U.S. Turns To Drones After Retiring Minesweepers To Reopen Strait of Hormuz Amid Iran Crisis

The U.S. is racing to reopen the Strait of Hormuz as Iran threatens one of the world’s most critical shipping lanes, testing a Navy that has recently retired most of its dedicated minesweepers and is now relying on a smaller fleet of unmanned systems to do the job.

President Donald Trump has warned Tehran against further escalation and signaled the U.S. is prepared to act to keep the strait open, while Iranian forces have laid mines and threatened commercial traffic in the narrow waterway that carries a significant share of global oil.

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The shift has left the Navy relying on a mix of legacy ships being surged into theater and newer unmanned systems designed to detect and neutralize mines.

“To be honest, that the minesweepers retired was never a concern to me, because we had brought in newer technology,” retired Vice Adm. Kevin Donegan, who previously commanded the Navy’s 5th Fleet, told Fox News Digital.

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Underwater drones — some torpedo-shaped — are deployed in grid patterns to map the ocean floor and detect objects that could be mines, using high-resolution sonar to distinguish them from debris.

“They kind of look like torpedoes and they map the bottom,” Donegan said.

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Donegan cautioned that timelines are difficult to predict, in part because U.S. forces must first confirm whether mines are actually present in the areas Iran has claimed.

“When somebody says they mined it, you have to go validate if that’s even true, and that takes time,” he said.

 Read the full article in Fox News Digital.