trump’s Hormuz Fantasy: “We Defeat Iran, Then We Take the Strait”

August 14, 2026 — Garden City, New York

During an event honoring police officers at the Nassau County Police Academy, U.S. President Donald Trump made the following statement:

“After we finish defeating Iran, we will announce that the Strait of Hormuz is U.S. territory.”

This goes far beyond mere political theatrics or a provocative statement.

The fundamental question is:

Does Washington believe that military victory can be transformed into territorial sovereignty simply through a presidential declaration?

The legal reality is far more complicated.

The Strait of Hormuz lies between Iran and Oman and is approximately 21 nautical miles wide at its narrowest point. Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), coastal states may claim a territorial sea extending up to 12 nautical miles from their baselines.

In other words, Hormuz is not some piece of land or water “belonging to no one,” waiting for Washington to plant its flag.

The territorial waters surrounding the strait fall within the maritime jurisdiction of the two coastal states.

The United States cannot simply declare them American territory.

International law does not work like a Trump Organization real-estate deal.

1️⃣ Sovereignty cannot be acquired by declaration

A foreign state cannot unilaterally transform another state’s territorial waters into its own territory.

Article 2(4) of the UN Charter prohibits the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of states.

Military occupation is not a legal title to sovereignty.

2️⃣ Freedom of navigation ≠ American sovereignty

The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea establishes a navigation regime for straits used for international navigation, including the principle of transit passage.

This means that ships and aircraft enjoy protected navigation rights.

It does not mean that Washington acquires ownership of the strait.

The right to pass through Hormuz does not mean the right to own Hormuz.

3️⃣ A blockade is not annexation

Even if Washington invokes the slogan of

“freedom of navigation,”

that does not automatically provide a legal basis for annexing the strait or imposing exclusive American sovereignty over it.

Any military blockade or forcible seizure would raise entirely different legal questions under the UN Charter and international humanitarian law.

And this is where Trump’s statement becomes strategically more dangerous.

Hormuz is one of the world’s most important energy corridors.

So imagine the sequence:

Defeat Iran ➡️ Control Hormuz ➡️Declare the strait U.S. territory.

At that point, the conflict would no longer be merely a confrontation with Iran. It would become a much broader struggle over sovereignty, maritime law, energy security, and the limits of American power.

And the contradiction is glaring.

Washington consistently presents itself as the defender of the “rules-based international order.”

But what rule says:

“We defeated you, therefore your territory belongs to us”?

That is not the language of international law.

It is the language of conquest and annexation by force.

The real danger, therefore, lies not only in what Trump said.

It lies in what the statement reveals about the logic of power behind the rhetoric:

If military power becomes sufficient to manufacture territorial sovereignty, then every strategic waterway in the world could become a potential prize for the most powerful navy.

Hormuz would not be the end of this logic.

It could become its precedent.