ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Washington is sending a third aircraft-carrier strike group and an additional Marine expeditionary unit to the Middle East amid continued Iranian strikes against commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz and as President Trump weighs different options in dealing with Tehran.
Ships, jet fighters, Marines and sailors are poised to arrive in the region by the end of November, US officials told the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) on Thursday, adding 9,000 to 10,000 more troops to the already-stationed 50,000 in the US Central Command (CENTCOM) theater of operations.
In April for the first time since 2003, three aircraft carriers operated in the Middle East at the same time, according to CENTCOM. The WSJ reported that the USS Theodore Roosevelt is set to join the USS George H.W. Bush and the USS George Washington in November, with the addition of Marine Corps ships and accompanying strike groups.
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) spokesperson Brigadier General Hossein Mohebbi said on Wednesday that while Iran targets vessels in the Strait of Hormuz on a daily basis, the US has not responded with the usual tit for tat retaliatory measures seen earlier in the conflict amid reports of four ships struck in the Strait earlier this week.
“It has been a while now that we target the ships, we prevent the small ships from passage through the strait of Hormuz,” said Mohebbi, adding that “for time now the United Status has not responded to any of our attacks.”
IRGC outlets reported on Thursday night that another oil tanker was struck in the strait. The UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) reported early Friday it had received a third-party report of a tanker being struck “by an unknown projectile” while transiting the Strait of Hormuz on Thursday, “resulting in a fire.”
On Wednesday the UKMTO stated in three separate time-late reports that tankers were struck in the Strait of Hormuz “by an unknown projectile” on Tuesday, one of which it identified as a crude oil tanker, in addition to a fourth tanker strike on Monday which resulted in a fire but no casualties. The reports did not specify the location or transit route.
Mohebbi on Tuesday held a press conference with foreign journalists and media representatives and published an “open letter” to the American people, according to the IRGC-linked Sepah news agency, portraying the US’ lack of retaliation as a “forced” retreat.
“For the first time in history, Iran has exerted, and retained, operational control over the Strait of Hormuz” and that “American warships were forced to flee deep into the Indian Ocean. Not a single U.S. vessel can now dock at the vaunted U.S. Fifth Fleet in Bahrain,” the letter read.
The Strait of Hormuz, a strategic chokepoint through which a fifth of the world's oil and LNG passed prior to the US and Israel’s aerial campaign against Iran in late February, continues to remain a contentious point of the conflict.
A US-imposed blockade remains in place since mid-July with Tehran routinely obstructing the passage of commercial ships and firing on vessels it accuses of unauthorized crossings.
Tehran has linked the lifting of Tehran’s blockade on its southern ports on conditions it presented to the US, which include the release of frozen assets and an end to hostilities.
Negotiations are taking place regarding the conditions of the reopening of the Strait.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Wednesday received Washington’s response to Tehran’s proposal for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, in which United States President Donald Trump initially rejected but a day later reiterated that he expects “more talks with Iran [this week],” Trump told Axios in a phone interview Sunday, noting that “they want to make a deal, but it is not the deal that I want to make.”
Trump this week has mulled over the possibility of resuming strikes against Iran.
“We're going to win. As far as I'm concerned, it's going to be one way or the other. It's going to go pretty quickly,” Trump told reporters at the White House this week.
“We have to make that decision. We blow them up or make a deal - but the time is coming."
