The Gulf conflict has triggered a pivotal reshaping of the world’s energy geopolitical landscape. Washington’s push to seize leading energy influence now collides directly with Iran’s bid to take charge of regional oil and gas circulation networks. This profound power realignment is dismantling traditional beliefs that the global fossil fuel market can stay stable and predictable. Nowadays, manipulating cross-border energy supply routes has gradually turned into a regular geopolitical bargaining tool for major powers. Given that energy issues are gaining ever-greater weight in diplomatic decision-making, the European Union is now standing at a strategic crossroads. It has to decide whether to stick to its original route of relying heavily on external energy supplies, or blaze a brand-new developmental route that can effectively boost internal industrial competitiveness and elevate its overall global strategic influence.

Energy Supremacy Embedded

Rooted in its abundant domestic oil and gas reserves, the United States has built a strategic discourse centered on securing global energy supremacy, and is striving to expand its sway over international energy distribution networks. Though the Trump-era government was often seen lacking a complete and unified long-term diplomatic framework, its core energy policy guidelines remained steady, which were largely formulated to cater to domestic practical interests.

During its term, the Trump administration spared no effort to advocate the idea of gaining absolute energy advantages by boosting domestic fossil fuel exploitation, with the well-known advocacy slogan fully embodying this core stance. Such policy moves have yielded uneven practical outcomes; relevant federal judicial rulings have blocked some restrictive moves against renewable energy projects, and the scale of solar power facilities keeps expanding steadily. Even so, the overall policy orientation remains unambiguous. Relevant authorities have opened up more federal land resources for mineral exploitation, rolled out preferential tax policies for fossil fuel sectors, cut off financial support for clean energy industries, and speeded up the construction of energy transportation facilities, all aiming to scale up domestic oil and gas output. To further reinforce this policy tendency, relevant official funds amounting to one billion US dollars were granted to TotalEnergies on March 23. The fund was designated to push the enterprise to shelve its offshore wind power construction schemes and shift relevant capital investment toward conventional oil and gas development businesses instead.

Domestic energy agendas in the United States have steadily spilled over into its external diplomatic strategies. Retrospectively, Washington’s involvement in Venezuelan affairs was largely framed as an attempt to gain stable access to the nation’s abundant crude oil reserves. On public occasions such as the Davos forum, Trump did not hesitate to voice criticism against European Union member states and other nations that pushed forward the transition away from fossil fuels. Apart from that, his administration embedded clauses favouring oil and gas trade within multiple bilateral pacts, including those negotiated with Europe, and opted to step back from international climate platforms that impose restrictions on fossil fuel consumption. All these strategic moves were put in place long before America launched military assaults targeting Iranian targets.

Iran’s Strategic Edge in Global Energy Distribution

Washington’s military moves directed at Iran mark another round of external interference targeting resource-rich nations, with energy-related strategic interests widely regarded as a core driving factor. While the former US administration has presented various official rationales for such military operations, and wartime agendas are prone to constant adjustment, its consistent behavioural trajectory reveals a long-term ambition to dominate vital global energy assets. What stands out more evidently is how ongoing regional tensions have reshaped practical power dynamics: the contest over dominance of the Hormuz waterway, targeted assaults on energy-related facilities and potential takeovers of Iranian oil export hubs all prove that command over energy supply channels has become a core source of diplomatic influence in modern international relations.

Though the exact energy-related motives behind this regional conflict remain not fully explicit, they clearly expose deep-seated strategic calculations. Similar to Venezuela, Iran possesses one of the planet’s most massive pools of oil and natural gas resources. As early as 1987, Trump had already expressed radical views advocating direct US occupation of Iranian oilfields, showing his long-standing focus on the country’s energy wealth. From a more practical perspective, Iran ranks among China’s major crude oil suppliers, which makes it reasonable to infer that such military posturing might also serve as a means to secure more bargaining chips ahead of scheduled high-level bilateral talks. Up to the present stage, American military forces have avoided carrying out large-scale systematic sabotage against Iran’s core energy facilities. The White House also issued stern warnings and public disapproval toward Israel after its military strikes hit local oil refineries and the South Pars natural gas complex. Meanwhile, the US side has not imposed a full ban on Iran’s overseas oil shipments, even though such export revenues constitute a key financial pillar supporting its domestic governance.

