Skip to content
Briefings are running a touch slower this week while we rebuild the foundations.See roadmap
Iran Conflict 2026
18MAY

CENTCOM redirections rise to 61, disabled count holds at four

4 min read
14:44UTC

Three vessels added to the cumulative count since 7 May; smokestack-disabling pattern unchanged

ConflictDeveloping
Key takeaway

CENTCOM redirections rose to 61 by 10 May; the disabled-tanker count held at four with two still unnamed.

CENTCOM added three commercial vessels to its cumulative Iranian-port redirection count between 7 May and 10 May, taking the running figure to 61 . The pace has slowed from the early-blockade rhythm of one to two vessels per day to a roughly one-per-day tempo, suggesting that the dark-fleet community has largely re-routed around the visible enforcement architecture or stopped sending tonnage into the corridor entirely.

The disabled-ship count held at four for the third straight day. The 8 May F/A-18 smokestack-disabling strikes against the tankers M/T Sea Star III and Sevda remain the most recent recorded immobilisations; the other two disabled vessels have not been publicly named by CENTCOM, an attribution gap that has now persisted for a fortnight despite repeated press-grid statements naming the operational pattern.

For Asian refiners the redirection figure translates to roughly two-to-four weeks of delivery delays on cargoes diverted from Bandar Abbas to alternative anchorages. For European buyers it shows up in the bid premium on Atlantic-basin barrels backfilling the lost volume. Brent's Monday Asian open at $104.71 set the prior $101.29 baseline is consistent with the market pricing that lost volume as a structural rather than transient gap.

The slowing tempo cuts against the U#90 framing that CENTCOM was scaling a sustained kinetic operation; the operational rhythm now looks more like enforcement maintenance than a widening engagement. The two-unnamed-tankers attribution gap is the open question: whether CENTCOM is holding the names for operational security, the targets are non-state-flagged dark-fleet vessels Washington does not wish to identify, or the War Powers Resolution documentation review is delaying public naming.

The operational floor under all of this is 20 US warships that Tribune India's ANI wire reported enforcing the strait, the largest sustained US naval presence in the Persian Gulf since 2003.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Think of the Strait of Hormuz as a single-lane motorway carrying about a fifth of the world's oil. The US Navy has been telling about two tankers a day to turn around if they were heading to Iranian ports, and the running total is now 61 since mid-April. Four tankers have actually been damaged. Two of those four have never been publicly named, which is unusual: usually the Navy says which ships it hit.

Deep Analysis
Root Causes

The cumulative redirection count is constrained by CENTCOM's standing order, which covers Iranian-port-destined traffic only and excludes the toll-interdiction track Trump posted to Truth Social on 12 April but never converted into a signed executive order.

The structural driver is the **War Powers Resolution** Section 1544(b) clock, which according to the Trump administration's 1 May formal position never started running because the United States is 'not at war' with Iran / U#85 framing. Without a signed AUMF, CENTCOM cannot broaden the operational rules to cover non-Iranian-port traffic in commercial vessels carrying Iranian-origin cargo; the standing order's narrow scope produces the slowing tempo.

The unnamed-tanker attribution gap is downstream of the same constraint: publishing the names risks creating a verification record that intersects with the pending Murkowski AUMF's reporting requirements (event 6).

What could happen next?
  • Meaning

    Pace of CENTCOM redirections has slowed; analysts will watch for whether the running total reaches 75 by 17 May (one-per-day tempo) or stalls at 65 (target-depletion signal).

    Short term · Assessed
  • Meaning

    Two unnamed disabled tankers remain an attribution gap that may become a press-freedom or congressional-reporting story.

    Short term · Assessed
  • Meaning

    Without an AUMF, the standing order's narrow scope limits CENTCOM's ability to act against non-Iranian-port-destined traffic carrying Iranian cargo.

    Short term · Assessed
  • Meaning

    Atlantic-basin barrel-backfill demand may continue to keep WTI above $95 even if Brent eases back toward the $101 floor.

    Short term · Assessed
First Reported In

Update #94 · Tehran writes, Trump tweets, Brent breaks

ABC News· 11 May 2026
Read original
Different Perspectives
Gulf shipping and insurance markets
Gulf shipping and insurance markets
With Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb both hostile at once, war-risk underwriters face their first dual-chokepoint pricing problem; the rerouting hedge that absorbed one closure is gone for Israeli-linked hulls. Any deal that reopens Hormuz without a Houthi stand-down clause delivers only partial shipping relief.
Russia and China
Russia and China
Russia and China met IAEA chief Grossi jointly in Geneva on 5 June to coordinate an advance blocking position against Washington's censure resolution, the first documented instance of proactive pre-session obstruction rather than reactive post-vote dissent. Beijing's move came four days after OFAC designated Shanghai Qianye Energy under Iran energy sanctions.
Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia was left out of the emergency $4.01 billion Patriot waiver Qatar received on 2 May as its own PAC-3 stocks ran near-empty from intercepting Iranian salvoes over Aramco facilities. Riyadh is on a standard 18-month FMS queue behind a production line booked through 2030, with no equivalent priority to Qatar's Al Udeid basing role.
Houthis (Ansar Allah)
Houthis (Ansar Allah)
The Houthis declared a complete ban on Israeli Red Sea navigation on 8 June and struck Jaffa, their first attack on Israeli territory since April, seven days after the Tasnim authorisation to activate other fronts including Bab el-Mandeb. The declaration put both chokepoints under hostile authority simultaneously.
Iran
Iran
Iran agreed the 9 June mutual halt after the Mahshahr exchange and coordinated with Russia and China to block Washington's IAEA censure resolution, using the Board as a second front while the bilateral pause held on the military one. Tehran's acceptance of the Lebanon carve-out contradicts the linkage position it stated on 1 June.
Benjamin Netanyahu and the IDF
Benjamin Netanyahu and the IDF
Israel struck the Karun Petrochemical plant at Mahshahr on 8 June over Trump's explicit objection, then agreed a halt with Iran the following day scoped on Israeli terms with Lebanon carved out. Netanyahu's posture is that the IDF will not accept Iranian missile factories as off-limits regardless of US diplomatic timelines.