of the US on a Hormuz freedom-of-navigation mission would be the most significant post-Cold War assertion of European strategic autonomy, if it materialises.
Long term · Medium
Risk
The 'conditions met' formulation may be used indefinitely to defer deployment, allowing the crisis to extend while coalition members claim credit for political commitment without operational exposure.
Medium term · Medium

Source Landscape

This story draws on neutral-leaning sources from Israel

Israel

Primary parallel: Operation Earnest Will (1987-88), the US-led convoy escort operation during the Iran-Iraq tanker war, began with a similar multilateral framing before becoming a unilateral US operation.

Britain, France, Italy, Belgium, and the Netherlands contributed naval forces but operated under separate national command structures without unified rules of engagement. The structural lesson: Hormuz coalitions historically fragment on ROE when Iranian interdiction begins, because each contributing navy answers to its own government's political risk calculus.

Counter-parallel: Operation Sentinel (2019), the Trump-era Hormuz maritime security initiative, recruited 15 nations to a US-led framework but achieved only escort advisory patrols , no interdiction authority. Saudi Arabia and GCC states joined Sentinel but have not confirmed Paris participation. The gap between nominal coalition size (40 nations at Paris, 15 at Sentinel) and operational commitment (zero vessels at anchor for either) is a recurring structural deficit.

Consensus view: The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in London characterises the Paris conference outcome as 'a coalition of political will without operational capability': 40 nations attending but no rules of engagement, no command structure, and deployment contingent on unspecified 'conditions being met'.

IISS's military-balance team notes that a purely defensive Hormuz mission requires at minimum a standing maritime task force with mine-countermeasures, air-defence umbrella, and frigate escort , none of which were committed at Paris.

Counter-view: The ECFR's (European Council on Foreign Relations) Julien Barnes-Dacey argues the conference's value is political rather than operational: it creates a multilateral diplomatic record that constrains any single power , including the US , from claiming exclusive Hormuz jurisdiction, and it gives European governments a coalition framework to act under if the US withdraws militarily without a Hormuz settlement.

Key tension: Whether the conference's 'conditions met' language translates into a deployable mission before the ceasefire clock expires, or becomes a permanent holding pattern used to justify non-deployment.

First Reported In

Update #71 · Netanyahu learned from the media

Windward AI· 17 Apr 2026

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Causes and effects

Caused by

Paris and London convene forty nations

The 17 April Paris conference was the direct operationalisation of the 40-nation Hormuz defensive mission conference Macron and Starmer announced on 14 April.

Occurred 14 Apr 2026

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Paris drafts the Hormuz passage mission

The Paris 40-nation conference on 17 April was the scheduled meeting Macron and Starmer convened to operationalise the Élysée statement.

Occurred 17 Apr 2026

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This Event

Paris conference, 40 nations, no US

The only multilateral Hormuz framework in the field is being drafted without Washington in the room.

Led to

Paris coalition is 51 nations, not 40

The Paris 40-nation conference (ID:2500) is the event this update corrects; the GOV.UK primary source establishes the coalition at 51, not 40.

Occurred 17 Apr 2026

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Northwood drafts Hormuz rules without Gulf signatures

The Northwood rules-of-engagement summit follows directly from the Paris 40-nation Hormuz posture (ID:2500), converting the political commitment into a working command structure.

Occurred 20 Apr 2026

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