The United States was humiliated this week when the USS Nitze came under simulated attack by four Iranian missile and torpedo-equipped speedboats in worldwide waters.
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While Iranian boats frequently come close to USA ships in the area, the US rarely fires warning shots, the defense officials said. The IRGCN boats responded to neither bridge-to-bridge hails nor maritime danger signals from the ship’s whistle. The Tempest and the Squall are patrol ships. That vessel approached Tempest head-on to within 200 yards, said Cmdr. Bill Urban told USNI News on Thursday.
Iran’s defense minister said Thursday that his naval forces will warn or confront any foreign ship entering the country’s territorial waters.
The USS Squall fired warning flares but the craft continued to approach – so the patrol ship fired live rounds. “And that is to take appropriate steps to try and de-escalate the situation”, he added, noting that the shots fired from the USS Squall forced the Iranian vessels to leave. “No one was injured or hit by the warning shots”, he said.
Later on Wednesday, the same Nassar-class boat also made a run at the guided missile destroyer USS Stout (DDG-55), which was also operating in the Persian Gulf. Because Stout can travel at much higher speeds than the IRGC boat, it maneuvered out of the way. “We operate wherever worldwide law allows”. After identifying them, the Nitze tried 12 times to make contact by radio without receiving a response, according to the Navy official. “But the behavior that we have seen is not acceptable”.
Urban said that the Navy’s Central Command “assessed all of these interactions as unsafe and unprofessional due to the Iranian vessels not abiding by worldwide law and maritime standards, including the 1972 Convention on the global Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea (COLREGS) maritime ‘Rules of the Road'”.
Of the rocket exercise, Urban noted that, “the unsafe exercise near US ships operating in accordance with global law while transiting in worldwide waters created a risky situation”. While most of the encounters were not considered to be harassment, the behavior of the Iranian navy was found to be less disciplined than that of other navies.
On Tuesday, 4 Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps craft buzzed around several United States patrol vessels, conducting what was described as a “high speed intercept” of at least one American warship.
Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy boats are known for harassing American warships in the Gulf and especially the Strait of Hormuz.
Only after the two Iranian vessels came within 300 yards of the Nitze did the Iranian vessels slow down.
“Not every incident escalates, but no incident can be ignored”, Cordesman said.
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He described the Iranian behaviour as “unsafe, unprofessional – and not routine”.
