U.S. Launches Military Operation To Clear The Strait Of Hormuz To Reopen Navigation
- 20.03.2026, 13:58
A-10 Warthog airplanes and Apache helicopters strike Iranian warships.
The United States and some of its allies have begun using attack aircraft to strike Iranian warships and Apache helicopters in an anti-drone effort to clear the Strait of Hormuz.
This is the first phase of an operation that should allow U.S. Navy ships to enter the strait by organizing security and escorting commercial ships in and out of the Persian Gulf. But the sweep of the strait and its coastline could take weeks, writes The Wall Street Journal.
General Dan Kane, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, announced the operation at a Pentagon news conference Thursday. He said heavily armed A-10 Warthog jets and Apache attack helicopters are flying missions over the strait and off Iran's southern coast. The planes are hunting Iranian speedboats. Some U.S. allies, however, which Kaine did not name, are using the helicopters to "counter single-use attack drones."
The operation is part of a multi-phase Pentagon plan to reduce the threat from Iranian armed boats, mines, cruise missiles and drones that have been blocking shipping since early March, the WSJ wrote. A-10 airplanes and Apache helicopters have been hunting the boats that harass merchant ships for days, a U.S. official told the newspaper. Fighter jets in the region may also join them, he said.
Iran has attacked dozens of vessels trying to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, using drones, both sea and airborne, among other things. It has also used missiles, including against ships in the Gulf of Oman and the Persian Gulf.
The Strait of Hormuz is only 38 kilometers wide at its narrowest point, so mopping it up alone would not be enough, said Michael Connell, an Iran analyst at the Washington-based Center for Naval Studies (CNA): "Cruise missiles can be launched from hundreds of kilometers away and still hit ships passing through the strait."
Despite nearly three weeks of massive bombardment by U.S. and Israeli forces, Iran still has huge stockpiles of mines, truck-mounted cruise missiles and hundreds of boats that are secretly stored in hidden facilities with tunnels along the coast and on islands, warns Farzin Nadimi, an expert on Iranian defense at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy:
"I think it will take weeks for safe navigation to resume in the strait. But even then, Iran will retain a significant portion of [combat] resources."