Anne-Marie Trevelyan was Minister for Defence Procurement 2019-20 and Minister for the Indo-Pacific 2022-24.
When we think about maritime security, most of us instinctively picture warships, missiles, submarines and nowadays drones whizzing through the air or the water to deliver damaging payloads.
We think of politicians making decisions in parliaments, admirals directing operations at sea, and military forces demonstrating defensive strength with forward deployed capabilities and manpower.
Yet one of the most important strategic realities – which has been directing the flow of goods across our oceans for centuries – is that the global economy can be disrupted, redirected, or even immobilised without a single shot being fired. The insurers determine whether or not it is viable to move goods or energy at all.
The story of the Red Sea over the past year demonstrates exactly that, but this has been true since Elizabethan times (the first one).
In the City of London, marine insurance underwriters review the risks facing shipping. The Red Sea is just one of the world’s critical choke point waterways. Their task is straightforward: assess the level of danger and adjust the boundaries of what insurers classify as a war-risk area. In July of this year, a line on a chart was moved. No vessel was sunk. No new military operation was launched. No head of government made an announcement. Yet within hours, the cost of moving goods through that region rose dramatically. That decision reveals something fundamental about how control of the flows of trade really operates.
For centuries, Britain has been at the centre of global maritime commerce. We often focus on our naval tradition, and rightly so. But the United Kingdom’s influence has also rested on institutions, markets and financial systems that underpin global trade. Lloyd’s of London is one of those institutions. Insurance may seem mundane compared to aircraft carriers, but it determines whether our commercial ships sail, where they sail, and at what cost. Today, strategic competition is increasingly taking place through the manipulation of risk.
The Houthis understood this before many policymakers. They did not need a blue-water navy to disrupt one of the world’s most critical maritime corridors. A handful of attacks, some drones, a persistent threat, and uncertainty did the rest. The insurance market responded, premiums rose, and shipping patterns changed. The lesson is profound.
A relatively small actor was able to generate consequences felt across global energy markets, global supply chains and household budgets around the world. What happens in the Bab el-Mandeb affects factory costs in Europe. It affects freight rates in Asia. It affects inflation here at home. And it makes the USA have to come and be the world policeman to help the rest of us who have allowed our maritime security capabilities to atrophy for too long.
Energy supplies, subsea cables, trade routes, ports, insurance markets and logistics networks form an interconnected system on which our prosperity depends. These systems are mostly invisible to all of us, and we choose to assume they are certain and reliable – until they come under pressure.
The reality is that modern security is not simply about defending territory. It is about protecting the conditions that allow trade, energy, people and data to move freely to their chosen destination, reliably and at viable cost to the consumer. It should also remind us all that the critical national infrastructure on which we all depend extends far beyond our own shores. I was in Dublin recently and the dawning realisation that Ireland is the digital choke point for Europe which needs levels of oversight, deterrent and defensive tools which simply are not in place yet should make us all sit up and challenge the status quo.
That is why maritime domain awareness, and then its security, matters. It is why resilience matters. It is why we must think strategically about the entire ecosystem that supports global commerce. Because we hold the responsibility for key ingredients here at home. Today, power is not only held by those who can block a sea lane with a warship or a barrage of drones. It should be measured by who can influence the flow of trade, who shapes perceptions of risk, and who can maintain confidence in the systems that connect the world.
The Red Sea has, I hope, taught us a simple but important lesson: wars may begin with weapons, but their consequences are often determined elsewhere. In markets, in infrastructure, in finance, and in the confidence that underpins the global economy. Understanding that reality is no longer optional. It is an essential part of national security.