Not worried about the Straits of Hormuz

 A number of people have been asking about the risk that Iran will shut down the Strait of Hormuz. The short answer is: we’re not worried about it. But it’s worth running down why.

The ostensible reason why the Iranian government might want to shut down the strait is retaliation against a Western oil embargo. Sanctions are already causing Iran pain;  there is little doubt that such an embargo could be devastating. The European Union purchases 18% of Iranian production; Japan and South Korea take another 27%. China absorbs 22%, and could take more, but probably won’t for two reasons. First, after China’s recent self-imposed foreign policy disasters, the People’s Republic seems to have little appetite for antagonizing the West. Second, China and Iran are right now embroiled in a pricing dispute that could cut Iran’s exports by 40%. The truth is that God only knows if the European Union will get its act together, but let’s say that they do. 

Would Iran respond militarily? Military actions against commerce will, of course, provoke a response by the United States Navy. The ensuing naval war has two outcomes:

(1)  Iran loses. That would be a bad result. The best-case loss for Iran is something like the 1988 battle. (This was called Operation Praying Mantis back in the day when the Defense Department chose names for reasons other than propaganda.) The worst case loss is a wrecked export infrastructure, no naval capacity, and airstrikes against the nuclear facilities. All that, and you get blamed as the aggressor in the court of world opinion.

(2)  Iran wins. Is that possible? Probably not. But … back in 2002 the United States held a wargame called Millennium Challenge 2002. The results were rather interesting.  

Red, commanded by retired Marine Corps Lt. General Paul K. Van Riper, used old methods to evade Blue’s sophisticated electronic surveillance network. Van Riper used motorcycle messengers to transmit orders to front-line troops and World War II lighting signals to get airplanes off the runways without using radio communication.

Red received an ultimatum from Blue that was essentially a surrender document that Red must respond to within 24 hours. Given that Red knew that Blue was coming, by the second day of the exercise Red used a fleet of small boats to determine the position of Blue’s fleet. In a preemptive strike, Red launched a massive salvo of cruise missiles, overwhelming the Blue forces’ electronic sensors, destroying sixteen warships. This includes one aircraft carrier, ten cruisers and five out of the six amphibious ships. The equivalent of this success in a real conflict would have resulted in the death of over 20,000 service personnel. Soon after the cruise missile offensive, another significant portion of Blue’s navy was “sunk” by an armada of small Red boats carrying out both conventional and suicide attacks, able to engage Blue forces due to Blue’s inability to detect them as well as expected.

At this point, the exercise was suspended and Blue’s ships were “re-floated” and changes were made to the rules of engagement; later this was justified by General Peter Pace as: “You kill me in the first day and I sit there for the next 13 days doing nothing, or you put me back to life and you get 13 more days’ worth of experiment out of me. Which is a better way to do it?” … Due to his concerns about the scripted nature of the new exercise, Van Riper resigned his position in the midst of the war game. Van Riper later expressed concern that the wargame’s purpose had shifted to reinforce existing doctrine and notions of infallibility within the U.S. military rather than serve as a learning experience.

Iran has invested heavily in mine technology, which suggests they are at least committed to making a plausible threat. Their mines would be a lot better — more destructive, smarter/more selective, and harder to detect — than they were in 1988. They’re believed to have several thousand, and could plausibly get hundreds of them in the water on short (less than 48 hours) notice. Iran has also invested in cheap, dumb anti-ship missiles: in increasing order of size and scariness, the Kosar, Noor, and Raad. That last is a 3-ton subsonic shore-to-ship cruise missile with a payload that could probably disable a warship with a clean hit. The Kosar and Noor are smaller and shorter-range but can be mounted on small boats — these are the missiles modeled in Millennium Challenge. The U.S. counter-campaign would not be as simple as just sailing in and claiming naval control of the Straits; a sensible admiral will want to see missile launch, radar and airbase sites suppressed first.

Since a spike in energy prices will hurt almost everyone, world opinion would set firmly against Iran pretty quickly. Notable exceptions would likely include Venezuela and Russia, with the latter being important for its Security Council veto. So, military counteraction won’t have the benefit of a U.N. resolution. Another interesting legal aspect is flagging. Under international law an attack on a flagged ship can be treated as an attack on the flag nation, so if a Panamanian-flagged tanker hits an Iranian mine, Panama has a formal casus belli. Mines have gotten a lot smarter, but not yet so smart they can detect a flag. Moreover, the GCC will firmly line up against Tehran. The U.K. will almost certainly back military action, and France is even more likely to act. (France has a small military base in Abu Dhabi.) In other words, the lack of a UNSC resolution will probably do little to slow Western action.

