The Trump administration recently released its National Security Strategy, an influential foreign policy planning document meant to sum up America’s geopolitical priorities. In that document, America’s economic leverage is a core factor and the use of trade to pressure other countries comes up repeatedly as a potential diplomatic tactic. Economic sanctions have long been a key component of the American foreign policy toolkit and are very effective due to the negative consequences for noncompliance on the part of third-party actors. Banks, companies, and individuals would much rather have access to the powerful American market than live under sanctions.
But what happens when the entities being sanctioned are powerful and heedless enough to deliberately skirt these sanctions and continue trading via illicit means? The threat of punishment or global ostracism does not hold water for these actors, and the sanctions can’t enforce themselves. In cases like these, it is incumbent on America to enforce our sanctions directly. That means using the full force of the American law enforcement and military apparatus to punish sanctions evaders through physical interdiction or seizure of their ill-gotten gains. If two recent news items are any indication, this may very well be exactly the path the Trump administration is choosing to take.
First, The New York Times reported that, back in November, an American special operation was launched to board a ship heading from China to Iran and confiscate its cargo. That payload included dual-use technological components that could be used to help rebuild Iran’s decimated military apparatus, in direct contravention of American interests. The cargo was seized and exfiltrated before the ship was allowed to continue on its journey, removing the threat in precise fashion. Second, earlier this month, the Trump administration once again interdicted an illegal, sanctions-evading vessel. This time, the target was a sanctioned oil tanker operating off the coast of Venezuela and the whole ship was seized, cargo included. The vessel was operating under a false Guyanese flag, routinely falsified its location by tampering with its transponders, and had previously trafficked oil from Iran and Venezuela to nations like China and Syria (under former dictator Bashar al-Assad). Finally, the president himself announced that he had ordered “A TOTAL AND COMPLETE BLOCKADE OF ALL SANCTIONED OIL TANKERS going into, and out of, Venezuela,” escalating the situation and displaying American seriousness about this issue. No enforcement actions have yet been taken, but the deterrent effect can be profound, especially given the number of American warships in the vicinity.
These moves, intended to enforce American sanctions law using American hard power, hopefully portend a shift to a more assertive posture by the White House.
Over the past decade-plus, sanctions evasion has become a booming industry, closely binding America’s antagonists into a mutually beneficial network of economic intrigue and clandestine trade. The effectiveness of our punitive regime has steadily declined during that time, largely due to evasion attempts and our inability or unwillingness to crack down on them. There are myriad tactics used to get around these economic penalties and maintain trade. Some are complicated, while others, like trading directly across land borders—Russia, China, and North Korea come to mind here—are simple. Sanctioned products are secretly altered or transshipped via third countries to disguise their origin. Shadow shipping fleets, notably for oil, travel the world with their illicit cargoes, avoiding scrutiny and challenging ship trackers. Secondary financial systems have been erected, while cutouts and catspaws are ubiquitous. The complex web of interconnections between adversarial nations, unscrupulous profiteers, and amoral intermediaries can be difficult to untangle. But there are ways to cut the Gordian knot and deal severe damage to these enemy networks.
Our maritime prowess represents the strongest tool in our arsenal to enforce our sanctions regime. Global commerce travels primarily by sea, while transnational oil shipments, especially from nations like Venezuela, Russia, and Iran, usually reach their final destination via massive supertanker craft. The vessels engaging in this illicit trade are in violation of US law and many are themselves under sanctions by Washington. Non-sanctioned vessels involved in this network spoof their transponder location, fly false national flags, and violate generally-recognized maritime law and standards in a plethora of ways. This gives the United States a very good reason to interdict these ships and stop them from reaching their destinations with their cargo.
If the Navy needs to focus on other objectives meant to deter our enemies, there are alternate ways of disrupting the growing sanctions evasion network at sea. Within our Constitution lies a means of extending our naval power and ability to defeat sanctions evasion: the letter of marque. In Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, Congress is granted the power to “grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal,” which are essentially commissions for private parties to carry out American law or act in our interests. These were used to bolster the strength of the nascent American republic, expanding our naval power via the temporary addition of privateers tasked with a specific purpose. The era of large-scale privateering, endorsed by national governments, ended with the 1856 Paris Declaration, in which European powers agreed to stop the practice after the Crimean War. Yet the United States never signed that document, nor have we ever formally repudiated the practice. Using letters of marque in a modern context to enforce sanctions law would primarily rely on private military companies and contractors, parties that the US has worked with in multiple contexts during the War on Terror. These groups are well-equipped and trained, while the ships they would be authorized to go after are usually lightly-crewed and completely unarmed.
The Maduro regime of Venezuela, an entity the Trump administration openly desires to liquidate, is dependent on exporting oil through the Caribbean Sea. Projecting power, whether public or private, in this area is well within our ability and would not unduly tax American strength. Iran is another key sanctions evader that could be harmed were we to use this strategy. Like Venezuela, their economy is almost entirely based on oil exports via the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean. America has a large naval base in the Gulf, at Bahrain, from which a mission like this could potentially be carried out. We also have a history of going after Iranian naval assets in the Gulf, notably during the so-called Tanker War in the Reagan administration.
A more difficult target, though no less important, is the Russian shadow fleet. Moscow operates an enormous armada of tankers necessary to finance its war machine. These vessels are often already sanctioned and are engaged in illegal maritime activity like flag falsification. They also operate as plausibly deniable cutouts for Moscow to engage in gray zone warfare, including sabotage and espionage. With the exception of Russia’s Arctic and Pacific ports, which export relatively little oil or are difficult to access year-round, the vast majority of Russian oil passes through maritime chokepoints that are controlled by NATO allies. At the exit of the Baltic Sea lie the Danish Straits, while Turkey controls the Bosphorus—the one pathway out of the Black Sea. Targeted interdiction at these critical chokepoints, carried out in concert with our allies, could slow Russian traffic and force buyers to either wait, reduce their willingness to pay, or find alternate suppliers. All of these would hamper Moscow’s ability to enact its malign regional agenda and aid NATO in halting any further advance into Europe. Russia does have a far greater ability and willingness to defend its shadow fleet, evinced by reports that they have stationed armed guards on various vessels, so that requires greater caution and a less assertive approach. But that does not mean that the effectiveness of enforcement would be any less significant.
America is the world’s greatest maritime power. We have the means to project that power and defend our interests across nearly every inch of the world’s oceans. We should start acting like it.
