Choke Point - Historical Examples

Historical Examples

Some historical examples of the tactical use of choke points are King Leonidas's defense of the Pass of Thermopylae during an invasion led by Xerxes I of Persia, William Wallace's victory over the English at the Battle of Stirling Bridge (Wallace had around 2,300 men against the English army of about 9,000 to 12,000 men and the bridge collapsed during the battle), and the Battle of Agincourt, where Henry V of England decisively defeated the French when they were forced to attack his smaller army through a narrow gap in the Agincourt Woods. It was the suitability of the Caribbean as a chokepoint that attracted pirates and buccaneers during the 17th century. The Spanish treasure fleets leaving the Americas would need to pass this way in order to pick up the strong, prevailing, westerly winds that would take them back to Spain.

The most important naval choke points were first identified by John Fisher in his defense of continued British colonialism (important colonies in parentheses):

• Hormuz Strait between Oman and Iran at the entrance to the Persian Gulf
• Strait of Malacca between Malaysia and Indonesia
• Bab-el-Mandeb passage from the Arabian Sea to the Red Sea (Yemen and Socotra)
• Panama Canal and the Panama Pipeline connecting the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans (British Honduras)
• Suez Canal and the Sumed Pipeline connecting the Red Sea and Mediterranean Sea (Egypt)
• The Turkish Straits/Bosporus linking the Black Sea (and oil coming from the Caspian Sea region) to the Mediterranean (Turkey)
• The Strait of Gibraltar (Gibraltar)
• Cape Horn (Chile)
• The Cape of Good Hope (South Africa)

The Fulda Gap was seen as one of the decisive bottleneck battlegrounds of the Cold war in Germany.