What The Ship (Ep109)| Containerships | Alliances | Updates | Tariffs & Cranes | Freedom of the Seas

Introduction on this the 109th episode of what the ship we look at the top five shipping stories and ask the question is Freedom of the Seas dead I'm your host Sal mogano welcome to today's episode so it's a little bit of a dark beginning for what the ship we're usually pretty light in levity here we're looking at ocean shipping and we can usually Find humor in everything but I got to tell you there's some ominous issues dealing with ocean shipping right now and we're going to discuss them because if you're a consumer ocean shipping and by consumer I mean anybody on the planet you're consumer of ocean shipping these are going to potentially impact you if you're new to the channel hey take a moment subscribe to the channel and hit the Bell so be alerted about new videos as they come out Story number one deals 1. Container Imports Surge, Rates Drop & Strike Looms with the potential strike on the US East Coast by the International longshoremen's Association story from Royers on September 10th us Imports surge ahead of potential Port strike so we're seeing cargo flowing into the United States in pretty record number but the fear here is that this is a tsunami of gear and Equipment coming in ahead of the October 1st deadline of the negotiation between the Ila and the US Maritime Association story from Mike Scher potential Port strike looms as us containerport brace for busy September we see the same thing in another Mike schula story strike concerns at us ports Loom large over shipping and it's across the Spectrum here Us East Coast in Focus as box spot rates nose dive this story is not just in the maritime domain news sites I'm seeing it hit the mainstream and understand should this happen should the East Coast Gulf Coast Longshore workers go on strike that has Global impact it's not just going to be the East andn Gulf Coast by any means this is going to resonate throughout the global supply chain system and what we're seeing now is everybody is frontloading their cargo getting it out and the reason we know that is you just got to look at Freight rates this is the drwy world index showing ocean shipping now this is their composite World index and it has taken A1 th000 nose dive over the past few days look over at their rates uh for around the world we see similar the Shanghai in New York Genoa Los Angeles Rotterdam all falling precipitously this is an indication that we've seen a lot of cargo coming up here in front of the potential shutdown of the East and Gulf Coast because of a looming strike and this one over at Freight waves Steward chills could East Coast Port strike spread to the West Coast the ilw this is the international Longshore Warehouse Union has pledged to support support the Ila in a contract fight if the ilw goes out on strike along with the Ila that is disaster for ocean shipping let's be clear so much of goods come in and out of the United States that if you shut just one port it has impact when Baltimore shut down Baltimore deals with two to 3% of us Imports exports if we start talking about New York New Jersey Charleston Houston Savannah La Long Beach Seattle Tacoma uh Virginia this is going to have catastrophic impact on freight and shipping it's going to cause ripples across the entire supply chain and if you have been following this story if you look at the Ila and their president daget I mean they are talking repeatedly about this and when you delve into the stories we start to see the facts this story from one of Mike SCH should a general work stoppage occur on the US Gulf and East Coast even a onewe shutdown could take four to six weeks to recover from with significant backlogs and delays compounding with each passing day that's meines this is probably one of the most ominous right here this is a usmx report about ongoing attempts to resume negotiation with the Ila on a new master contract covering the 25,000 Port workers they say despite continued Outreach the US Maritime Alliance has been unable to secure a meeting with the Ila leadership spokesman said we remain committed to resuming negotiations with the Ila on a new master contract our current offer includes industry-leading wage increases and the retention of existing technology language demonstrating our willingness to reach a new deal however the Ila is adamant that the numbers they're talking about in term of pay raise is nowhere near where they want to be and they have issues concerning automation they're worried about the fact that some of their workers may be taken out this one from Ben Hackett over at hacket Associates quote this has been this has caused some cargo owners to bring forward shipments bumping up June through September Imports and then this story over at Splash 247 quote shippers are transferring their cargo from the US East Coast to the West Coast to avoid the plan Ila strike in October resulting in a drop in demand and we're seeing that the numbers for LA and Long Beach are up at the highest level but the most disturbing has to be this quote from the Ila president Harold daget quote the Ila most definitely will hit the streets on October 1st they are not kidding this is something that should be of Paramount importance we are talking about an event that's maybe two weeks away and there has not been any intervention by the federal government to talk about a Labor uh rectification of this uh they're not even negotiating at this point and if the East Coast West Coast ports now I will note that the Ila does not represent every terminal in Port and they are not as all-encompassing as the ilw on the west coast but it doesn't matter if a few ports walk out on the East Coast you're going to have havoc and this has the