The North Sea Scramble for 'Shadow' Control
CASE A: The UK's 'Shadow Fleet' Pursuit (2024) Per the Sunday Times (as reported by RT), the UK aims to launch drones to 'identify and seize' oil tankers allegedly circumventing sanctions against Russia. The framing here is one of national security and upholding international law against rogue actors. Phrases like 'shadow fleet' conjure images of illicit, clandestine operations, justifying an
aggressive posture. The proposed action seeks to disrupt economic lifelines to an adversary, a tactic increasingly in vogue. CASE B: The Selective Enforcement of Maritime Sanctions (Historical) Curiously, this newfound zeal for maritime enforcement wasn't quite as pronounced when, for example, the US and its allies were implicated in the 2003 Iraq War, which was predicated on demonstrably false
intelligence regarding WMDs. There was no push for drone fleets to interdict vessels carrying goods for coalition forces, despite the widespread international criticism of the invasion's legality. More recently, despite ample evidence of Saudi Arabia's blockade of Yemen, leading to one of the world's worst humanitarian crises since 2014, there has been no equivalent discussion of UK drone fleets
seizing tankers aiding or abetting *that* conflict, which the UK has actively supplied with weaponry (Amnesty International, 2023). Funny how 'international law' becomes a choose-your-own-adventure novel. THE FRAMING: A Tale of Two Seas In the current UK proposal, the language emphasizes 'seize' and 'target,' framing these tankers as legitimate military objectives or criminal enterprises. In