{"text":[[{"start":5.6,"text":"On the morning of March 3, the day after Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz, Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency, arrived at his offices in Paris with an urgent request for his staff. He needed them to run the data to double-check what he had written in his journal late the previous night: “The scale of the crisis we are facing is set to make past oil shocks seem like mere warm-up acts.” Sure enough, staff found: more oil would be lost than in both 1970s oil shocks combined. What to do? "}],[{"start":38.85,"text":"Birol, a genial white-haired Turk who has worked on energy for 40 years, sits at the centre of this crisis. My conversations with him in Paris, and on a visit to Istanbul where we spoke on a panel, helped me understand how today’s world manages a crisis — or not. How much international co-operation survives in the Trump era? What do governments know? "}],[{"start":61.150000000000006,"text":"After the strait closed, Birol met and phoned countries’ leaders nonstop. He says: “I was surprised that for three weeks people didn’t realise the scale of the crisis.” For instance, many policymakers hadn’t grasped that supplies of jet fuel would be badly squeezed. The IEA, a small intergovernmental agency with a core budget of €23mn and no legislative powers, would have to take the lead. It held “the world’s best energy data and analysis”, and oversaw reserves of 1.2 billion barrels of oil. On March 11 the agency launched an unprecedented release of 400 million barrels. "}],[{"start":99.10000000000001,"text":"Initially, Birol avoided talking to media, to avoid spooking markets even further. But seeing governmental complacency, he began speaking out. He has a gift for packaging data into soundbites. His phrase “the biggest energy crisis in history” stuck in policymakers’ minds."}],[{"start":117.05000000000001,"text":"The IEA also convenes international meetings. At a recent one, a preparation for this year’s COP climate summit that doubled as a crisis powwow, it was striking who wasn’t there: the US and Russia. Without them, to borrow from the musical Hamilton, today’s world has no “room where it happens”. The conspiracy theorist’s question is, “Who really runs the world?” The answer, nowadays, is nobody."}],[{"start":142.75,"text":"A few leaders try to keep remnants of global co-operation alive. Birol mentions Emmanuel Macron, Japan’s new prime minister Sanae Takaichi and, surprisingly, US energy secretary Chris Wright. But poor countries are barely heard, says Birol. Take Iraq, where millions of civil servants, soldiers and pensioners depend on a state whose oil exports have collapsed. Imagine what could go wrong there. Yet even supposed masters of the universe aren’t thinking about Iraq."}],[{"start":174.2,"text":"It’s noticeable, in a crisis, how few states have any capacity for strategic thinking. Washington and Beijing do. Both have long-term back-up plans. The US has a giant petroleum reserve. China keeps building coal-fired power plants yet runs them well below capacity, using them as insurance in case oil and gas fail. But the American system is dysfunctional, while the Chinese don’t share much. At international meetings, China’s representative might listen in silence as small countries speak. "}],[{"start":204.1,"text":"Even states as big as the UK lack ongoing strategic capacity, says former British energy minister Chris Huhne. A ministry can call in outside experts. But almost all governmental time is spent dealing with events. Imagine how much headspace Keir Starmer, the embattled prime minister, can currently spare for long-term energy policy. No wonder that when states do attempt strategic shifts, these often misfire. Look at Germany, which first made itself dependent on Russian energy and in 2011, after the Fukushima disaster, decided to abandon nuclear power. "}],[{"start":239,"text":"Governments and markets are comforting themselves with the thought that this crisis is manageable and will pass. After all, energy prices haven’t risen hugely. But Birol says that’s partly because of high stocks of oil when the crisis began, and big releases since. Those are only “temporary sticking plasters”, he warns. “I don’t know why some people are underestimating potential issues.”"}],[{"start":263.6,"text":"Now governments face momentous strategic choices. Birol notes that even if Hormuz reopens tomorrow, geopolitical uncertainty will hang over it for years. That could make the strait commercially unviable. Energy importers and exporters are already looking for new routes, he says. They will redraw the global energy map, changing geopolitics, trade and the relative competitiveness of countries. Are governments doing the requisite strategic thinking? He replies, gently: “I don’t think at the moment we are there.” "}],[{"start":294.85,"text":"Find out about our latest stories first — follow FT Weekend Magazine on X and FT Weekend on Instagram"}],[{"start":308.3,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1779513812_9443.mp3"}