2008 US-Iranian naval dispute
Encyclopedia
The 2007-2008 US-Iranian naval dispute refers to a series of naval stand-offs between Iranian speedboats and U.S. Navy warships in the Strait of Hormuz
in December 2007 and January 2008.
On January 6, 2008, five Iranian patrol boats crewed by the Revolutionary Guard approached three U.S. Navy warships in the Strait of Hormuz
: the cruiser
USS Port Royal
, the destroyer
USS Hopper
and the frigate
USS Ingraham
. In a compilation of video and audio released by the Pentagon of the most provocative moments of the encounter, the radio officer of the USS Hopper is seen and heard attempting to make radio contact with the Iranian vessels. A few moments later another voice radioed the USS Hopper saying, "I am coming at you. You will explode [in or after] [static] minutes."
Early U.S. reports indicated that because the Iranian boats continued to circle the U.S. warships and had been seen to drop several packages into the water, the U.S. ships had no choice but to take the threats seriously and maintain a defensive posture. The US Pentagon said the American ships were about to open fire when the Iranian boats withdrew. The commander of the destroyer USS Hopper publicly denied that the American ships were about to open fire.
U.S. officials said the Iranians "harassed and provoked" their naval vessels, coming within 200 yards (182.9 m) of one warship. After the Department of Defense made a statement that the Iranian vessels acted aggressively towards the U.S. warships Iranian officials initially stated that the incident was a routine contact which happens all the time in the crowded waters of the Persian Gulf. In response, on January 8, 2008 the Department of Defense released an abridged four-minute video segment of the audio and video recordings of the incident that included the radio threat. An Iranian Revolutionary Guard source stated, "The footage released by the US Navy are file pictures and the audio has been fabricated" On 10 January 2008, Iran accused the U.S. of creating a "media fuss". The Iranian PressTV then released its own abridged video of the incident, where no threats can be heard. The U.S. later released a 36 minute video of the incident.
There has been significant confusion as to the source of the threatening radio transmissions. Persian-speakers and Iranians have told The Washington Post
that the accent in the American recording does not sound Iranian. The New York Times pointed out that the US-released audio includes no ambient noise of the kind that might be expected if the broadcast had come from on one of the speedboats. According to the Navy Times
, the incident could have been caused by a locally famous heckler known as the "Filipino Monkey
". Evidence for this includes that the threatening voice sounds different from that of the Iranian officer. Several media outlets reported that the Navy spliced the audio recording of the alleged Iranian threat onto to a videotape of the incident.
Although the Pentagon spokesman described the Iranian boats as “highly maneuverable patrol craft” that were “visibly armed,” he failed to note that these small boats usually only carry a two- or three-man crew and that they are normally armed only with machine guns. The only boat that was close enough to be visible to the U.S. ships was unarmed, as an enlarged photo of the boat from the navy video clearly shows.
On January 12, 2008, it was revealed that, contrary to previous reports, the packages the Iranian boats had dropped into the water posed no threat to the U.S. vessels. The leading U.S. vessels observed that they were harmless light floating objects and did not report them to following U.S. vessels as a danger.
Lieutenant John Gay of the fifth Fleet later said: "There is no way to know where this (radioed threat) exactly came from. It could have come from the shore... or another vessel in the area"
On January 12, 2008, two earlier incidents during December 2007 were revealed by U.S. Navy officials, one in which the USS Whidbey Island
fired warning shot
s in response to a small Iranian boat which was approaching it on December 19. The Iranian boat reportedly then retreated after the shots were fired.
In a July 8 speech to the Revolutionary Guards, Ali Shirazi, a mid-level clerical aide to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, "The Zionist regime is pressuring White House officials to attack Iran. If they commit such a stupidity, Tel Aviv
and U.S. shipping in the Persian Gulf will be Iran's first targets and they will be burned," according to the student news agency ISNA.
in Iranian airspace over the Strait, killing 290 civilians, an incident for which the U.S. never apologized, though it did provide monetary compensation.
of Iran
and Oman
under the transit passage provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea
. Neither Iran or the U.S. have ratified the convention, but the U.S. accepts the traditional navigation rules as reflected in the Convention. Iran has stated that it reserves "the right to require prior authorization for warships to exercise the right of innocent passage through its territorial sea." It is unclear if the incident happened in the territorial waters of Iran or Oman.
Strait of Hormuz
The Strait of Hormuz is a narrow, strategically important waterway between the Gulf of Oman in the southeast and the Persian Gulf. On the north coast is Iran and on the south coast is the United Arab Emirates and Musandam, an exclave of Oman....
in December 2007 and January 2008.
