The list of blockades informs about blockades that were carried out either on land, or in the maritime and air spaces in the effort to defeat opponents through denial of supply, usually to cause military exhaustion and starvation as an economic blockade in addition to restricting movement of enemy troops.
| 458–457 BCE | Aegina (Saronic Gulf) | Athens | First Peloponnesian War | ||
| 431–404 BCE | Athens | Sparta | Peloponnesian War | Spartan forces surrounded Athens on land. Athens withstood the landward attack, and subsisted on food imported by ship. In the Battle of Aegospotami, the Spartan navy destroyed the Athenian navy and implemented a sea blockade, forcing Athens to surrender.[1] | |
| 31 BCE | Supporters of Mark Antony Ptolemaic Egypt | Supporters of Octavian | War of the Second Triumvirate (Battle of Actium) | Octavian blockaded Mark Antony's ships in the Gulf of Actium. |
| 1068–1071 | Robert Guiscard | Norman conquest of southern Italy | Robert Guiscard's Norman forces blockaded Byzantine cities in southern Italy, most notably in the siege of Bari. | ||
| 1084 | Norman-occupied Corfu | Byzantine-Norman Wars | After the Normans occupied Corfu, Emperor Alexios I Komnenos blockaded the island with Venetian naval support gained in exchange for commercial privileges. | ||
| 1102 | Crusades | ||||
| 1104–1108 | Tripoli | Antioch Edessa Toulouse Cerdanya | Siege of Tripoli | Blockade of the Lebanese coast leading by the Outremer and Genoa leading to the establishment of the County of Tripoli | |
| 1110 | Sidon | Norway | Norwegian Crusade | See main article: Siege of Sidon. | |
| 1337 | Cadzand, Flanders | England | Hundred Years' War | See main article: Battle of Cadzand. | |
| 1379–1380 | War of Chioggia | ||||
| 1394–1402 | Constantinople, Byzantine Empire | Byzantine–Ottoman wars | Ottoman blockade of Constantinople[2] |
| Duration of Blockade | Blockaded Territory | Blockader | Conflict | Details | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1838–1840 | Rio de la Plata, Argentine Confederation | War of the Confederation | See main article: French blockade of the Río de la Plata. | ||
| 1840 | Kingdom of the Two Sicilies | Sulphur Crisis | |||
| 1845–1850 | Rio de la Plata, Argentine Confederation | Uruguayan Civil War | See main article: Anglo-French blockade of the Río de la Plata. | ||
| 1846–1848 | Mexican-American War | See main article: Blockade of Veracruz. | |||
| 1848–1851 | Germany | First Schleswig War | |||
| 1854–1856 | Crimean War | ||||
| 1861–1865 | American Civil War | See main article: Union blockade and Anaconda Plan. | |||
| 1854–1856 | Chincha Islands War | ||||
| 1886 |  Greece | Great Powers (excluding France) | Eastern Rumelia Crisis | [3] | |
| 1894–1895 | First Sino-Japanese War | ||||
| 1897 | Constantinople, Ottoman Empire | Great Powers | |||
| 1898 | Spanish Cuba San Juan, Spanish Puerto Rico | Spanish-American War | |||
| 1902–1903 | Venezuelan crisis of 1902–1903 | ||||
| 1914–1919 | World War I and its aftermath | See main article: Blockade of Germany (1914–1919). Included mainly Germany but also the entire Central Powers. The Allied blockade of Germany continued for a year after the Armistice until it signed the Treaty of Versailles.[4] | |||
| 1915–1918 | Lebanon | Middle Eastern theatre of World War I | [5] | ||
| 1936 | Spanish Morocco | Spain | Spanish Civil War | See also: Spanish coup of July 1936. The Spanish Republican Navy blockaded the Strait of Gibraltar to hamper the transport of Francisco Franco's Army of Africa to Peninsular Spain | |
| 1936–1939 | Republican-controlled Spain | Nationalist faction | The Nationalists blockaded northern and southeastern Spain | ||
| 1937–1945 | China | Second Sino-Japanese War | |||
| 1939–1945 | and its occupied territories (after 1940) and its colonies (after 1940) | (until 1940) (after 1941) (after 1941) | World War II | See main article: Blockade of Germany (1939–1945). The Allied Powers carried out a blockade to prevent the Axis Powers from acquiring materials. Although the blockade was initially ineffective due to the use of neutral ports in the Soviet Union and Francoist Spain, it grew more severe when the Soviet Union and the United States entered the war in 1941 and when the Germans lost control of their occupied territories in France and Eastern Europe in 1944. | |
| 1940–1945 | See main article: Battle of the Atlantic. The Nazi German Kriegsmarine attempted to block shipping to Britain and Russia through the use of U-boats. | ||||
| 1941–1945 | Leningrad, Soviet Union | Eastern Front of World War II | See also: Siege of Leningrad. | ||
| 1944–1945 | Pacific Front of World War II | ||||
| 1948 | Changchun, Republic of China | Chinese Red Army | Chinese Civil War | See main article: Siege of Changchun. Changchun was one of the largest cities in Manchuria and was a strategic ROC Army base in Northeast China. The fall of the city led to Communist victory in the Liaoshen campaign. | |
| 1948–1949 | Berlin Blockade | The Soviet occupation forces in Germany blockaded West Berlin at the beginning of the Cold War, but it became ineffective due to an American-led airlift. | |||
| 1949–1958 | Cross-Strait conflict | ||||
| 1950–1953 | United Nations Command | Korean War | See also: Blockade of Wonsan. | ||
| 1956 | Israel | Suez Crisis | Egypt blockaded the Straits of Tiran before the Suez Crisis. | ||
| 1962 | Cuban Missile Crisis | The United States declared a "quarantine" of Cuba in reaction to the deployment of Soviet nuclear missiles. | |||
| 1965–1975 | Vietnam War | See main article: Operation Market Time and Operation Game Warden. | |||
| 1966–1975 | Beira Patrol | The British government, along with most of the international community, did not recognize Rhodesia's Unilateral Declaration of Independence due to its policy of no independence before majority rule. | |||
| 1967 | Six-Day War | Egypt resumed its blockade of the Straits of Tiran shortly before the war. Israel responded by invading and occupying the Sinai Peninsula. | |||
