In the vietnam warthe United States came to deploy more than 500,000 soldiers in Southeast Asia and still failed to impose a clear victory. Decades later, that conflict remains the classic example of how an overwhelming military power can become trapped in a war that, on paper, seemed much simpler. The war begins to mutate. The war between the United States and Israel against Iran has entered a different phase because two strategic moves are happening at the same time and the satellites have clearly revealed their destinations. While the United States strengthens the region with marine units capable of rapidly deploying troops ashore, two major US ships ready to clear mines in the Gulf have appeared in Malaysiathousands of kilometers from Hormuz. There is no doubt, this combination is, to say the least, strange: if the immediate objective was to reopen the strait through a classic naval operation, those ships displaced from the East should be precisely there. The contrast suggests that Washington is beginning to assume that the problem it won’t solve itself from the sea and that the conflict can lead to a more complex and prolonged phase. Hormuz: the perfect bottleneck. The strait favors especially Iran because it turns an American technological advantage into a logistical problem. It is a passage, pardon the redundancy, narrow, surrounded by a hostile coast and saturated with underwater noise, which makes it difficult to detect mines and defend ships. As we count last week, Iran can combine speedboats, drones, mobile missiles and mines of different types to sow uncertainty with cheap means. The suspicion of a minefield is enough to paralyze navigation, trigger maritime insurance and force Washington to spend enormous resources on escorts and surveillance. The asymmetry of the mines. naval mines they explain much of the problem. Placing them is relatively simple and cheap: they can be launched from small boats, submarines or even civilian ships. However, removing them It’s much more difficult. Mine-clearing ships must move slowly, use sonar, drones and helicopters, and examine the seabed in great detail. Plus: during this process they are vulnerable to attacks from the coast. That’s why even a few devices can block an entire strait and force the world’s most powerful navy to act with extreme caution. The USS Canberra somewhere in the Middle East in 2025 Where are the minesweepers? In that context, the absence of the LCS Americans prepared for countermines is especially striking. He USS Tulsa and the USS Santa Barbara They were deployed in Bahrain precisely to replace the old Avenger minehunters retired from the Gulf. But satellite images recent ones place them on the other side of the world, in Malaysia. This means that two-thirds of the ships destined for that mission are no longer in the area where they are most needed. The decision may have tactical explanationssuch as preventing them from being exposed to Iranian attacks in port, but the result is more or less clear: the American ability to clear mines in Hormuz is now much more limited. The limits of the naval solution. Even if such ships were present, clearing the strait would not be quick, of course. They counted the TWZ analysts that the new LCS are not dedicated minehunters like the old Avenger, but rather multipurpose platforms that depend on drones, helicopters and remote sensors to locate each device. In other words, the process aims to slow and requires air protection constant. In the middle of war, with missiles and drones flying from the Iranian coastthe operation becomes even more risky and almost suicidal. That is why many analysts warn that reopening Hormuz only from the sea could lead to weeks or months. Uss Tripoli The marines arrive. This is where the other big piece of the board comes in. The United States is sending a Marine Expeditionary Unitthat is, a rapid response force of about 2,200 marines embarked on amphibious ships with helicopters, F-35B and landing vehicles. These units are designed for assault operationsraids and temporary terrain control. In the case of Hormuz, and although everything is a hypothesis, its mission could include attack nearby islands into the strait, destroy missile launchers or neutralize bases from which mines are placed. School or attack. This change implies, a priori, a conceptual shift. Instead of just escorting oil tankers and clearing mines, the United States could try to eliminate threats on land. That would mean attacks on strategic islands, military depots or launching positions off the Iranian coast. Under that scenario, amphibious operations would allow open temporary windows security for navigation, but they would also introduce US troops into a hostile environment where the enemy can respond with missiles, drones or maritime guerrillas. Marine Expeditionary Unit on the move in the Pacific The risk of escalation. The problem with this type of operation is that tend to expand. The main reason? An incursion on an island requires protecting the deployed troops. Not only that. Then you have to maintain control of the place, reinforce defenses and secure supply lines. And if Iran reoccupies the area once the marines withdraw, the cycle begins again. This is how operations intended as quick hits can be transformed into prolonged missions. The mirror of Vietnam. May the main countermine warships have fled thousands of kilometers from Hormuz while marines arrive does not suggest a simple maritime reopening operation, but rather the possibility that Washington begins to assume that the real problem is no longer just in the water, but on the coastin the islands and in the Iranian capacity to reappear again and again with mobile, dispersed and cheap means. And that brings the war closer, saving all historical distances, to a very logical similar to vietnam. Not because Iran is going to reproduce that conflict exactly, but because the central risk is the same: a technologically superior superpower enters with objectives that seem limited and rational, discovers that the terrain forces it to expand the mission, and ends up trapped in a … Read more
