00:00Now, Professor, I gather you know the Strait of Hormuz very well, and it's a narrow waterway, strategically, vitally important.
00:09What particular challenges are involved, associated from a naval point of view, with keeping that waterway flowing and operating?
00:19I think in many ways, those of us who have served in navies, sometimes you think of it as an
00:27open ocean, the big blue water sailing across the Pacific or the Atlantic, and you can paint a picture of
00:36what's going on or see where the enemy is at great range.
00:40In a strategic choke point like the Strait of Hormuz, and there are others around the world, and maybe we
00:46want to come on to these because they're at risk in the future as well.
00:50In these strategic choke points, everything is compressed. Everything is concentrated. It's about the geography.
00:57So even though the Strait may be 20 miles wide, that doesn't mean to say there's 20 miles of manoeuvre
01:02space.
01:03There are lanes to go through, there are islands to navigate around, there's traffic going in all directions.
01:11And so that means that time to react, warning time, is very short, and that becomes a problem.
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