The news, as it so often does these days, arrives with an air of déjà vu. Three Indian sailors with British connections are missing, and the Royal Navy is monitoring a tanker attack in the Gulf of Oman. One wonders if we are witnessing the prologue to a new chapter of imperial decline or merely a footnote in the saga of globalised maritime chaos.
The incident, involving the tanker 'Bilbao', is a reminder that the seas, once the arteries of the British Empire, are now contested arteries of a lawless world. The sailors’ fate hangs in the balance, and the Royal Navy, reduced to a shadow of its former glory, appears more as a spectator than a policeman. This is not the first attack in these waters, and it will not be the last.
The usual suspects—pirates, insurgents, or state-sponsored proxies—are likely involved, but the deeper narrative is one of a world order fraying at the edges. The British link here is tenuous, yet it speaks to a post-colonial diaspora where questions of loyalty and belonging are constantly renegotiated. As a contrarian, I ask: why should we care?
Because the absence of these men underscores our collective impotence. The Victorian era would have sent a gunboat; today, we send monitors and statements of concern. The decadence of our time is measured in the gap between our rhetoric and our reach.
The memories of empire linger, but the muscle has atrophied. Let us not pretend that flag-waving or finger-pointing at Iran or others will bring these sailors home. They are pawns in a larger game of geopolitical chess, and the Royal Navy’s presence is a futile gesture.
We must face the reality that our control over global sea lanes is eroding, and with it, our sense of security. The missing sailors are a symptom, not the disease.