potential to be the massive disruption on a scale we haven't seen in a long time the ILWU and the PMA were going back and forth forever the Ila is using language that they are adamant it sounds like they are walking out on October 1st and it doesn't appear that everyone is worried enough about it and you should be everybody should be worried about this because I think dagget and if you looking at dagget I don't think he's kidding they're going to walk on October 1st and everyone needs to get ready for this all right hopefully we get a better story number two story number two is a reshuffling of the major container liners so if you 2. Container Alliance Reshuffle follow this channel one of the things we've talked about quite a bit is that the top 10 ocean carriers in terms of containers control 85% of all the capacity at Sea those 10 companies were organized into three massive alliances not cartels don't call them cartels the companies don't want you to call them cartels they are not cartels they will tell you they are vessel sharing agreements so if you have a alone a major airline you will sometimes book a flight on American or Delta or United and then you find out well you're not really flying on them you're flying on Republic or one of these other kind of vessel sharing agreements it's it's an private Airline but they're working under the banner of the large ones that's what we have here with vessel sharing agreements now the problem is that they control a ridiculous amount of the percentage of Ocean Travel and what we're seeing is the first major reshuffle in of those in quite a while the story from Mike Scher major shipping Alliance reshuffle Premier Alliance to launch MSC unveils a standalone Network so the ocean Network Express o which actually is made up of a series of Japanese lines hmm and yang men Maritime Transportation have announced the formation of a new alliance it was the alliance but now it's going to be named the premier Alliance because Premiere is better than the the premier Alliance will field itself in February of 2025 meanwhile Mediterranean shipping company will have plans to go independent on its own although there will be some assistance another story from Mike Schuler reshuffle container Alliance networks take shape offering Suez and Cape routes so this week marisk and hog Lloyd under the Gemini cooperation has released a second draft Network plan while the alliance to be named the premier Alliance has also announced a new list of services with with MSE being independent so what do we mean this story from over at Sam Chambers references this chart from liner litica it shows you the number of weekly Services by alliances per trade so the Far East to Northern Europe you'll see who is handling those so the ocean uh Alliance the premier Alliance and msse will be handling the bulk from Far East to Northern Europe with about six to seven routes and then Gemini four you'll see on the far East of Mediterranean route it's MSC will be the dominant one on the far East to the US West Coast it will be the ocean shipping line followed closely by the premere line and then the Far East to us East Coast the ocean shipping line with the other ones in close proximity now the Gemini cooperation agreement is taken effect amid the federal Maritime commission scrutiny so this officially goes into place on Monday and this means that this cooperation hasn't really been blessed yet by the federal Maritime commission uh it was presented to them on May 31st and allows the companies to share vessels on routes it will eventually accompass seven major routes and 26 Mainline services using a hub and spoke model I have to tell you everyone I've talked to in shipping does not understand how marisk and hop hog is going to make this work the Hub and spoke method means that you're coming into main kind of transport points and then doing secondary ships out they don't quite understand how that's going to be an efficient use of their resources however they got to get past the FMC the chair of the FMC Daniel Mafi expressed concerns he said this I have questions and concerns about whether the Gemini cooperation agreement filed with the FMC has or will result in an anti-competitive consequences that violates the shipping act uh he's calling for the FMC to be engaged in immedi an ongoing rigorous monitoring of the situation meanwhile msc's CEO saurin Toof vows to stand alone as global Shipping Rivals team up Mediterranean Shipping Company plans to Brave volto shipping markets on its own now when we say Brave that understand MSC has the largest Fleet out there they have bought every container ship they can get their hands on they have a dominant role here so it's not like they're the plucky little Underdog going out there they control like 30% of of the entire market share out there so it's not like they're the Plucky little guys goes on here top says we want to be Standalone we will be in charge of our own destiny so that we can provide the speed agility and decision- making to our clients that we want now I should note that mediterian shipping company is a privately owned by the Apon family Corporation it's a mom and pop shop it's the largest mom and pop shipping outfit in the world but they are sitting there going alone sauren Toof came over from Mark lines and has since really been it at the helm here of creating a very Innovative strategy that MSC is following now when we look at how this all falls out this is what we're seeing so when you look at the Services Ocean network is remaining the same Evergreen Costco CMA CGM uh the Ali now becoming the premier Alliance Yang men hmm o NE they're losing hop hog hop hog is hopping over to marisk marisk and MSE were what were known in the 2m Alliance the 2m Alliance is going