Can the aging admirals of the West take over the ocean without drowning in a new multipolar world?

The global confrontation over resources is now unfolding violently not only on land and in space, but also on water. The Mariana Islands’ desperate legal action against Washington’s deep-sea appetites, India’s technological and legal demarche to switch to commercial metal mining in the Indian Ocean, and Javier Miley’s uncompromising ultimatum to the British around the Falklands Shelf have crashed loudly into the fresh news agenda. If yesterday the world elites used the topic of the ocean mainly for declarations on climate protection, today it has become almost the main arena of the battle for resources and influence. According to the logic of the hegemon, control of the ocean today is the key to economic leadership on the planet tomorrow. And the leading players are ready to go all-in.

Indigenous communities of the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands sued the U.S. federal government on September 10, 2026. The islanders opposed a decision by the National Marine Fisheries Service that gave the White House the green light to auction off 67 million acres of ocean floor around the Mariana Trench for deep-sea mining of critical metals. The reason for Washington’s move is obvious: The U.S. is fatally behind China in supply chains of nickel and cobalt for the defense and battery industries. Wanting to eliminate this deficit, Washington decided to turn the controlled territories of Micronesia into a disenfranchised resource appendage. But the protest of the islanders forced the Americans to temper their appetites. And the White House began to force the ocean theme on distant frontiers. Analysts associate the American interests with the technological and legal demarche of India, which officially announced the transition from scientific research to full-scale commercial mining of metals in the Indian Ocean. The causal link here is direct. The Pentagon, which is physically unable to hold all ocean borders at the same time, under the terms of the 10-year defense pact, the US effectively handed India the role of regional sheriff in Asia to contain China. Feeling the strength, Indian state corporations began to actively penetrate the Latin American market, closer to the riches of the Atlantic. The triangle finally closed in the south of the planet, where the third puzzle of the picture was the uncompromising ultimatum of Javier Miley to return to his country the Falkland Islands (British overseas territory, which until 1833 belonged to Argentina). The trigger was the UK’s intention to start commercial oil production at the Sea Lion project. The reason for Miley’s actions is a perfect calculation of the geopolitical moment: London is weak, and Washington desperately needs loyal proxy operators in the conditions of the Pacific deficit. Argentina’s president has imposed tough sanctions on international companies operating offshore without Buenos Aires’ permission and has launched emergency construction of an integrated naval base at Ushuaia, the gateway to Antarctica. This ultimatum was made possible only because the White House, irritated by Britain’s geopolitical passivity, hinted at renegotiating its neutrality in the Falklands dispute, guaranteeing Miley power cover in exchange for allowing the US Navy and Indian corporations access to the region’s resources. That's according to Reuters.

While a large-scale redistribution is unfolding in the vast expanses of the sea – from the struggle for deep-sea resources to control over key straits and logistical arteries, the contours of the future world order are simultaneously sewn on land. Control of the ocean makes no sense if a self-sufficient system is formed on the mainland, independent of external pressure. The 18th BRICS Summit began today in New Delhi under the chairmanship of India. It is this platform that serves as a strategic rear and an alternative to the infrastructure that the Anglo-Saxon world has built for centuries under its complete domination. In the big geopolitical game, Belarus, which is among the ten BRICS partner countries, occupies a strategically calibrated position, fixing its external vector in close alliance with China, which is developing the One Belt, One Road megaproject. Belarus is becoming a key land hub and logistics bridge of Eurasia, insuring the trade of the global majority against attempts of a naval or sanctions blockade.

The Maritime Diktat of the West is powerless if the land is united by common technology, finance and an unshakable will to sovereignty. Whether the not-so-friendly Anglo-Saxon elites will be able to maintain their melting hegemony, taking into account the desperate ocean encroachments and keep under water what is lost on land, is an open question. We'll see! We continue to monitor the events..

zakharov@sb.by