Iranian Mines, Missiles Can Easily Shut Hormuz

As Iranian lawmakers are preparing a bill requiring the government to close the Strait of Hormuz, some in the West are asking how Tehran can do so, except for drowning an oil tanker in the midst of the waterway which is the easiest way of cutting the world oil lifeline for months.

In addition to its short, mid, and long missiles, Tehran has a range of other weapons it can use to close down the vital oil artery.

These include the hard-to-detect “rocket mine” that’s triggered by the distinctive magnetic our acoustic signature of a ship, such as a US aircraft carrier, and then launches a propelled 600-popund warhead at the target.

Then there’s the Russian MDM6, equally difficult to detect, that can tackle multiple targets. It lies on the seabed that fires a torpedo-like warhead when it senses a vessel.

Both these mines can be laid by Iran’s Kilo-class submarines.

As the United States builds up its forces in the Persian Gulf, including the recent arrival of four new mines countermeasures ships to boost US-British minesweeping strength to 12, the New York Times quoted a senior Defense Department official as saying:

“The message to Iran is, ‘Don’t even think about it’. Don’t even think about closing the strait. We’ll clear the mines.

“Don’t even think about sending your fast boats out to harass our vessels or commercial shipping. We’ll put them on the bottom of the gulf.”

Iran isn’t planning to fight a conventional war with the US and its allies. Rather it plans to employ what’s known as asymmetric warfare, in which the weaker forces uses unconventional means to overcome the power of a strong opponent.

Asymmetric warfare is specially appropriate for the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz which are too narrow for the huge US warships to maneuver.

That means mines, anti-ship missiles and swarm attacks by small heavily armed boats.

By some accounts, Iran is believed to have as many as 3,000 sea mines. Some estimates go as high as 5,000, but no one knows the exact number as Iran never discloses all its capabilities and arsenals.

Whatever, it’s the fourth largest sea mine arsenal in the world after the United States, Russia and China.

The EM-52 is probably the most dangerous mine Iran has. But the bottom-influence EM-11 and the EM-31 moored mine can also play havoc with surface craft.

So the United States and its allied naval forces face a formidable foe.

“Iran’s ability to lay a large number of mines in a short period of time remains a critical aspect of the stated capability to deny US forces access to the Persian Gulf and impede or halt shipping through the strait,” cautioned US analyst Anthony Cordesman in a March analysis by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

Iran has hundreds of anti-ship missiles, including 300 C-201 Seersucker weapons and 200 C-801 indigenous Noor systems, deployed along its long Persian Gulf coastline, as well as air-launched weapons and cruise missiles.

“It’s notable that the US never successfully targeted Iraq’s anti-ship missile assets during the Kuwait war, although they were deployed along a far smaller coastal area,” Cordesman observed.

Iran’s army and the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps, a combined force of some 400,000 troops, vastly outnumber US and allied ground forces. You may also add millions of Basij (volunteer) forces.

But it’s from the sea the Iranians will out up their main fight. How long the shooting will last is anyone’s guess.

Hormuz could be closed to tanker traffic for several weeks, and the disruption in oil supplies will trigger severe global economic problems.