No. of Recommendations: 4
Looks like several of us are making the same point. You can either continue to rhetorically maneuver around that point, or meet that point head on:
Why do you think, with the economic impact of the gulf’s closure growing daily…… that we haven’t ventured to open the Strait of Hormuz?Point of order. I first made the point that the Navy hadn't serious tried to open the straits. That point was never acknowledged (because that's how this board works).
Anyway. But to answer your question:
-We're exercising different types of pressure campaigns on Iran. Military force is one. Economic pressure is one.
-It's a race, isn't it? How long can Iran hold out? According to all of you the answer is "indefinitely". I don't believe that's realistic.
Here's a counter question for you: Why isn't oil at $200 a barrel and rising? Why, despite the strait being closed for ~6 weeks or whatever it is, has the price of oil largely stabilized in the mid $90s?
Let's keep going. Now that the board has decided the US hasn't made a concerted effort to open the straits (better late than never), let's examine why that might be. Better yet, let's talk about what that would entail. The Joe Biden method for Naval operations was to allow the Houthis to shoot as many missiles, rockets and drones they could muster against a mostly passive US fleet. Had the effect of burning up loads of munitions and risking ships for...no reason. (This board was 100% silent on that topic. It's hilarious there are some complaining now).
For those who've forgotten (conveniently), here's what Pentagon malpractice looks like:
https://taskandpurpose.com/news/air-force-truman-h....
(Hopefully I don't need to explain why this was dumb squared. Again.)
This board also believes that the current Pentagon is stupid because you all hate Hegseth. That's fine. It's also a misunderstanding of how Pentagon planning and decision making are working, but whatever. If you don't think that US ships should be passive targets -and- you want the strait open by force, what would that entail? What would we have to do?
For one it would involve carpet bombing the sh1t out of the Iranian coast. That means heavy bombers. How many Iranians do you want to kill in the coastal areas? Then you'd need to clear mines. Upthread it was mentioned a few mine hits on US ships in the past along with missile strikes.
Why haven't we read about these things happening now? Because the Pentagon isn't as stupid as this board thinks it is: They had a plan to eliminate Iran's ability to get airplanes up to shoot at US forces. They can't lay mines at high rates, they have no subs and not much of anything other than the 2 dudes in their Zodiac. While some of you seem to be under the impression that amounts to a ton of firepower, in reality our two guys aren't going to be able to haul around large amounts of naval mines in the back of their speed boats. Their threat level also drops to close to zero the first time a merchant ship hands a bolt action .30-06 rifle to somebody who's a reasonably good shot. Of course they wouldn't hand over a Winchester would they? Would be more like a Barret .50 cal or better.
There *was* that awesome intimidating video of Iranian SEALs or whatever it was scaling a boarding ladder that somebody on the cargo ship helpfully dropped over the side for them to climb. Then they were let inside the ship they wanted to capture by another helpful crew member of the target ship. Yeah, that's not going to be happening at a large scale in the strait.
Everything the Pentagon has been doing was in the service of degrading Iran's ability to react to what we're doing and put our ships at risk. (Here's where someone starts chanting TACO or something).
The culmination of all this is the following:
We haven't forced open the strait because we haven't felt like we had to. And because we're not willing to de-populate Iran up to 10 miles from the water's edge.
-We have a blockade in place that's hurting Iran
-The "global economic crisis" so far hasn't materialized. You guys might ask yourselves where Japan for example is getting its oil from now.
