Turkish Straits

The "Turkish Straits" are one of the most strategically important waterways in the world.

The order of importance is generally set by the amount of oil that is shipped through a particular area. Other shipping is also important but oil is the most critical factor.

This image shows the Sea of Marmara near the bottom of the Black Sea.

Here is the Bosporus Strait again.

Here is the Dardanelle

In this image you can see the entire length of the Sea of Marmara.

It would be difficult to explain the critical importance of this area of the world for the oil business, international shipping and international politics.

Just to give you an idea of how important this place is, consider that during a Military Style Strategic War Game exercise conducted at Harvard University in early 2008 to "simulate" a so-called "Oil Shockwave" event impacting the security of the United States, a simulated newsfeed supplying information to the panel of experts selected the Turkish Straits as the location for a simulated terrorist strike against international commerce. The news report begins by explaining that the event has occurred in the Sea of Marmara.

I think this is an excellent indicator of how important this area is, the fact that it was selected to be the key geographical and political focus point for a serious war games excercise.

You can check out this fascinating video here: http://www.iop.harvard.edu/Multimedia-Center/All-Videos/OIL-SHOCKWAVE-An-Oil-Crisis-Simulation

The Turkish Straits are considered to be the 5th most important "oil chokepoint" in the world behind #1 Strait of Hormuz, #2 Malacca Strait, #3 Suez Canal, #4 Bab el Mandab Strait where the Red Sea connects to the Indian Ocean.

About 2.4 million barrels per day of the world's 87 million barrel per day demand are shipped through the Turkish Straits.

Sea of Marmara

In this image the Sea of Marmara is visible to the bottom right of the southwestern edge of the Black Sea.

Bosporus Strait

The Black Sea has only one outlet. It is the Bosporus Strait.

This image shows a close up view of the entire length of the Bosporus.

The Black Sea is at the top of the image.

The Sea of Marmara is at the bottom of the image.

If you click on the image you can zoom in and see other details like the City of Istanbul in Turkey and several bridges the span the Bosporus.

 You can also see the wakes from several ships in the upper part of the image as they navigate the strait into the Black.

The thing I find most interesting about the Bosporus is that the water is stratified. There is an upper layer and a lower layer. The upper layer is much less salty than the lower layer that gets it's salt from the Mediterranean.

The really weird thing is that the lower salty layer flows INTO the Black Sea and the upper less saline layer is where most of the water in the Black Sea flows out.