away so MSE will be on its own partnered with Zim for the Atlantic service and then meis will team up with hop hog but notice even marisk and hop hog combined don't equal msse and Zim and neither does the premier Alliance the o Alliance really finds itself in the position where it could be the dominant one and then if you look at this chart done uh over by the folks over at Transportation geography uh we see here how these alliances have evolved starting back in the 1990s they eventually became the norm by the early 2010s everybody was in an alliance initially the alliances were formed of small companies trying to tackle the larger companies but now what we see see is those three alliances the premere the ocean and Gemini all lining up with MSE on the outside this is an amazing thing to watch I have to say I just absolutely fascinated by this because I love watching the the give and take and the play here that's going on uh obviously you have a lot of monkey wrenches that are thrown into this the houthi and the Red Sea are number one this issue about the loss of Freedom of the Seas we're going to be talking about is another one uh these companies operate open registries you know Panamanian Liberian martial Island flag vessels largely they're doing it with Crews from you know a variety of different countries Philippines India Indonesia uh China and a few others uh they don't have support of navies what we're seeing here like in the Red Sea is CMA CGM under the ocean Alliance is able to run some ships through under the protection of the Marine National the French navy let's go ahead and jump over to our third story Story number three is a batch of updates 3. Updates I wanted to do because there's a lot of key stories coming out again I don't always have a time to go back and do it it's onep person show here what's going on with shipping so I don't always have the time to do it so I thought it' be perfect to capture him here so three stories off the bat number one US Coast Guard is preparing on Monday September 16th to start holding hearings on the loss of the submersible Titan Titan as you remember was the submersible that went down to Titanic suffered the catastrophic implosion five people died on board I did a lot of coverage of Titan when the event happened and now we're going to get a two- week hearing to underco uh to uh uncover facts surrounding the incident uh a lot of debate here whether or not the US Coast Guard was going to hold this because this happened in international waters on board a Canadian platform it was a Canadian ship that actually towed Titan out and did the submersible drop however Titan was built in the United States the owner was an American a corporation was offshore in Bermuda but I think it's really important that we do this because uh getting to the bottom of what happened here is important submersibles are one of the safest means of transportation and use in the world's oceans you have not seen a major accident in 60 years with ocean submersibles Titan broke the mold of that it was a radical new design that really was not properly tested or regulated in any way and I think what you're seeing here is a lot of cya covering people's butts to make sure that something like this doesn't happen again Story number three takes us up to Philadelphia and the SS United States where the owners of SS United States have filed an urgent motion against the peer operator alleging misconduct and obstruction so the SS United States Conservancy which oversees the former liner this is the ocean liner SS United States built back in 1952 the last holder of the blue Rabon for the fastest passage across the Atlantic is fighting to preserve the vessel and keep it however the birth operator has filed a motion to get the vessel off there's talk about about it being reefed and sunk however the conf Conservancy has filed a motion in District Court in eastern Pennsylvania uh concerning misconduct and obstruction they're trying to get the vessel to remain on the birth the Conservancy is making the argument that after Decades of paying our peer rent in full and on time the operator pen warehousing has brought us to the brink of losing SS United States an inspiring expression of her of her her namesakes Nation strength unity and pride there is a lot of feelings about SS United States and I am one who has one I love the SS United States I think it it was the epitome of the Merchant Marine it was the flagship of the Merchant Marine every Master whoever served on vessel came from my alma mat Maritime College uh I have a lot of feelings about the SS United States at the same time you're never going to bring this ship back to Sea again it's very unlikely you're going to be able to turn it into a museum or to a hotel of some kind the ship is absolutely gutted there's nothing that's left in the inside of her she is an empty Hull and I I just it's a sad story for me I don't want to Reef The Vessel and at the same time I don't want to scrap it I don't want it to become razor blade I sure don't want the US Navy shooting at it it just it needs a better end than this however what we had here was the pier kind of forcing the issue so it's a big question about what eventually happens our last update goes over to the Panama Canal where the Panama Canal unveiled strategies to combat El Nino induced drought we are back up to full operations at the Panama Canal rain is a fallen uh it's all good in the canal however the potential for this to happen again is there I should note that there was a video that just came out from Mega projects on the Panama Canal I love Simon Winchester the guy who does that series it's great but serious errors in that video I got to say I I I I have to challenge it maybe time for better call Sal video on it