Source: Reuters

Would’ve been hard to imagine some 4 yrs ago: just learned Ukrainian military will train ​German military to defend against potential Russian attack on ‌NATO. ‘Ukrainian military is currently ⁠the only one in the world with frontline experience against Russia’ head of German army said
True that

😬 de moins en moins parodique et souvent bien plus fiable que beaucoup de titres "sérieux".
Prenez des notes, les confrères du Moint et du Cigaro.
Le Gorafi vous démonte à la petite cuillère.

C’est jour de sortie !! 🛎️

(Strip de mars 2025)

Minab

Ce qui me trouble, c'est que pendant 20 ans on a bouclé sur "Wikipédia raconte n'importe quoi, c'est rédigé par n'importe qui dont on ne sait même pas qui c'est", et maintenant on croit des générateurs de texte, sous contrôle parfois d'une certaine politique, entraînés sur n'importe quoi.

The question was raised how bad a task would it be to clear the Strait of Hormuz if it was mined. The answer is "pretty bad".

But let's backtrack a bit - in 1991 Captain Christopher Craig of the Royal Navy had the opportunity to see what the mine threat in the Gulf was all about. In his book "Call for Fire: Sea Combat in the Falklands and the Gulf War" (here in Swedish) he described the events.

As part of a huge naval task force, USS Tripoli (a 19,000 Iwo Jima-class amphibious assault ship) suddenly struck a mine in an area where there weren't supposed to be any. All operations stop, the force stands around trying to figure out the situation, and map where the mine field actually is.

Before the situation is quite under control, the cruiser USS Princeton suddenly suffer a large explosion - turns out there are bottomlaid mines in the area, making things even more complex.

a man in a suit and tie stands in a crowd ALT: a man in a suit and tie stands in a crowd

In this case the number of mines weren't huge - the minelines were six anchored mines in each, with lines being approximately 200 meters from each other. In other words not thousands of mines, but dozens. Added to this was a handful of more advanced Italian Manta-mines. cat-uxo.com/explosive-ha...

The bottom mines are an issue, as they are more difficult to spot and remove as part of mine countermeasure operations. In many cases, you also want to send down divers to disarm a few mines and bring them up for study to make sure what you are dealing with so you know how to hunt for them safely.

It is highly likely that the Iranian stock of mines is somewhat similar - a large number of relatively cheap and simple mines, mixed in some smarter mines to make sweeping and hunting more difficult. In addition mines can (though not in accordance with international law) be set to drift.

Navy's Avenger Class Mine Hunters Have Left The Middle East For Good The last four Avengers in Bahrain were carried off on a heavy lift vessel at a time of crisis, where mining the Persian Gulf could come into play.

Now, a major issue here is that the state of USN mine countermeasure capabilities is... not good. As you might have seen, the last of the old Avenger-class was shipped out of the Gulf in *January*. Something which once again is very much on brand for the complete lack of long-term planning by Trump.

Navy Deploys First Operational LCS Mine Countermeasures Packages - USNI News The Littoral Combat Ships carrying the first two operational mine countermeasure packages deployed earlier this month after more than a decade of fits, starts and failed systems, USNI News has learned...

Now, what is available is the LCS in it's MCM-setup. The program has been troubled and might provide questionable value for money, and it is unproven. However, there's no reason it *shouldn't* work, so I remain cautiously optimistic. The big issue is that the number of vessels is too small.

Here you might ask yourself "What do you do if you have too few mine countermeasure platforms?", or alternatively you might ask yourself "What did Christopher Craig do during the Falkland's War?"

I'm glad to say the answer to both questions is found in Sandy Woodward's classic "One Hundred Days".

...and finally, remember that mines are - as O'Flaherty nicely describe it - agnostic to ceasefires, and if Iran goes down that route, it effectively removes the ability to quickly open the strait even in case of a diplomatic solution.

I question whether the current MCM capabilities are enough to keep up with Iranian mining capabilities, even *if* the USN would be ready to escort convoys out guns blazing (which is very high risk and seems unlikely), or whether a 'true' opening would require boots on the ground on both shores.

Another particularly worrying issue with this case is the ability of Iran to hold vessels and platforms doing the mine clearing at risk with shore-based missiles, drones, and USVs. Add to this the ability to resow the already cleared parts of the minefield at short notice, and you have a headache.

YMMV, but this gives a rough picture of what it would take to clear a significant stretch of the strait and how fast ~4 LCS could do that work - and remember clearing takes almost the same time regardless of whether there are mines in the area or whether there is just a fear that there might be.

Sweeping (against cheap anchored mines) is faster, with 4-6 nautical square miles per day (13.7-20.6 square km), for up to five days. After that vessels and crews need to head back to shore before coming back out again for the next shift.

...so you need to sell that confidence interval to the tankers as 'good enough'.

Another factor is the closing part: a minehunter (i.e. a vessel able to find bottomlaid mines) is able to clear a nautical square mile (1.852 x 1.852 km = 3.4 square km) every 24 hours, and keep that up for 5-10 days.

What about mine-clearing? Let's go to another RN captain, namely Chris O’Flaherty and his excellent “Naval Minewarfare: Politics to Practicalities”. The big issue here is that finding and removing mines isn't a clear-cut "mined-cleared", but a scale of "We are X% sure there aren't mines here".

Thought you could deliver! Excellent thread, the best about this topic I’ve ever seen!

Thank you very much.

A cartoon by Ron Cobb (1975), showing a shadow of US B-52 bomber above cratered landscape. Two people who look like Vietnamese peasants look up; one says “they’re having problems with their economy again.”

This is from 1975.

#Trumpmuskovia s Mine Sweeping Capabilities are under the Water - and they know it! So, #Trump Regime is only able to do something against #Iran Mine Thread with the Help of the "Freeriders" from #NATO.
Remember #Greenland?
#TrumpsWar? #WithoutUs!
centerformaritimestrategy.org/publications...

😑😬 the irony!

I was in a 2 hour briefing today on the Iran War. All the briefings are closed, because Trump can't defend this war in public.

I obviously can't disclose classified info, but you deserve to know how incoherent and incomplete these war plans are.

1/ Here's what I can share:

Ma suspicion d'entente 🇨🇳🇮🇷 s'appuie sur des sources multiples.
Or on constate que la majorité des navires (toutes flottes confondues) se refusent encore maintenant à s'avancer.
#Ormuz
Conclusion ?
Je n'en tire aucune.
Parce que je ne sais rien