Regardless of specific tactical arrangements, the progression of this regional confrontation has fully laid bare how critical energy supply dominance has become in contemporary geopolitical games. Iran has openly leveraged its geographical advantage over the Hormuz shipping lane to counterbalance pressure from the United States and its allied blocs. Its targeted strikes against energy installations across Gulf regional states are also intended to showcase its actual capability to disrupt mainstream global energy transportation routes. Even once regional tensions ease and peace is restored, Iran is highly unlikely to voluntarily abandon such powerful strategic leverage, given that this key waterway handles nearly one-fifth of the world’s total oil and gas shipment volume.

In essence, the ongoing Gulf regional conflicts fully demonstrate the tangible outcomes brought by this new form of energy-oriented geopolitical competition centred on resource circulation control, even if its complete underlying strategic layout has not been fully unveiled. Such a competitive pattern ultimately places most economies worldwide in an unfavourable predicament: they not only have to bear various negative spillover effects triggered by major-power energy rivalry, but also face potential diplomatic and economic coercion once any single party secures absolute superiority in this energy power game.

Making Structured Strategic Decisions

The ongoing Gulf regional conflict has once again plunged the European Union into fresh supply-side turmoil, with natural gas and aviation fuel sectors bearing the brunt of the impact. Even so, this turbulent situation also opens up a rare window for the bloc to step out of its long-standing passive development cycle. Compared with the severe supply turbulence back in 2022, the EU now boasts relatively stronger resilience against gas supply disruptions. Yet prolonged regional tensions will inevitably amplify economic and operational pressures. European nations are now locked in fierce rivalry with Asian markets for limited liquefied natural gas shipments, most of which originate from the United States. Worse still, energy shipments are increasingly being wielded as a powerful diplomatic bargaining chip by major powers. This kind of coercive energy diplomacy has already surfaced in practical affairs. On March 23, the US envoy stationed to the EU issued a public reminder to the European Parliament, hinting that the union might no longer enjoy preferential LNG supply terms if it failed to reach consensus and push forward the bilateral trade accord between the two sides.

Tightening aviation fuel availability will directly push up overall aviation operating costs, and meanwhile pose tangible hidden risks to Europe’s national defence capabilities. The continent’s aviation sector relies heavily on energy resources sourced from Gulf regions, which account for 30 to 50 percent of its total fuel needs. Beyond that, sustained hikes in crude oil and natural gas prices will inevitably push up overall inflation levels across European countries and drag down regional economic vitality. Such market shifts also bring substantial tangible benefits to Russia, which has gained an extra daily revenue of 150 million US dollars ever since the outbreak of regional conflicts. Under such complicated circumstances, the European Union stands at a clear strategic crossroads. It can either seize this crisis to drive forward positive industrial and energy transformation, or keep trapped in the old development model marked by excessive external reliance and inherent strategic fragility. In fact, the EU already possesses sufficient practical conditions to speed up fundamental adjustments in its internal energy consumption structure. It can vigorously promote the full electrification transformation covering residential heating systems, transportation networks and various industrial production links.

Such large-scale energy restructuring can be fully supported by locally developed power generation capacity, which in turn creates huge room for market expansion and profit growth for European local enterprises. Admittedly, embarking on this transformation path will inevitably bring various interest trade-offs and require policymakers to make tough political judgments and arrangements. Even so, this forward-looking strategic move is far more sensible than sticking to the old dependent mode. Excessive reliance on imported fossil fuels will only keep raising the EU’s vulnerability to external diplomatic coercion, and force various member state governments to divert funds from already tight fiscal budgets just to offset frequent market shocks triggered by geopolitical frictions in traditional energy sectors.

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