Iran rapidly bolsters retaliation capability in gulf, experts say
Source: The Washington Post
Iran is rapidly gaining new capabilities to strike at U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf, amassing an arsenal of sophisticated anti-ship missiles while expanding its fleet of fast-attack boats and submarines, U.S. and Middle Eastern analysts say.
The new systems, many of them developed with foreign assistance, are giving Irans commanders new confidence that they could quickly damage or destroy U.S. ships if hostilities erupt, the officials say.
Although U.S. Navy officials are convinced that they would prevail in a fight, Irans advances have fueled concerns about U.S. vulnerabilities during the opening hours of a conflict in the gulf.
Increasingly accurate short-range missiles combined with Irans use of swarm tactics involving hundreds of heavily armed patrol boats could strain the defensive capabilities of even the most modern U.S. ships, current and former military analysts say.
Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/iran-bolsters-retaliation-capability-in-gulf-experts-say/2012/07/26/gJQAQuFUCX_singlePage.html
SCVDem
(5,103 posts)WTF are we spending BILLIONS in defensive (offensive) on?
If all this money amounts to squat, then lets cut the military budget in half because obviously it is gaining us nothing!
DavidDvorkin
(19,504 posts)NickB79
(19,285 posts)Thinking we'll face off against another large, sophisticated country fielding tanks, fighter jets and soldiers wearing body armor. And it's possible that may be the case 20 years from now if China becomes a military threat. But for the time being, we're still not taking seriously the threat of small but agile enemies employing unconventional military tactics.
Brother Buzz
(36,490 posts)It appears the Iranians did.
Van Riper played the opposing force commander, and easily sunk a whole carrier battle group in the simulation with an inferior Middle-Eastern "red" team in the first two days. After the simulation was restarted with different parameters, he claimed that the wargame had been "fixed" to falsely validate current doctrine of the US Navy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002
gmpierce
(97 posts)Our senior naval commanders did their best to ignore and minimize the results of Millennium Challenge, but it's likely that some of the junior officers in 2002 actually learned something. Ten years later these guys are now in command.
This probably explains why the USNS Rappahannock attacked an Indian fishing vessel with 50 caliber machine gun fire and killed a number of innocent civilians.
The circumstances in the Gulf are kind of similar to what our Marines found in Afghanistan. You might be attacked at any moment and your chances of surviving go up if you shoot at anything that moves.
Under circumstance in either Afghanistan or the Gulf, there are no "rules of engagement" that make any sense and also protect the innocent.