Let’s say, then, that Iran could win the opening battles of a naval war in the Persian Gulf. Then what? The U.S. and E.U. won’t lift sanctions. The world’s largest navy will regroup and counterattack. There will be a period of prolonged high oil prices, but that won’t make the West (or the GCC) more willing to back down.

The nature of a counterattack would be open to considerable debate. Attacking the oil export facilities, for instance, could cripple Iran’s economy — but would also ensure that oil prices would stay high, as Iranian production would be offline for a long period of time. Nonetheless, even limited American action will destoy a great deal of Iran’s export capability along the way. Attacking the nuclear facilities would mean a dramatic expansion of war aims. It would probably be expensive, too — those facilities are far inland, dispersed, and well protected. Still, Iran will run a high risk that the U.S. will take the opportunity to attack the nuclear program: after all, Iran will have already used the biggest arrow in its quiver, and a counter-campaign will have to involve prolonged airstrikes on Iranian coastal defenses. 

In theory, of course, Iran could escalate further. Iran could launch missile attacks against GCC targets, but the U.S. and its Arab allies would respond with strategic attacks of their own — e.g., the destruction of Iran’s export capability. Iran could intervene in Iraq, but the U.S. no longer has combat troops in that country. A year ago, Iran could possibly call on Syrian support, but nowadays Syria has other problems. Finally, Iran could attempt to mobilize Hezbollah, but launching a Third Lebanon War isn’t in Hezbollah’s interests at the present time. Moreover, Hezbollah can do nothing to dissuade the United States.

In other words, if Iran loses the naval war, then it loses. If Iran wins the naval war, then it loses, possibly worse. There is no obvious endgame that ends with Iran ahead.

If a war starts by Iranian action, it won’t be because there is an international payoff. The reasons would be domestic. Some elements in Iran might consider a conflict with the U.S. worthwhile, even if Iran clearly comes off the worse, as long as critical regime assets are not endangered. There’s nothing like a foreign war for rallying popular support, after all. The most likely scenario would involve an actor or actors rather than the central government as such — the Revolutionary Guards, or some other group, taking an action that pulls Iran out on a limb. Nonetheless, that seems unlikely. 

Therefore, we will be greatly surprised if Iran mines Hormuz or otherwise attacks shipping, except in retaliation for an American (or Israeli) air raid. It simply has nothing to gain.

A one-sentence counterargument below the fold.

One could apply the same logic to Japan in 1941 … 

Comments

[Will Baird]

I remember that exercise. It was awesome for the slap in the face it gave. However, I suspect that the recon element of it is a bit tougher than the exercise gave for the faux Iranians.

That said, we are steaming in two carriers and one is in the area already. That have around 120 fighters. The most they would face would be 300 odd fighters which most are what we or the Chinese have sold them. I'd be hesitant to say that they would do well.

[Peter]

Isn't the real risk that a mere threat of military action would cause insurance rates to rise to impossible levels?

[setty]

I'm curious what you think China and Russia are doing during this theoretical war. It seems like their counterforce may be almost as strong in the real world as in the UN Security Council.

[Noel Maurer]

I'm not sure that I understand the question. China won't do anything but want it to be over; it's hard to imagine Russia doing anything in the face of an Iranian act of war, which blocking the straits would be. But I'm not sure that answered the question.

[Doug M.]

China and Russia have basically zero effective force projection capability in the region. So, there's not actually much they could do.

Russia could certainly sell weapons to Iran (as they've done in the past, and are they're doing with Syria right now), but this would probably not have much military impact unless the conflict drags on much longer than expected.

Doug M.

[Alex]

Much of the oil exported out of the Straits heads east to China.

The Chinese would likely either offer to contribute a couple of ships (probably the two 042s and a fleet tanker they have on piracy patrol, or perhaps they'd put together a bigger group centred on one of their new LPDs) to the international task force, thus guaranteeing their voice in the eventual settlement and asserting their arrival as a sea power while gaining credit with the US and EU, or else try to browbeat Iran diplomatically into giving in before it all went kinetic, thus establishing a protector-client relationship and earning credit by turning up at the last moment with a solution.

The Russians, I think, would do nothing of any consequence, might whine a little or even a lot, and would be very happy to replace the weapons used or destroyed, at the usual rates on this here price list.