Incident
Strait of Hormuz
The Strait of Hormuz is a narrow, strategically important waterway between the Gulf of Oman in the southeast and the Persian Gulf. On the north coast is Iran and on the south coast is the United Arab Emirates and Musandam, an exclave of Oman....
: the cruiser
Ticonderoga class cruiser
The Ticonderoga class of missile cruisers is a class of warships in the United States Navy, first ordered and authorized in FY 1978. The class uses phased-array radar and was originally planned as a class of destroyers...
USS Port Royal
USS Port Royal (CG-73)
USS Port Royal is a United States Navy guided missile cruiser, the 27th and final in the class. She is the second U.S. warship to bear the name of two naval battles of Port Royal Sound, South Carolina, of the American Revolutionary War and the American Civil War...
, the destroyer
Arleigh Burke class destroyer
The Arleigh Burke class of guided missile destroyers is the United States Navy's first class of destroyer built around the Aegis combat system and the SPY-1D multi-function phased array radar. The class is named for Admiral Arleigh "31-Knot" Burke, the most famous American destroyer officer of...
USS Hopper
USS Hopper (DDG-70)
USS Hopper , an Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer, is a ship of the United States Navy named for the pioneering computer scientist, Rear Admiral "Amazing Grace" Hopper....
and the frigate
Oliver Hazard Perry class frigate
The Oliver Hazard Perry class is a class of frigates named after the American Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, the hero of the naval Battle of Lake Erie...
USS Ingraham
USS Ingraham (FFG-61)
The USS Ingraham , the last American to be built, was the fourth ship of the United States Navy to be named for Captain Duncan Ingraham ....
. In a compilation of video and audio released by the Pentagon of the most provocative moments of the encounter, the radio officer of the USS Hopper is seen and heard attempting to make radio contact with the Iranian vessels. A few moments later another voice radioed the USS Hopper saying, "I am coming at you. You will explode [in or after] [static] minutes."
Early U.S. reports indicated that because the Iranian boats continued to circle the U.S. warships and had been seen to drop several packages into the water, the U.S. ships had no choice but to take the threats seriously and maintain a defensive posture. The US Pentagon said the American ships were about to open fire when the Iranian boats withdrew. The commander of the destroyer USS Hopper publicly denied that the American ships were about to open fire.
U.S. officials said the Iranians "harassed and provoked" their naval vessels, coming within 200 yards (182.9 m) of one warship. After the Department of Defense made a statement that the Iranian vessels acted aggressively towards the U.S. warships Iranian officials initially stated that the incident was a routine contact which happens all the time in the crowded waters of the Persian Gulf. In response, on January 8, 2008 the Department of Defense released an abridged four-minute video segment of the audio and video recordings of the incident that included the radio threat. An Iranian Revolutionary Guard source stated, "The footage released by the US Navy are file pictures and the audio has been fabricated" On 10 January 2008, Iran accused the U.S. of creating a "media fuss". The Iranian PressTV then released its own abridged video of the incident, where no threats can be heard. The U.S. later released a 36 minute video of the incident.
There has been significant confusion as to the source of the threatening radio transmissions. Persian-speakers and Iranians have told The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
that the accent in the American recording does not sound Iranian. The New York Times pointed out that the US-released audio includes no ambient noise of the kind that might be expected if the broadcast had come from on one of the speedboats. According to the Navy Times
Navy Times
Navy Times is a weekly newspaper serving active, reserve and retired United States Navy personnel and their families, providing news, information and analysis as well as community lifestyle features, educational supplements and resource guides...
, the incident could have been caused by a locally famous heckler known as the "Filipino Monkey
Filipino Monkey
"Filipino Monkey" is a taunt used by radio pranksters in maritime radio transmissions since at least the 1980s, especially in the Persian Gulf. This taunt is also used as a name for pranksters who make odd, confusing, or even threatening calls on VHF marine channel 16, which is the VHF calling and...
". Evidence for this includes that the threatening voice sounds different from that of the Iranian officer. Several media outlets reported that the Navy spliced the audio recording of the alleged Iranian threat onto to a videotape of the incident.
Although the Pentagon spokesman described the Iranian boats as “highly maneuverable patrol craft” that were “visibly armed,” he failed to note that these small boats usually only carry a two- or three-man crew and that they are normally armed only with machine guns. The only boat that was close enough to be visible to the U.S. ships was unarmed, as an enlarged photo of the boat from the navy video clearly shows.
On January 12, 2008, it was revealed that, contrary to previous reports, the packages the Iranian boats had dropped into the water posed no threat to the U.S. vessels. The leading U.S. vessels observed that they were harmless light floating objects and did not report them to following U.S. vessels as a danger.
