The Iran war is giving fresh life to Somali pirates who prey on commercial ships laden with fuel and goods – a threat that had lain dormant for years.

Earlier this week, a group of pirates seized a cargo ship off the coast of Somalia – at least the fifth such attack since April, according to Windward, a global maritime intelligence firm. Windward concluded that the pirates are likely resurgent in part because nations have shifted naval resources to the Middle East because of the war.

In addition to the hit this week, Somali pirates have seized at least three tankers carrying oil and fertilizer – two commodities that have seen the highest price spikes due to disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz. In July, pirates seized a ship carrying chemicals off the coast of Yemen. The seized tankers are now being held off the coast of Somalia and dozens of crew members are hostages.

Though Somali pirates so far have seized relatively few ships by sheer numbers, it represents another threat to shipping companies already severely strained by recent attacks on vessels around the Strait of Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb Strait on the Red Sea, said Brett Erickson, managing principal of the consultancy Obsidian Risk Advisors.

“We’re now looking at multiple vectors that are increasing pricing for maritime companies, forcing companies to de-risk entirely, and posing a huge threat to the global economy,” he said. “The threat from Somali pirates doesn’t need to be significant on its own, but because it compounds with all the other factors, it makes a fairly large difference at this point every time they take action.”

A White House official said the U.S. is the largest contributor to Somalia’s security and suggested it is “false” to “blame localized piracy attacks on recent regional conflicts with Iran.”

“The United States maintains robust, highly capable maritime security forces in the region that are fully equipped to protect critical shipping lanes, including oil transport, while simultaneously addressing broader regional threats,” the official said.

Regardless of what is driving the uptick in attacks, the pirates are also now active again in an area that has served as a relief valve for global oil shipping routes as an alternative to the Strait of Hormuz.

According to Windward, “Somali piracy is back as an active operational threat to commercial shipping in the Western Indian Ocean and southern Gulf of Aden.”

Somali pirates attacked hundreds of ships between 2005 and 2011, causing an estimated $18 billion in damages annually. However, the threat was largely neutralized after sustained efforts by NATO and the Combined Maritime Forces, a 47-nation naval partnership that includes the United States. Now, American ships are protecting tankers crossing the Strait of Hormuz.

If the situation worsens, it could pose increasingly severe risk to the global economy, said Erickson. In the short term, fewer ships will be willing to take the risk of traveling in the region. It also means greater shipping costs, higher insurance prices and increased spending on private security. For now, the increased cost of a barrel of oil and tightness in the market means it’s a more attractive target for the Somali pirates.

“This is obviously a very, very lucrative business for them, and right now they have a far lower risk of American reaction to it because so many resources are tied up in the Middle East in general,” he said. “They’re profiteers, and this is an opportunity to profit.”

At this month’s NATO summit in Ankara, allies announced billions of dollars in new arms deals and reaffirmed their commitment to spend more on defense. European governments have made the pledge, and the money is real: European defense spending has doubled since 2019, and by 2030, European NATO member countries are projected to spend in excess of €800 billion a year, up €300 billion from 2025, with equipment spending alone nearly doubling.

But committing money is the easy part. The harder question is whether Europe’s defense industry can turn it into equipment fast enough to matter. Europe’s largest defense manufacturers’ order books now average more than five years for production, and some are closer to nine. Money is flowing in faster than industry can turn it into equipment. But a purchase order is not equipment that can be deployed on the ground and the air.

European countries have long duplicated capabilities rather than pooling them.

The bottleneck sits in the defense industrial system. Deterrence relies on the chain from funding to contracts, then through production, deployment into services, then rapid innovation in the field. Europe’s next goal comes after the spending promise. The continent fields six times as many weapons platforms as the United States, because countries have long duplicated capabilities rather than pooling them. Production ends up split across many small runs that never reach an efficient scale. Ukraine, under pressure, has shown how fast a defense system can move, adapting tactics in weeks and building drone detection networks from consumer electronics. Europe needs to catch up and then accelerate.

Four moves would help Europe accelerate.

The first is multi-speed procurement. Software-led systems such as drones and targeting improve in rapid cycles throughout their deployment and need procurement that can keep up. Israel’s Iron Dome started out as far less capable than it is today and improved continuously in service. European defense ministries have already set up high-speed procurement units with dedicated teams and greater risk tolerance. These need to become mainstream, rather than the exception.

Collaboration in procurement, maintenance and training brings costs down and delivery forward.

The second is military collaboration to reduce fragmentation. Collaboration in procurement, maintenance and training brings costs down and delivery forward. The Tempest project, where the U.K., Italy and Japan are jointly building a next-generation fighter, demonstrates the model: shared development costs that no single country could carry alone. Recent bilateral maritime agreements, and Romania’s use of EU funding to buy European while expanding production at home, show the same logic spreading.

The third is industrial consolidation, which is already underway and needs to move faster. Companies are driving it themselves. Airbus, Leonardo and Thales have agreed to merge their space divisions into a single joint venture with roughly €6.5 billion in revenue and 25,000 employees, and European defense mergers and acquisitions rose 35 percent year over year in the first half of 2025. McKinsey analysis finds that consolidation across key supply chain segments could unlock around €9 billion in annual synergies, more than the current equipment budgets of 24 of Europe’s 30 NATO members. The deepest opportunity sits below the big primes, among the thousands of tier two, three and four suppliers that still duplicate one another’s work. Europe can speed this up by harmonizing requirements, reducing national carve-outs and letting industry do the combining. Consolidation is only half the task. Europe also needs to build sheer capacity — more shipyards, more assembly lines, more of the physical plants that turn orders into hardware — and the capital to fund it. In several categories, Europe simply lacks enough places to build.

Real deterrence means difficult choices, and a public that understands the importance and the cost of security.

The fourth is regulatory unlocking. Full scale-up demands skilled workers retrained, accredited and security cleared from other industries; production sites with preapproved permitting; and alignment of export controls across European allies. These regulatory unlocks now need the same energy and focus as the funding commitment debate. 

Real deterrence means difficult choices, and a public that understands the importance and the cost of security. That conversation is only beginning in much of Europe. It must include the potential for “gray zone” cyber strikes on hospitals, arson at industrial sites, drones disrupting ports, undersea data cables cut — these have all occurred, but many citizens do not yet recognize this as having malicious intent.

The opportunity in getting it right is significant. McKinsey and GLOBSEC estimates indicate that every euro of spending on European-manufactured equipment generates two euros of revenue across the European supply chain, and an additional €165 billion a year in equipment spending could create up to 1.2 million jobs. The coming years will reveal how effectively Europe is able to scale up to protect its territory and citizens, and how much of the promised investment becomes lasting deterrence and European jobs. Getting there depends on the whole ecosystem — governments, industry and investors — moving together. Increased spending is important. Spending it effectively matters more.

Jonathan Dimson is a senior partner in McKinsey’s London office. Mikael Robertson is a senior partner in the Stockholm office.