ON AUGUST 3rd, the US military announced a plan to deploy armed troops on commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz, continuing the unilateral measures to stoke instability in the Persian Gulf.
The latest provocation was reported by Western media outlets, citing four anonymous US officials, who said the final decision was yet to be made and that the deployment will be carried out at the request of civilian ships.
The announcement came just when the landing ship USS Carter Hall and the amphibious assault ship USS Bataan were on their way to the Persian Gulf, carrying thousands of US marines and sailors.
In a statement on Monday, US Naval Forces Central Command said more than 3,000 Marines and sailors arrived in the West Asian region, proving earlier media reports right.
Last month, US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered the escalation ‘in response to recent attempts by Iran to seize commercial ships’ in West Asia, according to a statement from US Central Command.
In May this year, the White House announced that the Joe Biden administration plans to make a series of moves in the Persian Gulf region, without specifying what those moves would include.
In mid-July, Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh stated that the Department of Defence is increasing its presence ‘to monitor the Strait of Hormuz and surrounding waters’, revealing some military details.
The Pentagon announced the deployment of A-10 Thunderbolt II attack bombers, F-16 and F-35 fighters, as well as the guided-missile destroyer USS Thomas Hudner (DDG-116).
In the following days, the deployment of USS Carter Hall and USS Bataan was also announced.
The latter was already deployed off Iran’s coast in January 2020 when the US and Iran were on the brink of war over the assassination of Iran’s top anti-terror commander, Lieutenant General Qasem Soleimani.
Official US explanations for deploying new forces in the Persian Gulf are alleged Iran’s ‘harassment of free navigation’ and accusations that it contributes to ‘regional instability’.
In reality, as experts opine, it is the US that began harassing ships and tankers with Iranian exports, forcing sailors to dock at unscheduled ports, seizing the cargo and selling it to its own companies.
These US illegal activities were part of former US President Donald Trump’s so-called maximum pressure campaign against Iran and the purpose was to isolate Iran commercially from the world.
Things, however, didn’t go according to plan for Washington as Iran retaliated in full measure, targeting the ships of states and companies that took direct part in American piracy.
Iran’s retaliatory campaign has proven to be an effective method of deterrence, and today no energy company wants to buy stolen Iranian oil from tankers on a forced berth in Texas, fearing repercussions.
The US military muscle-flexing in the Persian Gulf has to be seen in the context of the US military-industrial complex’s malicious plans against Iran and security and stability in the region.
First, the US wants to discourage Iran from retaliatory measures and seeks to send a message to energy companies that they can freely buy stolen Iranian oil.
This indicates that Washington has no intention of stopping piracy activities and economic warfare against the Islamic Republic of Iran, but only plans to intensify it in the near future.
Furthermore, the US is evidently miffed with the diplomatic rapprochement between Iran and the Arab states of the Persian Gulf, as well as their efforts to control their seas with a joint naval coalition.
Washington wants to convince the Arab countries that it is more beneficial for them to continue the hostility with Iran and look for rapprochement with the Israeli regime, signalling that it will be their guardian and that the US Navy will be a buffer zone.
The most important reason for American militarisation in the Persian Gulf can be read from the statements of Israeli regime officials, who in recent years have repeatedly asked Washington to reject the nuclear agreement (JCPOA) and to threaten Iran with military build-up.
The refusal of the Biden administration to return to the nuclear deal and lift sanctions as well as the latest deployment of forces testify that the US administration, regardless of party affiliations, unquestioningly follows the Zionist warmongering policy on Iran.
Iran has responded to the deployment of US military forces in the Persian Gulf in kind, strengthening its own coastal and maritime presence, holding military exercises and publicly unveiling new weapons.
On August 2, the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Navy started drills close to the three islands of Abu Musa, the Greater and Lesser Tunbs, as well as the lesser-known island of Nazeat.
Various units of the IRGC Navy, including the combat, naval, missile, drone, rapid reaction, electronic warfare and airborne units, backed by the IRGC Aerospace Force, exercised a range of military tactics.
The IRGC has deployed various types of weapons and equipment in the drills, most notably the Abu Mahdi naval cruise missile with a range of over 1,000km.
Abolfazl Shekarchi, the spokesman for the Iranian Armed Forces, warned the US that it has no place in the Persian Gulf, the Sea of Oman and the Indian Ocean, adding that regional countries are capable of maintaining security on their own.
In remarks on Monday, IRGC spokesman Brigadier General Ramezan Sharif warned the US against any act of mischief in the region, including the seizure of Iranian ships.
‘Iran has reached such a high degree of power and capability that can respond in kind to any US action and mischief (in the region), including the seizure of ships,’ he was quoted as saying.
His remarks were in response to the US Naval Forces Central Command (CENTCOM) announcement that the US Navy has deployed more than 3,000 sailors and Marine forces to West Asia under the pretext of protecting ships and vessels crossing the main waterways in the strategic region.
- The US Air Force has found unsafe levels of a likely carcinogen at a military base where a large number of men and women have reported cancer diagnoses.
The discovery of Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs) in an underground launch control centre at a Montana nuclear missile base ‘is the first from an extensive sampling of active US intercontinental ballistic missile bases to address specific cancer concerns raised by missile community members,’ Air Force Global Strike Command said in a press release on Monday.
The two launch facilities at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana showed PCB levels higher than the thresholds recommended by the Environmental Protection Agency, it said.
The EPA classifies PCBs, which are oily or waxy substances, as proven animal carcinogens and probable human carcinogens with the potential to cause rare blood cancers among other types.
In the meantime, US General Thomas Bussiere, commander of Air Force Global Strike Command, directed his subordinates to note and address the issue and take ‘immediate measures to begin the clean-up process for the affected facilities and mitigate exposure by our Airmen and Guardians to potentially hazardous conditions’, according to the Monday press release.
After a military briefing was obtained by The Associated Press in January showing that at least nine current or former missileers at Malmstrom were diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a rare blood cancer, the Air Force School of Aerospace Medicine launched a study to look at cancers among the entire missile community.
And, based on new data from a grassroots group of former missile launch officers and their surviving family members, there could be hundreds more cancers of all types.
The Torchlight Initiative found that at least 268 troops who served at nuclear missile sites, or their surviving family members, have self-reported being diagnosed with cancer, blood diseases, or other illnesses over the past several decades.
It is noteworthy that the missileer community is very small. Only a few hundred airmen serve as missileers at the country’s three silo-launched Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile bases at Malmstrom, FE Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming and Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota.
Since the Minuteman operations began in the early 1960s, there have been only about 21,000 missileers, in total.
Minuteman missileers serve in underground launch control centres where they are responsible for monitoring, and if needed, launching fields of silo-based nuclear weapons.
Missileers spend their duty time on watch in underground bunkers, ready to turn the key and fire Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles if ordered to do so by the US President.
The infrastructure and equipment at the sites are decades old and missileers have raised health concerns multiple times over ventilation, water quality and potential toxins they cannot avoid as they spend 24 to 48-hour shifts on duty underground.
The US Air Force’s carcinogens report comes as the risk of nuclear weapons is higher than at any time since the Cold War era, according to the United Nations.
