[NYTr] Iranianian Boats Confront US Navy in Persian Gulf

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

[See Juan Cole's comments after CNN story. He notes that even the US
military admits the "confrontation" was not intentional, despite VNN's
prvocative use of the word "harass." - NYTr]


CNN - Jan  7, 2008
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/01/07/iran.us.navy/?iref=hpmostpop

Iranian boats 'harass' U.S. Navy, officials say

by Barbara Starr

(CNN) -- Five Iranian Revolutionary Guard boats "harassed and provoked"
three U.S. Navy ships early Sunday in international waters, the U.S.
military said Monday, calling the encounter a "significant"
confrontation.

An Iranian official, however, said it was not a serious incident, the
state-run news agency IRNA reported.

U.S. military officials said the incident occurred early Sunday morning
in the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow shipping channel leading in and out
of the Persian Gulf.

They said that as the USS Hopper, the USS Port Royal and the USS
Ingraham were entering the Persian Gulf, five Iranian boats approached
them at high speed and swarmed them.

The Iranian boats made "threatening" moves toward the U.S. ships and in
one case came within 200 yards of one of them, the U.S. officials said.

The U.S. Navy also received a radio transmission that officials believe
came from the Iranian boats. The transmission said, "I am coming at
you. You will explode in a couple of minutes," the U.S. military
officials told CNN.

When the U.S. ships heard that radio transmission, they took up their
gun positions and officers were "in the process" of giving the order to
fire when the Iranians abruptly turned away, the U.S. officials said.

After the radio transmission, one of the Iranian boats dropped white
boxes into the water in front of the U.S. ships, the officials said. It
was not clear what was in the boxes, the officials said

No shots were fired, and no one was injured.

Iran's foreign ministry spokesman downplayed the incident, calling it
"ordinary," IRNA reported. Mohammad Ali Hosseini said that similar
incidents had occurred in the past between Iranian and American ships,
and the issues were resolved as soon as the ships recognized each
other, IRNA reported.

The Strait of Hormuz, which is in international waters, is near much of
the world's oil supplies.

The White House urged Iran to refrain from "such provocative actions
that could lead to a dangerous incident in the future," National
Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said.

U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the United States
probably would not make a formal protest to Iran about the incident.

McCormack said, "I can't speak to their rationale, their reasoning,
their motivations."

Iran and the United States do not have diplomatic relations.
Switzerland represents U.S. interests in Tehran, while Pakistan
represents Iranian interests in Washington.

McCormack declined to comment further on the incident but said, "The
U.S. will confront Iranian behavior where it seeks to do harm either to
us or to our friends and allies in the region."

On Friday, the U.S. Navy announced the same team of naval ships had
been searching in the Arabian Sea for a sailor missing for a day from
the USS Hopper. The outcome of the search was not immediately known
Monday.

In November, the U.S. military reported that Iran's Revolutionary Guard
Corps had taken command of Tehran's naval operations in the Persian
Gulf.

The United States considers the Revolutionary Guard to be a major
supporter of terrorist activity.

Tensions between Iran and the U.S. have increased over the last few
years. The U.S. has concerns about Iran's nuclear program and has
accused Iran of supplying weapons to insurgents in Iraq who target
American forces.

In March, Iran detained 15 crew members of a British ship before
releasing them after nearly two weeks. Iran alleged the British vessel
strayed into Iranian waters -- an assertion Britain strongly denied. 

[CNN's Brianna Keilar and Charley Keyes contributed to this report. ]

                                ***

Informed Comment - Jan 7, 2008
http://www.juancole.com/2008/01/iran-irgc-ships-confront-us-navy.html


Iran IRGC Ships confront US Navy

by Juan Cole

That the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps coast guard would play
chicken with the US Navy is not that surprising. Enemies at sea often
taunt one another, and I think there were similar feints by Soviet subs
in the old days.

What is harder to understand is the Iranian government explanation,
which was that the IRGC did not recognize the US naval ships as such.
That isn't plausible, and besides, what other naval ships would the
IRGC have a problem with?

It is the kind of explanation you would give when your nerdy crazy
second cousin threatened to beat up a guest twice his size at your
cocktail party. I.e., I don't think the incident was ordered from
Tehran, but was some gung-ho local IRGC commander who'd been at sea way
too long. I presume they thought the US was in Iranian waters (and the
Iranians claim more offshore territory than the standard in
international law).

Supreme Jurisprudent Ali Khamenei recently said that while it wasn't
desirable right at the moment, Iranian diplomatic relations with the US
in the future were not out of the question. So if anything the top
leadership has been trying to ratchet down the tensions.

Here are the most recent entries from the Iranian press culled by the
USG Open Source Center on the IRGC naval forces:

    ' IRGC Navy Conducts Final Stages of Persian Gulf Exercises (19
December) - The second and third stages of the Iranian Navy exercise
"Courage 86" was carried out over an area of 7,000 nautical miles in
the Persian Gulf. An IRGC naval commander, Brig. Gen. Ali Razmjoo, said
that the second exercise included pre-emptive defensive and
psychological operations, mine-laying operations, night-time tracking
of vessels, and deploying frogmen from helicopters into the sea. The
third stage included chemical defense, shooting targets at sea,
intercepting vessels, and capturing hypothetical targets. Razmjoo said
several hundred vessels, missile launchers, destroyers, and mine layers
have been involved in a series of IRGC naval exercises in an area
between northern Bushehr Province and Asalouyeh over a four-day period
(IRNA).

    Iran Kicks Off War Games in 7,000-Mile Persian Gulf Area (18
December) - Designed to ensure it can protect the nation's territorial
waters, islands, and coastlines, as well as neighboring countries, from
foreign threats, Iran began four days of war games in the Persian Gulf
on 18 December. According to Press TV, the war games will be held in
three stages in an area that encompasses northern parts of Iran's
coastal province of Bushehr and the southern region of Aslouyeh. The
war games will cover 7,000 square miles and employ hundreds of vessels
and divers (Fars News Agency). '

The US says it won't protest the incident, which means that they concur
it wasn't an intentional provocation from Tehran.