I I just have to get the time to delve into it and take a look at it but the Panama Canal is dealing with this issue of drought The Authority has introduced the long-term slot allocation method allowing companies to purchase Transit slots uh for over a year the canal has operated below capacity they are now back up to capacity but one of the things they have to do is Implement long-term social and environmental strategies uh they have to include land and registry and title programming in the wet wed as well as AGR forestry and Forest protection initiatives uh the problem was everybody knew the canal was going to use more water that was clear that's why they put the containment Wells uh and lakes and ponds for the new can for the new new uh locks uh they aim to catch 80% of the water the problem is they only caught 50% of the water and then you have a drought and not enough water in the canal so they've got to do better at Water Management all right let's go ahead and jump over to Story number four so Story number four I started this channel in 2021 with the grounding of everg given in the Suz and one of the 4. Chinese Tariffs and Cranes first major stories that I covered after ever given was the global supply chain crisis and I kind of hate that I started when I did because there is a lot of Shipping News going on before this and the one issue that really captivated ocean shipping prior to that was the implementation of tariffs by the Trump Administration back in the 2018 and it created havoc in Ocean shipping and we may be seeing that again this story from Reuters Trump plans to height tariffs would spike shipping costs just like in 2018 story has this quote from Peter Sans the chief analyst over at zentia absolute must follow if you're on LinkedIn follow Peter he is just a a treasure of information he says this quote Trump's import tariffs are history repeating and will cause a spike in ocean container shipping markets with consumers picking up the costs goes on down here the national retail Federation said this tariffs are attacks on Imports operating like a sales tax wearing a mediocre uh disguise goes on here Matt Prix CEO of footware Distributors and retailers of America we're the poster child of how tariffs did not keep American domestic production in place pointing out that 99% of shoes are now imported we will be out there engaging with policy members and discussing how tariffs are paid by americ consumers story goes on Ocean shipping Market rates Spike More than 70% after the Trump Administration announced new tariffs in 2018 off-contract spot rates to ship a 40ft container from China to the West Coast jumped 75% to 264 between January 1 and November one of that year goes on down here ocean Freight rates are already elevated due to the ongoing Iran back houthi attacks on ships near the Suz Canal the that pressure combined with a recent surge in Holiday goods and Industrial material Imports recently sent the cost to Ferry a 40ft container from Shanghai to New York to $10,000 now as you know from the first story ocean Freight rates are plummeting down right now so we're seeing them fall but again we've got a political election on the horizon we've got a strike on the horizon so if you think about it for a second October 1st you may see an East and Gulf Coast strike you may see a presidential election in November that's going to result in the return of President Trump meaning tariffs are on the horizon I I mean if you think you know what's going to happen to Ocean shipping and ocean Freight rates nobody knows because there are too many variables at play What's the Ila going to do what's going to happen in this presidential election we just don't know and let's be clear too some of these tariffs are still in place because they weren't removed by the Biden Administration so we don't know if the Harris Administration would remove them there are just so many questions out there and if you want that example here's this reuter story from September 13th us locks in steep China tariff hikes the Biden Administration on Friday locked in steep tariff hikes on Chinese Imports including a 100% Duty on electrical vehicles to strengthen production for strategic domestic industries from China's State driven excess production capacity goes on here L brainer the top White House economic adviser told Reuters that the decision was made to ensure that the US EV industry diversifies away from China's dominant supply chain same time we're seeing this the final tariff decision does not provide some temporary relief for us Port operators who are facing a new 25% tariff on massive ship the Shore cranes we're going to talk about this story in a minute an industry that China dominates with no us producers the duty would add millions of dollars to the cost of each of these cranes that story is related to this one the house committee warns of Chinese crane threats to the US Port security a joint investigative report released today by the house committee on homeland security has revealed significant cyber security and National Security vulnerabilities in US ports due to the dominance of Chinese made container cranes the report highlights the risk posed by shanghai's zpmc a Chinese state-owned Enterprise that accounts for nearly 80% of ship to shore cranes in the US this is the report that was put out by the committee I actually got an early version of this I was able to read through it understand the big issue with the cranes is this it's not that they're made in China it's that some of these cranes were being delivered with modems and uplinks installed in them that the operators knew nothing about they were not in the specifications they were not included there was a investigation in these cranes coming into Baltimore a few years