The SunTensions in the Middle East have just reached a breaking point. Iran has reportedly laid a fresh round of naval mines across the Strait of Hormuz – the world’s most critical oil chokepoint – as oil prices continue to soar. It comes as a third US aircraft carrier, the USS George H.W. Bush, arrives in the Middle East to assist Donald Trump’s blockade and crackdown on Tehran-linked ships. Trump vowed to “shoot and kill any boat” suspected of laying mines in the Strait of Hormuz. However, US intelligence is reportedly not certain if all of the mines from the first round have been found and destroyed.
While Washington sources say the US knows exactly how many new mines have been deployed, they have so far refused to reveal that number. According to the Pentagon, it could take six months to fully clear the Strait of Hormuz of the mines deployed by the Iranian military. All of which raises a bigger question: are Iran’s low-cost mines limiting the options of a military superpower? In this interview, former British Army officer Hamish de Bretton-Gordon explains why these mines are such a serious challenge.
00:00 Middle East tensions hit breaking point
00:55 Why Iran’s mines are so dangerous
01:57 Could mines destroy a US aircraft carrier?
02:24 Why US carriers wouldn’t enter the Strait anyway
03:32 Why the Strait is so important
04:16 Why clearing the mines is so difficult
07:44 Why it could take months to fully clear
08:08 How ships could move sooner
08:57 The two ways this could end
10:46 What ‘shoot to kill’ actually means
11:20 Why we’re in a stalemate
14:57 The cost to the US military
17:59 How this could end
