Qatari Energy Minister Saad Al-Kaabi blasted Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Sunday, saying he was "wrong" to claim the Strait of Hormuz would become "worthless" to the oil industry in two years.
"I think this is completely wrong," Saad Al-Kaabi said Sunday at the Qatar Economic Forum in New York.
Speaking to Fox Business's Larry Kudlow on the sidelines of the Group of 20 finance ministers' summit in North Carolina earlier this month, Bessent said the Hormuz maritime chokepoint, in about "two years will be… a worthless piece of water," adding that oil "will be going on pipelines across land."
Al-Kaabi, who also heads QatarEnergy, argued that rewiring the Hormuz area with pipelines to bypass the critical maritime chokepoint, as Bessent described, would not eliminate the broader trade flowing through the strait.
"I don't think this is ever going to be obsolete," he said.
Bessent's comments come as a generational rewiring of energy flows in the Gulf, and really the world, is underway, and allies in the Gulf have already announced plans for new pipeline exits out of the region that bypass the strait.
New routes through the UAE and Iraq could eventually carry roughly 4 million additional barrels a day. Combined with increased flows through Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline, that could replace around 40% of the 20 million barrels a day that previously transited Hormuz.
The rewiring is all part of meaningful diversification but carries risks, as demonstrated by the recent drone attack on Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline that has rendered it useless in the short term.
Alternative pipelines can reduce dependence on Hormuz. But warfare has forever changed, with low-cost one-way attack drones putting every critical infrastructure asset in the region in the crosshairs.
Beyond the Gulf, the Trump administration is diversifying oil supply chains by signing a mega deal with Venezuela and allowing US energy giants to begin investments to ramp up oil production. The aim is to bring energy and critical materials supply chains closer to home, a key pillar of Trump's Western Hemisphere revival.
Making Hormuz worthless is a long game for the Trump administration while it builds out energy assets in the West.