Lieutenant John Gay of the fifth Fleet later said: "There is no way to know where this (radioed threat) exactly came from. It could have come from the shore... or another vessel in the area"
On January 12, 2008, two earlier incidents during December 2007 were revealed by U.S. Navy officials, one in which the USS Whidbey Island
USS Whidbey Island (LSD-41)
USS Whidbey Island is a Whidbey Island-class dock landing ship of the United States Navy. She was named for Whidbey Island, in Puget Sound, Washington, the location of NAS Whidbey Island; the name ultimately derives from the sailor, explorer and engineer Joseph Whidbey.Whidbey Island was laid...
fired warning shot
Warning shot
A warning shot is a military term describing harmless artillery shot or gunshot intended to call attention and demand some action of compliance...
s in response to a small Iranian boat which was approaching it on December 19. The Iranian boat reportedly then retreated after the shots were fired.
In a July 8 speech to the Revolutionary Guards, Ali Shirazi, a mid-level clerical aide to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, "The Zionist regime is pressuring White House officials to attack Iran. If they commit such a stupidity, Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...
and U.S. shipping in the Persian Gulf will be Iran's first targets and they will be burned," according to the student news agency ISNA.
Historical context
The presence of U.S. warships in the Strait has been a sensitive issue for Iran since July 3, 1988, when the U.S. Navy cruiser shot down an Iranian commercial flightIran Air Flight 655
Iran Air Flight 655 was a civilian jet airliner shot down by U.S. missiles on 3 July 1988, over the Strait of Hormuz, toward the end of the Iran–Iraq War...
in Iranian airspace over the Strait, killing 290 civilians, an incident for which the U.S. never apologized, though it did provide monetary compensation.
Territorial context
To travel through the Strait of Hormuz, which at its narrowest is 21 nautical miles (38.9 km) wide, ships pass through the territorial watersTerritorial waters
Territorial waters, or a territorial sea, as defined by the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, is a belt of coastal waters extending at most from the baseline of a coastal state...
of Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
and Oman
Oman
Oman , officially called the Sultanate of Oman , is an Arab state in southwest Asia on the southeast coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by the United Arab Emirates to the northwest, Saudi Arabia to the west, and Yemen to the southwest. The coast is formed by the Arabian Sea on the...
under the transit passage provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea
United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea
The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea , also called the Law of the Sea Convention or the Law of the Sea treaty, is the international agreement that resulted from the third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea , which took place from 1973 through 1982...
. Neither Iran or the U.S. have ratified the convention, but the U.S. accepts the traditional navigation rules as reflected in the Convention. Iran has stated that it reserves "the right to require prior authorization for warships to exercise the right of innocent passage through its territorial sea." It is unclear if the incident happened in the territorial waters of Iran or Oman.
See also
- USS Typhoon encounter with Iranian Craft (April 11, 2008)
- United States-Iran relationsUnited States-Iran relationsPolitical relations between Iran and the United States began in the mid-to-late 19th century. Initially, while Iran was very wary of British and Russian colonial interests during the Great Game, the United States was seen as a more trustworthy Western power, and the Americans Arthur Millspaugh and...
- 2007 Iranian seizure of Royal Navy personnel2007 Iranian seizure of Royal Navy personnelIranian military personnel seized 15 Royal Navy personnel during 2007 and held them for 13 days. On 23 March 2007, 15 British Royal Navy personnel, from HMS Cornwall, searching a merchant vessel were surrounded by the Navy of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and subsequently detained off the...
- Millennium Challenge 2002Millennium Challenge 2002Millennium Challenge 2002 was a major war game exercise conducted by the United States armed forces in mid-2002, likely the largest such exercise in history. The exercise, which ran from July 24 to August 15 and cost $250 million, involved both live exercises and computer simulations...
- Filipino MonkeyFilipino Monkey"Filipino Monkey" is a taunt used by radio pranksters in maritime radio transmissions since at least the 1980s, especially in the Persian Gulf. This taunt is also used as a name for pranksters who make odd, confusing, or even threatening calls on VHF marine channel 16, which is the VHF calling and...
- Iran Air Flight 655Iran Air Flight 655Iran Air Flight 655 was a civilian jet airliner shot down by U.S. missiles on 3 July 1988, over the Strait of Hormuz, toward the end of the Iran–Iraq War...
- House Resolution 362House Resolution 362House Concurrent Resolution 362 is a bill and non-binding resolution in the United States House of Representatives that was introduced on May 22, 2008 by Gary Ackerman [D-NY] . It currently has 280 cosponsors as of April 24, 2009...