Historically, isn't that a "stormier" route? As the euphemism "Cape of Good Hope" replaced the "Cape of Storms".

Also, I think shipping is about to get more expensive, I guess.

> Historically, isn't that a "stormier" route?

I'm no expert, but I think it makes a huge difference whether you're in a flimsy, wooden ship with even flimsier sails made of cloth, or in a 400m long, extremely massive steel vessel with a reliable internal combustion engine.

Vs. storms at sea it's not a major difference, and if anything the sail boat is in better shape. The real advantage is accurate weather reports to avoid the worst of it.

> if anything the sail boat is in better shape

Why? That sounds implausible. Firstly, the larger a ship, the less affected it is by waves. Secondly, high winds will shred your sails, but without sails it's hard to maneuver .

The problem with Ever Given was exactly the "sail area", since it was a big boat [1]. You can check videos of container ships in storms on Youtube.

[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/sail-area

I did. They seem to be doing fine, even in waves which could have swallowed an entire sailing ship.

Territorial waters extend 12 nautical miles (22 km) from a coastline.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Convention_on_t...

Also this would be innocent passage anyways.

And that's how you'd get a nice, friendly visit from the Sixth Fleet.

"Knock knock. It's the United States. With huge boats. With guns. Gunboats."

The US navy has a proud tradition of gunboat diplomacy going back at least as far as commodore Perry and the opening of japan.

That's indeed the reference, yep: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Mh5LY4Mz15o

Well, that would trigger some Freedom of Navigation Operations.

If I were South Africa I would make sure that this route is as attractive as possible.

That would be illegal and if they attempted to enforce it they would be engaging in piracy.