Rhetorics of war
Attacks on tankers and pipeline infrastructure in the Gulf started weeks after Washington designated Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) a terrorist group on April 8, and a series of other steps were taken by the U.S. administration to block Iran trade activity.
The United States has repeatedly accused Iran of being involved in these attacks, but Tehran has denied the charges.
After the attacks on two tankers in the Gulf of Oman on June 13, the U.S. military released images it said showed the IRGC removing an unexploded limpet mine from a Japanese-owned tanker.
The United States also displayed limpet mine fragments it said came from the attack and said the ordnance looked Iranian in origin.
U.S. military images taken June 13 showing personnel that the Pentagon says are members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy removing an unexploded limpet mine from M/T Kokuka Courageous, a Japanese-owned commercial tanker. U.S. Navy/Handout via REUTERS
Days after the images were released, Iran shot down a U.S. military drone it said was on a spy mission over its territory but Washington said the aircraft was targeted in international air space in “an unprovoked attack.”
Map distributed by the U.S. Pentagon showing the path of the drone shot down over international waters.
The purported wreckage of the American drone is seen displayed by the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) in Tehran on June 21. A map in the background illustrates the path of the drone over Iran’s territorial waters.
After the drone incident, U.S. President Donald Trump called off a retaliatory air strike minutes before it was launched. It would have been the first time the United States had bombed Iran in decades of hostility. On Monday, Trump signed an executive order imposing sanctions against Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other senior Iranian figures.
Relations between Washington and Tehran have deteriorated since Trump withdrew last year from a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, and reimposed and extended sanctions to throttle Iran’s vital oil trade. Iran retaliated earlier this week with a threat to breach the limits on its nuclear activities imposed by the deal.
U.S. MILITARY BUILD UP IN REGION
Traditional U.S. allies in the Middle East include Saudi Arabia, Israel, Oman, Kuwait and Bahrain, where the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet is based.
In May, Washington announced the deployment of 1,500 more soldiers in the region. Official sources told Reuters the figure would be higher.
During the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, both Iran and Iraq attacked tankers and merchant ships in the Gulf, which drew the United States into the conflict. Iran learned lessons from that period, which became known as the “Tanker War,” and now has many more tools at its disposal such as mines and speed boats to block the strait, military analysts say.
Recent Comments