Since early 2026 a sharp uptick in incidents involving commercial vessels in and around the Gulf of Oman, the southern Red Sea and parts of the Arabian Sea has been widely attributed to Iranian forces and proxies responding to earlier US strikes. From drifting mines and small-boat swarm harassments to unmanned aerial systems and occasional missile strikes, the pattern is deliberate: raise the cost and risk of commercial navigation to pressure Washington and its partners while signalling resolve to domestic and regional audiences.
What Iran is doing and why
– Tactics: Reported attacks have included limpet or contact mines, small fast-attack craft swarming larger ships, short-range cruise or ballistic missile strikes against military and logistical targets, and armed drones used for surveillance and strikes. Some incidents are covert — mines attached to hulls, electromagnetic interference, or clandestine boarding — while others are overt demonstrations, like parading captured vessels to media.
– Objectives: Tehran seeks to deter further US strikes, punish countries seen as aligned with Washington, elevate the economic and political costs of US policy, and demonstrate asymmetric capability. By threatening global shipping, Iran leverages the vulnerability of commercial trade and the international community’s reliance on open sea lanes.
– Attribution and ambiguity: Iran often acts through proxies or denies direct involvement, creating plausible deniability. This ambiguity complicates international responses and reduces the political appetite for swift military retaliation.
Can the US stop the attacks?
Short answer: not completely and not unilaterally. The US can deter, mitigate and make attacks riskier and costlier for Iran, but permanently stopping an irregular, dispersed maritime campaign would be very difficult without broader political resolution.
What the US can do
– Naval escorts and patrols: Deploying carrier strike groups, destroyers, and mine-countermeasure vessels, and increasing patrols along threatened corridors, can protect transits and respond to incidents. Escorts reduce risk for individual convoys but are resource-intensive and cannot effectively cover all commercial traffic across multiple sea lanes indefinitely.
– Mine countermeasures and ISR: Expanding surveillance (maritime patrol aircraft, drones, satellites), deploying specialized mine-clearing units, and fast-reaction forces improves situational awareness and response time. Effective ISR helps attribute attacks and target attackers, but requires sustained assets and regional basing.
– Defensive systems and ship hardening: Advising and assisting commercial shippers on avoidance routing, hardening ships, installing electronic countermeasures and close-in weapon systems (on naval escorts or private security units) lowers vulnerability.
– Targeted strikes and interdiction: The US can conduct strikes against Iranian assets, proxy bases, arms shipments and command nodes to degrade capabilities. That risks escalation: Iran may widen attacks or retaliate against US forces or partner states.
– Coalition building and diplomacy: Multinational maritime task forces spread the burden, provide legal cover, and signal unity. Diplomatic pressure through the UN, International Maritime Organization, and negotiations can isolate Iran economically or offer off-ramps. Engagement with regional powers — Gulf states, Turkey, Pakistan, India — is essential for sustained presence and basing.
– Economic and legal measures: Sanctions, asset freezes, and legal claims against state or proxy actors raise non-military costs. Insurers and shipping companies may respond by rerouting or suspending services, which can blunt Iran’s leverage but also imposes global economic costs.
Limits and risks
– Geography and scale: The littoral waters and chokepoints of the Strait of Hormuz, Bab al-Mandeb and adjacent seas are narrow and complex, which enables small, cheap asymmetric weapons to threaten high-value, high-volume commerce. Policing these zones continuously is resource-heavy.
– Attribution challenges: Ambiguous attacks make legal and political justification for strikes harder. Mistaken attribution could draw the US into a broader conflict with severe consequences.
– Escalation dynamics: Forceful US responses can deter but also provoke asymmetric or kinetic escalation, including attacks on US bases, shipping belonging to partners, or energy infrastructure. Each side faces domestic political pressures that shape thresholds for action.
– Economic collateral damage: If shipping re-routes around longer passages or insurers hike premiums, global trade and energy markets can suffer, affecting allies and neutrals and complicating the US position.
– Political constraints: Domestic US politics and allied divisions limit unrestricted military options. Hardline rhetoric, such as election-era promises, may raise expectations that are hard to meet without risking major war.
Realistic outcomes
– Short term: Expect continued attacks at varying intensity, accompanied by multinational patrols, selective US strikes against identified militant or logistical nodes, stepped-up sanctions and public diplomacy. Many commercial operators will divert routes or pay for extra security, raising costs but keeping most traffic moving.
– Medium term: Sustained deterrence is possible if the US and partners maintain credible military presence, degrade key Iranian capabilities, and offer diplomatic channels to de-escalate. However, absent a negotiated settlement addressing the underlying grievances, Iran can continue to apply periodic pressure.
– Long term: A lasting end to attacks would likely require a political solution: either normalization of relations that reduces Iranian incentives to use maritime coercion, or a durable regional security architecture that provides Iran with alternative security guarantees and economic incentives.
Bottom line
The US can raise the costs to Iran and make maritime attacks less effective through naval power, intelligence, coalition action, and diplomacy, but it cannot guarantee an end to a dispersed asymmetric campaign without accepting risks of escalation or achieving a political settlement. The choices Washington and its partners make will determine whether confrontation remains limited or spirals into wider conflict — and how expensive freedom of navigation becomes in the interim.