Posted on 04/26/2006 2:01:56 AM PDT by Wiz
WASHINGTON [MENL] -- Iran lacks the capability to block the world's leading shipping route for crude oil exports.
The Center for Strategic and International Studies said the Iranian Navy, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, has failed to procure the platforms or weapons required to block the Straits of Hormuz, the passage for 60 percent of the world's oil trade. In a report, the Washington-based center said the United States could block any Iranian attempt to attack Gulf shipping, particularly from the sea.
"Iran could not close the Strait of Hormuz, or halt tanker traffic, and its submarines and much of its IRGC forces would probably be destroyed in a matter of days if they become operational," the report said.
(Excerpt) Read more at menewsline.com ...
until the appropriate guided munitions shut it down. Fixed facilities with pipes and piers are easy to shut down. 15 minutes and it's all over.
I doubt that's true.
I spent 5 months of my life as part of Earnest Will as the battery officer and gunner for the 25mm chain guns. Man did I get a tan.
Iran doesn't have to militarily block the Strait, just the threat to try will have insurance companies world-wide pull coverage for vessels entering there.
Wait until General Salami has to deal with Special Forces raids on his coastline. All you need to do is head ashore, cut a few throats, shoot up a few dozen targets, and run back out and that 2,000 km coastline becomes a liability to defend, not a threat to shipping.
"However, I know nothing about Arab armies."
Overall, Arabs are personally very brave and good skirmishers and snipers, but don't organize very well at higher levels. The average soldier is uneducated, and the officers do a disproportionate amount of control work.
However, we're talking about Persians, who are different people.
"However, I know nothing about Arab armies."
Overall, Arabs are personally very brave and good skirmishers and snipers, but don't organize very well at higher levels. The average soldier is uneducated, and the officers do a disproportionate amount of control work.
However, we're talking about Persians, who are different people.
IF they try that crap again the first 'splash' will be accompanied by "INCOMING!!!" (in arabic that is 8^)
Thanks for the homework! I wonder how the MSM would cover an operation like this today? I can envision the unapologetic, Leftist, scum portraying us as greedy, consumption-oriented, militarists using our Armed Forces for the benefit of Big Oil rather than facing down a genocidal, megalomanical sock-puppet of the 8th Century Neaderthals that have control of Iran.
Actually tankers are extremely difficult to sink. Their cargo is generally neutral to bouyant. Enviro weenies have ensured that they are mostly double hulled. They have the ability to transfer significant amounts of cargo/ballast quickly. They have good fire suppression systems. Their vast bulk ensures that massive amounts of damage must be done using repeat attacks. (Very unhealthy for the enemies crews to fire that second salvo) Few if any would be sunk or significantly damaged (ie cargo lost, since the vessel can be towed clear if neccesary.) I saw mention of the insurance issue. IIRC the premiums were high but not prohibitively so once we began escorting tankers.
Nothing new some of us had not made perfectly clear with many long winded examples to prove the point earlier on. But fine.
For once the CISI, seems to get it.
I rather suspect that the locations of these "hidden" sites have been pretty well worked out by various means.
Given the accuracy, inexpensiveness, and wide availability of JDAM bomb guidance packages, I further suspect that part of the bombing strategy would be to blast anything that even looks like it might be a silkworm site: one bomb per site, and we'd still have a bunch left over.
Ah well.
I don't know how God counts them either.
I kept trying to tell Travis McGee that Iran couldn't possibly disrupt shipping traffic in the strait for more than 30 days (at most). Maybe now he'll believe me, but somehow I doubt it.
Such is the mentality of the "self-combusting" muzzie.....not a lot of "mental" in the fundamentalist movement....
Here's a thought for Iran. The time to start a war with them is now befor the heating oil season.
The USN doesn't "get cross" it isn't a petulant teenager. It does what is is ordered to do by, ultimately, the President.
No President is going to provoke China by blockading, threatening to sink, or sinking Chinese merchantmen in international waters at this time, or any foreseeable time in the future.
If you are trying to argue that he will, then you are deluding yourself. You might convince yourself, if you try hard enough.
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