| 1968–1970 | Nigerian Civil War | Nigeria blockaded the secessionist republic of Biafra, creating an international humanitarian crisis that resulted in Biafrans receiving aid from volunteers around the world during the Biafran airlift and inspired the formation of Doctors Without Borders. | |||
| 1971 | East Pakistan | Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 | |||
| 1973 | October war 1973 | See also: Operation Badr (1973). | |||
| 1982 | (Occupied by making it  Islas Malvinas) | Falklands War | |||
| 1982–2000 | 1982 Lebanon WarSouth Lebanon conflict | The blockade was first imposed during the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. However, it was sporadically renewed after the Israel Defense Force was forced to withdraw to the South Lebanon security belt due to its continuing conflict with Hezbollah. | |||
| 1988 | Nagorno-Karabakh conflict | Armenia and Azerbaijan have been at war since the dissolution of the Soviet Union over the status of Nagorno-Karabakh. Armenia is a landlocked country and therefore cannot conduct foreign trade without going through one of its neighbors. Turkey, Armenia’s historic enemy with whom it shares its largest border, is also an ally of Azerbaijan. Turkey and Azerbaijan have long refused to allow any Armenian trade over their air or land space. Lacking a sizeable enough border with Iran to facilitate major trade means Armenia is effectively dependent on the Georgia and Iran to conduct international trade. In order to avoid disturbing relations with Azerbaijan, Georgia imposes certain limits on Armenian imports. | |||
| 1990–2003 | Gulf War Iraq disarmament crisis | Enforcement of sanctions against Iraq. The U.S. Air Force, the Royal Air Force, and the French Air Force also enforced no-fly zones in the northern and southern halves of the country. | |||
| 1990 | Singing Revolution | See main article: Soviet economic blockade of Lithuania. The Soviet government refused to recognize Lithuania's independence. | |||
| 1992–1993 | Croatian War of Independence | Yugoslavia refused to recognize Croatia's independence. The Yugoslav Navy blockaded the Adriatic coast until it was defeated by Croatian artillery in the Battle of the Dalmatian Channels. | |||
| 1993–1996 | United Nations Protection Force | Bosnian War | See main article: Operation Deliberate Force, Operation Maritime Guard and Operation Sharp Guard. NATO imposed a blockade on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to enforce the UN sanctions on the country and enforced no-fly zones. | ||
| 1996 | Third Taiwan Strait Crisis | The PRC launched ballistic missiles at ROC territorial waters near the important ports of Keelung and Kaohsiung, forcing lengthy travel and shipping delays. The missile launches were believed to be intended to intimidate the Taiwanese public before the 1996 presidential election. | |||
| 2001–2007 | Maritime protection program to prevent arrivals of unauthorized "boat people." | ||||
| 2006 | 2006 Lebanon War | ||||
| 2009 | Mullaitivu, Sri Lanka | ||||
| 2011 | Libya | Libyan Civil War | The U.N. Security Council approved a no-fly zone over Libya. | ||
| 2015 | 2015 Nepal blockade | Nepal accused India, on which it is reliant for petroleum and medicine imports, of imposing a blockade. | |||
| 2017–2021 | Qatar diplomatic crisis | Several Arab League countries accused Qatar of funding terrorism in violation of a Gulf Cooperation Council agreement. Qatar denied these accusations but Saudi Arabia, Qatar’s only land neighbor, sealed its border, imposing a “land blockade“ and shutting down all land based trade to and from Qatar. Qatar was also criticized for its close relations with Iran and the management of Al Jazeera. Qatar claims it never funded terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, and also shares a strategic alliance with the United States in the War on Terror and the international intervention against ISIL. The conflict was resolved after a diplomatic agreement brokered by the United States and Kuwait. | |||
| 2022 | Nagorno-Karabakh conflict | See main article: Blockade of the Republic of Artsakh (2022–2024). Starting in December 2022, Azerbaijan launched an illegal blockade of the breakaway Republic of Artsakh in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, trapping the 120,000 residents within the region, blocking transport of food, medicine, and other supplies, and cutting off electricity and natural gas to the region.[6] [7] [8] The blockade has remained in place despite calls from the International Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights for the blockade to be lifted.[9] [10] |
| 2007 | Gaza–Israel conflict | See main article: Blockade of the Gaza Strip. Israel and Egypt closed all land border crossings to the Gaza Strip after the Battle of Gaza (2007) following the election of the Hamas Party and imposed a strict air and sea blockade. Israel claims that the blockade is necessary to prevent weapons from reaching Hamas, while Egypt claims that the blockade is intended to prevent Hamas from undermining the legitimacy of the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority after winning the election. | |||
| 2015 | Saudi Arabian–led intervention in Yemen | See also: Blockade of Yemen. After the Houthis overthrew President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi the Saudi government accused it of supporting Iran and blockaded the country. The United States and the United Kingdom provided naval and logistical support. The international community has criticized the blockade for creating a humanitarian crisis in Yemen including famine and a cholera outbreak. | |||
| 2022 | Russian invasion of Ukraine | Russia blockaded Ukraine's access to the Black Sea. After negotiations with Ukraine via Turkey, a corridor to export Grain was opened. It was briefly halted after the Kerch Bridge was attacked with a Truck Bomb.[11] |