ago where they investigated and found these modems installed in the cranes that were providing Uplink information to zpmc which was a stold company by the Chinese government and you know since then people have gone back through all the the cranes in the US to find these and remove them but you know when you have 80% of these cranes built in in China that means spare parts Machinery uh software updates all that stuff has got to come from One Source if you become wholly dependent on one source for your cranes that's a problem and if there was uplinks that control these cranes all you got to do is knock out a few cranes and you cause Havoc across the United States ports and so this investigation was done so you've got tariffs you got these Port you got these crane issues there is so much going on right here that we're talking about looming on the horizon and again and I keep telling everybody there's so much we need to be aware of when it comes to Ocean shipping all right let's go ahead to our last story and discuss whether or not Freedom of the Seas is dead this 5. Is Freedom of the Seas Dead? story deals with the death of Freedom of the Seas now that's a bit overdramatic uh Freedom of the Seas is not going away anytime soon but it is being challenged and when Hugo grus in 1609 wrote May Liam free ocean the concept was we were going to develop the world's oceans into a common you know the blue Commons where everyone could share and use them and there's a lot of debate about whether or not we've ever achieved that entirely the houthi are interdicting trade uh right now there are allegations that the US interdicts trade all the time by leveling sanctions against Iran and Venezuela and Korea and so there's a lot of debate whether or not the seas are free but what we're seeing right now are issues that are really raising the concern about whether or not the seas are not even free but they're losing what Freedom they do have so this story over at Splash 247 condemnation Reigns in over Russian strike on Greek bulker in the Black Sea had this story the other day about the attack on the a a bulk carrier coming out of Ukraine that was struck by the Russians as4 kitchen missile fired from a tu22 backfire bomber is this red storm Rising I'm living in now it's kind of strange Mike Schuler followed up that story with Russian missile strike on civilian ship in Black escalates Maritime tension uh can I also say something too I've been dealing with this issue quite a bit a as4 kitchen with a th000 kilogram Warhead would do exactly that damage to a bulk carrier a bulk carrier is carrying 27,000 tons of wheat it hit a cargo hold full of 5,000 tons of wheat that is 50 feet of wheat I I mean that missile is not going to go screaming through wheat and come out the bottom I mean it's going to hit it like concrete uh not surprising the damage you saw and again I know I got all my Russian Ukrainian people going back and forth on this video I am just worried about the crew of a St kits anas flagged vessel coming out of Ukraine and sailing that area anyway sorry a little bit off track meanwhile over in the Red Sea the eternal flame that is the tanker so Union continues to burn since August 21st August 21st it is September 13th I'm filming this August 2 over 3 weeks this ship has been burning there's been a salvage attempt to get it it failed and now a new Salvage attempt is being taken however this has the potential to dump a million gallons of crude oil into the Red Sea let's not forget it was the houthis who not only attacked this vessel but went on board it twice and detonated explosives on it thereby causing the disaster that would befall not just them but all the countries in the Red Sea meanwhile we have issues like this oil spilled fears Mount as Russian tankers reject key Danish Pilots tankers haing Russian crew heading through Straits between Denmark Sweden and Norway they are rejecting taking pilots on board the 3 months through July 20% of the Shadow Fleet tankers moving Russian oil through the D Danish Straits declined the help of experts who know the local Waters that proportion is increased from 4% a year earlier this is one of the narrowest little Straits in the world a very tight passage sailed through it before heading into the Baltic tankers going through there without Pilots is a recipe of disaster and the dark Fleet tankers of the Russian calling Russian crude oil don't have the best track record out there right now and this seems to be a issue emerging here at the same time up in the Arctic you have two Chinese container ships crossing paths in the Arctic Waters this is a pretty dramatic event here as two vessels come out the Flying Fish one the first ever panamax container ship to venture in the Arctic is traveling from St Petersburg to Ching da the other vessel is the newno star it's transporting 3,534 teus now you should note these are not big container ships they are also ice strengthened container ships so these are not container ships that you just pull off the world's oceans and do but this route that you're seeing here is remarkably shorter than the route around uh Indian Ocean Red Sea or around Africa uh it has its issues with the fact that you need ice breakers especially in some of these key areas here where there is a lot of ice density but it is representing A new challenge that the Russians may have with the opening of the Northern sea route then you have the North Korean leader emphasizing the importance of strengthening Naval power Jong-un emphasized the importance of strengthening Naval power during a tour of a naval base now that we are soon to possess large surface warships and submarines which cannot be anchored by the existing facilities for Mooring warships the construction of a naval base for