From Malacca to Taiwan: China’s chokepoint problem

The conflict in the Middle East has triggered an unprecedented disruption to global energy markets. While the world economy has faced several energy crises in the recent past, the current prices have been made worse by a combination of extensive damage to major oil and gas facilities in the region and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a 40km-wide maritime passage that connects the Gulf countries with the rest of the world. 

During normal times, around 100 ships engaged in maritime trade pass this critical junction each day. Since the start of March, this has dropped to almost zero, due to the threats made by Iran to attack ships and the presence of sea mines. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz has trapped hundreds of ships inside the Gulf and, more importantly, cut off countries across the world from essential energy supplies (e.g., oil, LNG, fuel) and other critical goods (e.g., fertiliser).  

The effects are particularly acute for countries in Asia, which rely disproportionately on energy supplies from the Gulf. The closure of the Strait has therefore caused havoc to regional economies. For instance, the Philippines, which imports around 98% of its oil from the Middle East, was the first country to declare a national energy emergency on 26 March after petrol prices in the country more than doubled after the start of the conflict. 

The ongoing tension in and around the Strait of Hormuz has reignited attention and debates about the criticality of maritime chokepoints — narrow sea passages that facilitate huge volumes of global trade — and the various threats to these critical junctures.

To understand these present-day issues, it is worth exploring historical and emerging security threats to maritime chokepoints. In this article, I will focus on the Asia-Pacific region, home to some of the most critical chokepoints globally, including the Strait of Malacca, the Strait of Taiwan, and several straits across the Indonesian archipelago, which have long faced security threats. 

The recognition of the importance of maritime chokepoints is not a new phenomenon. With the proliferation of global trade and imperial expansion in the 16th and 17th centuries, securing safe passages through key maritime chokepoints became a key concern for seagoing nations. In 1904, the British admiral John Fisher proclaimed his country’s naval supremacy by stating that  “Five keys lock up the world! Singapore, the Cape, Alexandria, Gibraltar, Dover. These five keys belong to England”. 

In Southeast Asia, the Strait of Malacca has long been a focal point of this struggle for control. The Portuguese seized the trading post of Malacca (1511) to dominate the spice trade, followed by the Dutch in 1641 and later the British, who also expanded their position in the region by taking control of Penang and through the establishment of Singapore. Control over these ports meant influence over valuable trade flows from the Far East to the West. The strategic importance of the Strait of Malacca has also attracted non-state actors. 

In the 18th and 19th centuries, piracy was endemic in the region. In the 19th century, the British Navy frequently engaged in naval campaigns to suppress pirate activity. But the threat of piracy persisted: the Strait of Malacca accounted for a significant share of global piracy incidents in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. This even put into question the long-term competitiveness of Singaporean and Malaysian ports compared to regional ports located further away from the Strait; something quite unimaginable given the global importance of ports like Singapore, Port Klang, Tanjung Pelepas and the Port of Belawan. These episodes point to the consistent security threats to vital chokepoints like Malacca across modern history.  

With the emergence of the Asia-Pacific region in the world economy, in particular China, the global dependency on maritime chokepoints has also grown. Today, around 80% of global trade by volume is transported by sea, and a large share of Asia’s trade flows through a handful of critical passages. In value terms, roughly one-fifth of global maritime trade transits the Taiwan Strait and the Malacca Strait, underscoring their central role in linking East Asia to Europe, the Middle East, and the western part of the continent.  

These dependencies differ, however, across countries, depending on the set of trading partners and commodity composition. China, Japan and South Korea rely heavily on the Taiwan Strait for both export flows and imports of raw materials, while South and Southeast Asian economies, including India, Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia, depend on the Malacca Strait as their main maritime gateway. 

Beyond these headline routes, the Asia-Pacific region hosts a dense network of secondary chokepoints across the Indonesian archipelago, such as the Sunda, Lombok and Makassar Straits, as well as the Korea Strait and Luzon Strait. While these often offer alternative routes, they are not without risk, and disruptions can result in costly rerouting.  

The Asia-Pacific’s maritime chokepoints are increasingly exposed to a complex mix of geopolitical and security risks, many of which are intensifying simultaneously. Dominant among these is the rise of great power rivalry, particularly between the US and China.

Key corridors such as the South China Sea, East China Sea and the Strait of Malacca are at the centre of their strategic competition. Key maritime waterways are not only vital for trade but also for military reach, as emphasised by US military involvement to secure the Strait of Hormuz and recent US claims to the Panama Canal. In the Asia-Pacific, similar tensions could raise the risk of maritime chokepoints becoming contested in times of crisis.

At a regional level, tensions between neighbouring states further heighten security risks to chokepoints. Maritime disputes in the South China Sea, where China’s claims overlap with those of countries such as Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia, create persistent uncertainty for commercial shipping. Similarly, tensions around Taiwan and the Senkaku Islands increase the likelihood of escalation in the East China Sea. Other risks also remain prevalent. Piracy and armed robbery continue to affect busy routes like the Malacca Strait. Together, these overlapping risks underline how Asia-Pacific chokepoints are becoming increasingly fragile nodes in global trade.

A disruption to any of the key Asia-Pacific maritime chokepoints will be felt across the region. China is most at risk in terms of the absolute amount of trade flowing through these chokepoints, with 24% and 29% of China’s maritime exports going through the Malacca and Taiwan Straits, respectively, and 37% and 58% of the country’s maritime imports. As such, any disruption, and the resulting delays and potential production shortfalls, could have a major impact on Chinese manufacturing output, and therefore the rest of the world. Such impacts would be even larger if a local disruption were to spill over across the region, blocking multiple major shipping lanes and ports. 

For China, there is one alternative to bypass critical chokepoints like Malacca, Suez and Gibraltar: the Northern Sea Route. In 2018, China published its Arctic policy, also dubbed the “Polar Silk Road” (as an extension of its Belt and Road Initiative), in which it outlines its ambition to develop Arctic shipping lines and make infrastructure investments in the region. 

In the last ten years, several Chinese cargo ships have made the journey through the Arctic during the months with low ice coverage and accompanied by multiple ice breakers. In October 2025, the container ship Istanbul Bridge completed what resembled a liner schedule, leaving the Ningbo-Zhoushan Port and calling at ports in the UK, Netherlands, Germany and Poland before heading back to China. This so-called “Arctic Express” cuts the time to reach Europe’s main ports from China by half. And with climate change causing the further retreat of sea ice, this route could become a viable alternative for a longer time window through the year. 

Yet from a logistics point of view, travel time alone does not determine shipping networks. Furthermore, the connectivity with other shipping lines plays a crucial role, ensuring that containers can be transhipped to smaller ports or by other major routes. This makes Arctic shipping less appealing.

Still, for China, having a polar alternative to the conventional route to Europe, alongside the ongoing investments in land corridors through Pakistan, Myanmar and Eastern Europe, is key to handling geopolitical uncertainty that manifests itself at chokepoints in the Asia-Pacific region or elsewhere. And the situation in the Strait of Hormuz will only accelerate China’s ambition.

Related: Polar Silk Road: China’s plan B for global trade | What if the Taiwan Strait were blockaded?