PARIS — When the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most critical global energy chokepoints, was effectively closed by Iran following the outbreak of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, the resulting disruption rippled through every corner of the global economy. This Friday, French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will convene a high-level summit in Paris to advance a multinational initiative to reopen the waterway, a diplomatic and security effort that notably excludes the United States.
The gathering marks the most visible step yet by non-belligerent nations that have chosen not to join the ongoing conflict to mitigate its widespread global spillover. Since Iran closed the strait — through which roughly 20% of all global crude oil shipments pass daily — global energy markets have swung sharply, dragging already fragile economic growth down and pushing up inflation worldwide. The new initiative, officially named the Strait of Hormuz Maritime Freedom of Navigation Initiative, has been planned entirely without input or participation from the U.S. government.
Macron laid out the core parameters of the mission in a pre-summit post on social media platform X, emphasizing that the effort will be strictly limited to defensive operations, open only to countries that are not active participants in the current conflict, and will only be deployed once on-the-ground security conditions permit.
Starmer, who has publicly accused Iran of holding the entire global economy hostage, has joined Macron in spearheading both diplomatic outreach and preliminary military planning for the initiative. The stakes have grown even higher following U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcement of a full retaliatory blockade on Iranian ports, a move that has deepened global economic uncertainty and energy market volatility. Ahead of the summit, Starmer framed the urgency of the action, stating, “The unconditional and immediate reopening of the Strait is a global responsibility, and we need to act to get global energy and trade flowing freely again.”
Preliminary military planning for the mission has been underway for weeks, mirroring the structure of the coalition of the willing assembled to support Ukraine during its conflict with Russia. French military spokesperson Colonel Guillaume Vernet confirmed Thursday that the mission framework remains a work in progress. A senior anonymous official, speaking in line with French presidency protocol, outlined the core practical needs of the operation: ship operators must have full confidence that their vessels will not be targeted when transiting the strait, which may require sharing real-time intelligence, mine-clearing support, military escort capability, and standardized communication protocols with coastal states.
Independent defense and Iran experts have weighed in on the mission’s likely scope, noting that large-scale escorted transits are unfeasible for participating nations. Sidharth Kaushal, a sea power research fellow at the London-based Royal United Services Institute, explained that full tanker escort operations would require a far larger fleet than any coalition of participating countries could assemble. “You need huge numbers of vessels for that sort of thing, which nobody has,” Kaushal noted. Instead, experts point to mine-clearing and the development of a shared maritime threat warning system as the coalition’s most realistic core roles.
Ellie Geranmayeh, Iran expert and deputy head of the Middle East and North Africa program at the European Council on Foreign Relations, added that European-led participation carries a key strategic advantage over U.S. involvement. “They would be a better party to do this than the United States, because once you have U.S. military doing this and lingering on Iranian shores, it creates a potential arena for Iran and the U.S. to have miscalculations and get back into a sort of military tension,” she explained.
Military preparations have already begun. Britain has outlined plans to test mine-hunting drones deployed from the Royal Fleet Auxiliary ship Lyme Bay, while France — which fields the European Union’s most capable military — has already moved its nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, a helicopter carrier, and multiple frigates to the region. Britain’s current force posture in the region highlights the constraints on the coalition: the Royal Navy currently has only one major warship, the destroyer HMS Dragon, deployed to the eastern Mediterranean.
Over 40 countries have participated in preliminary diplomatic and planning meetings led by Paris and London in recent weeks, though far fewer are expected to commit dedicated military resources to the mission. Around 30 countries will attend Friday’s summit in Paris, including nations from the Middle East and Asia. The full attendee list has not been publicly released, but German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni have confirmed they will attend in person, with other participating leaders joining via video conference.
The initiative itself is widely viewed as a partial response to Trump’s public criticism of U.S. allies, who he has berated for refusing to join the war against Iran. Trump has repeatedly argued that reopening the strait is not America’s responsibility, has called allied leaders “cowards,” and attacked the alliance, claiming that “NATO wasn’t there when we needed them.” He even went so far as to mock Britain’s military capabilities, claiming “You don’t even have a navy.”
For many participating European nations, the summit also represents an opportunity to demonstrate the ability to deliver regional security independent of U.S. leadership. “I imagine there’ll be some desire on the part of many European states, and potentially Canada, to demonstrate the ability to provide security in a way that’s distinct from if not completely separate from the U.S. and which also demonstrates a capacity for independent action,” Kaushal said. Still, he noted that the actual level of military capacity nations will be able to commit remains an open question.