https://openyls.law.yale.edu/bitstream/handle/20.500.13051/8684/43_101YaleLJ893_1991_1992_.pdf?sequence=2&isAllowed=y

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Outside the blockade area and on the high seas,34 belligerents relied on the practice of "visit and search"3s to stop vessels suspected of carrying “con-traband” to the enemy.36 A belligerent warship sailing on the high seas had the right to visit and search all merchant vessels. Merchants found carrying enemy contraband were captured and escorted to the belligerent’s nearest home port. The belligerent nation’s prize court then determined the fate of the captured ship and cargo.37 In cases where merchants resisted either capture or visit and search, the blockading force was entitled to pursue and, if neces-sary, damage or destroy the vessel to force the ship to submit.

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belligerents today continue to enforce blockades from long distance or through blockade zones. They do so because of three twentieth-century developments in maritime warfare: first, the growing importance to belligerents of conducting economic warfare in conjunction with armed con-flict;s3 second, the introduction of a large array of new weapons to the maritime battlefield; and third, the proliferation of modern weapons to less powerful nations incapable of conducting traditional blockade. In combination, these three developments have forced states to replace traditional blockade form with long-distance blockade or blockade zones.