running the largest large warship has become a pressing task understand we are already seeing the houthi interdicting shipping we've seen the Iranians interdict shipping coming out of The Straits of Hormuz we're seeing the Russians operating a dark Fleet we're seeing the Russians attacking shipping coming out of Ukraine what if Kim Jong-un the most level-headed man in the world decides to start attacking ships in the Sea of Japan and decide to announce that the Sea of Japan is no longer the Sea of Japan it's now the Sea of Korea and they exert their dominance preventing the flow of ships from The Straits of tashima up through the Japanese home AES now not a big deal shipping will just divert around Japan out into the Pacific but it will cost money it is a long longer Voyage to do that it represents risk and should we allow Korea to exert their dominance over this region that's the concern you have at the same time too let's not forget what's happening down in the South China Sea 60 Minutes is running a special on Sunday about the Chinese Navy and Coast Guard versus the Philippine Coast Guard and navy understand we have an Alliance treaty the United States with the Philippines this event down in the South China Sea has the potential to expand at the same time China is strengthening its grip on global Shipping Sam Chambers over spash 247 with a great story talking about how China is reactivating closed shipyards they're combining together shipyards China's on the brink of building more than half of the world's oceangoing vessels over 50% soon they're going to Eclipse Korea and Japan combined and the rest of the world that is a significant development at the same time you have op-eds like this why can't the US build ships deals with the issue that the US is just floundering in its ability not just to build commercial vessels but having problems building Naval vessels you have the US Navy withdrawing forces this an article about the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt leaving the Middle East understand the US had two aircraft carriers in the Middle East the Abraham Lincoln and theer Roosevelt it had an amphibious ready group The Wasp group up in the Mediterranean yet when the Eisen how battle group pulled out after a lot of press talking about that this is the most combat a US aircraft carrier strike group has ever undertaken since World War II nobody went back into the Red Sea to stopped the houthi the Roosevelt didn't the Lincoln did it and so what you get are the houie and trolls in my opinion coming out and saying that they vanquished the Eisenhower they made the Eisenhower run the US Navy is too scared this is policy this is Administration level stuff this is not the US n if you ask the US Navy to go in and hit the houth they're going to go hit the houthis I guarantee you that they want to hit the houth this is Administration issues they have decided to abgate us defense in the area which I talked about from the very beginning if you try to defend everything you defend nothing sunu and instead they have turned this over to the European Union the European union doesn't have enough forces to do this which I kind of raise questions about because part of the European Navy is over in the fraking Pacific two German Navy ships just sailed through the Taiwan Straits on Friday in an effort to demonstrate the fact that China doesn't control the Taiwan Straits there's no the Chinese aren't stopping anyone from sailing through the Taiwan Straits when you do a freedom of navigation exercise through the Taiwan Straits who are you demonstrating freedom of navigation to pisses the Chinese off it makes you bump your chest like hey we sailed through the Taiwan Straits if the Europeans who have a ton of ships in the Pacific right now including an Italian carrier strike group never thought I would say that phrase an Italian carrier strike group is in the Pacific if the Europeans want to practice freedom of navigation I've got a place for you to go it's called the Red Sea the Gulf of Aiden and the Bob El MAV cheers there's a place you can actually do live fire tests in the region and actually may be able to get War risk insurance down or at the very least help escort European Union us U UK vessels through the region set up some convoys and run them through diminish the war risk costs and actually open up a maritime choke point and get some ocean shipping going through it 15% of the world's shipping goes through that area in terms of cargo and you have diverted at least half if not 2third of it around Africa 7 to 10 % of World Trade is being diverted by The houthi Who are not the recognized government of Yemen they're recognized by a very small handful of countries yet they have decided to execute a maritime strategy and are forcing the world ships to divert around the area let's be clear of the ships they have attacked only a third of them a third can be linked back to Israel they're doing their Six Degrees of Separation to Kevin bacon to try to connect every ship back to Israel they're they they're contortionists when it comes to this well that ship from that company five years ago went into Israel therefore this ship is liable for attack okay you're stretching that a bit just to be clear okay everybody knows you're stretching it you can make the argument all you want but you're stretching it you're you're really kind of silly puttying this whole argument yet the US UK and European Korean Japanese all the major players out there are abating this and allowing this to happen meanwhile if you want to ask what's keeping ship owners up at night Sam Chambers with this fantastic story talking about this issue what are the issues that you that ship owners around the world are concerned about and what you see is this