Beyond Oil: Iran War and Strategic Militarisation of the Western Indian Ocean

By : Ambassador Sushil Kumar Singhal

Page No: 145-156

Abstract
The Iran war has revived familiar anxieties over oil prices, tanker insurance, and vulnerability of Strait of Hormuz. Yet its deeper significance lies beyond energy disruption. The conflict has exposed the Western Indian Ocean as a contested strategic theatre where naval power, missile warfare, drones, cyber operations, chokepoint politics, and great-power rivalry now overlap. The sea lanes linking Persian Gulf, Gulf of Oman, Arabian Sea and the wider Indian Ocean are no longer merely commercial routes, they are becoming spaces of deterrence, coercion, and strategic signalling.
This article argues that the Iran war has accelerated the militarisation of Western Indian Ocean. Iranian capacity to threaten maritime chokepoints, Israel’s direct confrontation with Tehran, US naval deterrence, Chinese energy dependence, Russian opportunistic balancing, security vulnerability of Gulf states and Indian strategic dilemma together point to a changing maritime order. For India, the crisis poses a difficult challenge of how to protect energy lifelines, diaspora interests and sea lanes of communication without being drawn into a wider military confrontation. The Western Indian Ocean has become India’s extended strategic frontier.

Author
Sushil Kumar Singhal has been a career diplomat who served as India’s Ambassador to Angola and Papua New Guinea.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.32381/JIOS.2026.34.02.3