this is the graph that they put together Maritime leaders perception of risk against shipping abilities to address the risk in 23 2024 what's the risk versus the lowest confidence political instability that's what they're worried about political instability followed by cyber attacks and malicious physical attacks that is the Red Sea that is what we've seen being executed by the Russians and the Chinese that is the concern that is out there what are they not really worried about they have lowrisk high confidence epidemics pandemics industry reputation extreme weather events they can handle that they know how to handle that everything else supply chain instability Financial instability administrative burdens regulation barriers to trade they're medium risk but they are figuring out how to handle them but they don't have quite as much confidence in how to handle them and I think that's a telling demonstration what is the thing they worry about more than anything else geopolitical instability cyber attacks and physical attacks on their vessels that's it and you know know who's supposed to provide that defense Nations and navies however before you shipping companies think you get off scotf free with this you have decided to basically incorporate offshore you have decided to flag your vessels in Nations without navies listen if you flag yourself in the Cayman Islands the Cayman Island Navy which I think is a roboat of some kind is not coming to get you understand that there is this issue now where we have to kind of rethink how doing ocean shipping the idea of the free sea versus the closed sea is no longer I think applicable we need a new thought because the idea of what flag you fly off the back of the ship may not be the one that is important anymore it may not be just who owns the ship anymore because trying to figure out who owns a fraking ship is nearly impossible ask the houi because they get it wrong on a consistent basis because it's not clear the other issue you have is well then do you protect the trade what cargo is on the ship because if you're protecting the cargo that's a whole different issue because a 12,000 box container ship that's cargo from everybody around the world and the real big question is what do we do then to do this do we need to create a world tax to fund a world Navy I'm not advocating that don't that's not Sal's suggestion don't don't delete that from this video it's a terrible idea we need to rethink how we do things and some Nations I will say are starting to think about that of all places Australia my hats off to the Australians Australia seeks commercial vessels for strategic Fleet the Australian G government has announced a tender for vessels to participate in the Strategic Fleet pilot program a five-year initiative aimed at strengthening the nation's Maritime capabilities and resilience three private vessels operated commercially but available to the government for requisition in National Emergency according to the honorable Katherine King uh Min uh Minister for infrastructure transport Regional development and local government can I just say great title I like that title a lot I wish we had Minister for infrastructure transport Regional development and local government she said this this is a major step toward fulfilling our commitment to establish a strategic Fleet of up to austral 12 Australian flagged and crew vessels to strengthen our Sovereign Maritime capability while supporting a maritime Workforce listen you can go for the foreign flag flag foreign owned foreign registered vessel all you want but understand the world seas are not as free as we think thought they were they are coming under more and more threats and attacks than ever governments navies militaries politicians you name it need to protect them in a way that we haven't been used to we're used to the Open Seas we're used to being able to gloat our Goods on a Filipino Mann Panamanian Flag vessel and it's going to come across the ocean with no problem and it's going to dirt cheap and we love every minute of that because we can buy the the goods without a lot of Transportation costs that may not be the case which means Transportation costs are going to go up which means inflation's going to go up which means we may see reshoring of some uh manufacturing or nearshoring in some ways we be becoming on a new age of Ocean trade routes Peter uh Philip Parker's book back here trade routes one of my favorites talks about all sorts of trade routs both on land and at Sea we may be at one of those inflection points coming ahead here maybe we need to be thinking about new ways to do things New Missions for navies and coast guards out there what roles should they be playing should we require ships to be registered in countries that can provide defense for them maybe the international Maritime organization should get off their ass in Geneva and actually start passing some laws and rules and regulations that actually do something to help defend vessels and the Mariners on them I don't no crazy idea but that's what I am thinking that's a lot to process I hope you enjoyed today's episode if you did hey take a moment subscribe to the channel and hit the Bell so be alerted about new videos as they come out leave a comment share it across social media and if you can support the page why should you support the page because this takes a long time to put together it's not easy that's a lot of information right there and to edit it put it together takes me time and I appreci all the support I get to the page how do you support the page well you hit that super thanks button down below or head on over to patreon and become a monthly yearly subscriber until our next episode and hopefully freedom of the sea still exists the sou signing off