How the U.S. Navy Can Clear the Strait of Hormuz

By Steven Wills

Thursday, March 19, 2026

 

Sea mines in naval warfare are “both obscure and controversial,” as Weapons That Wait, a 1991 treatise on mine warfare, put it. So the waterborne weapons attract considerable public attention when used. In the case of current U.S. military operations against the Islamist regime in Iran, much of that focus has been critical of the U.S. ability to open the Strait of Hormuz to commercial traffic after regime officials — whose forces possess several thousand sea mines — announced “closure” of the strait.

 

The reported lack of U.S. mine warfare capability and capacity — such as images of minesweeping vessels from the Middle East (CENTCOM) returning to the U.S. in the lead-up to the U.S.-Israeli operations in Iran — has been roundly criticized in many outlets. Despite these assertions, decommissioning and retiring the aging Avenger-class mine countermeasures ships (MCMs) in favor of unmanned systems operated from littoral combat ships (LCS) and the air was the right choice. This is not unique to the U.S., either; European and other allied mine countermeasure fleets are facing similar obsolescence.

 

The Avenger-class mine countermeasures ships have been in service since the late 1980s, and it was the lead ship, USS Avenger, that played an early role, along with the older MSO-class sweepers, in reopening closed Kuwaiti shipping lanes and naval gunfire support areas during the 1991 Gulf War.

 

Fourteen Avenger-class ships were built by 1994 and have served in multiple theaters, including the Persian Gulf and Western Pacific, over the last 40 years. The Avengers have served well, far beyond the usual 20-year service lives of smaller ships; their retirement was overdue.

 

Replacing the Avengers’ capabilities are the littoral combat ship–based mine warfare packages. While there have been many delays and challenges with the LCS and its capabilities, including its mine warfare systems, the current unmanned and helicopter-based mine warfare systems have been tested and approved by the secretary of the Navy, who authorized the retirement of the Avenger ships in the CENTCOM region in June 2025.

 

The LCS-based unmanned surface vessel and its acoustic and magnetic sweep systems, as well as the helo-mounted laser-mine detector (ALMDS) and its attendant mine disposal abilities (AMNS), allow our ships and the sailors aboard to stay a safe distance from the minefield. Instead, the touchy operations are handled by unmanned and airborne systems. The older vessels, both American and European, required that the ships enter the minefield to detect and dispose of the mines directly, often with human divers in support.

 

The relocation of the LCS-based mine countermeasures ships to locations outside the Persian Gulf, condemned by some sources, was another correct decision, as it prevented the Iranian regime from targeting those vessels as it did the Fifth Fleet Headquarters in Bahrain. Though an LCS is much better armed (with a 57mm gun and short-range missile defense system) than the Avengers with just two .50 caliber machine guns, it’s not an Arleigh Burke destroyer with 96 vertical launch missile cells and CIWS. Missile and drone threats are real, and their scale varies. While the Navy gained great experience shooting down those weapons in the Red Sea, there is no need to expose less capable warships to that threat.

 

If there is criticism of the current strategy, it should be directed toward the pending retirement of the MH-53E minesweeping helicopter, which in the past has allowed the U.S. joint force to act much more rapidly to clear mines than what is possible with conventional mine countermeasure ships. Without these helos available to CENTCOM forces, the discovery and disposal of sea mines is limited to the slower process of mine hunting that the MH-60 helicopter-based system executes as opposed to the wide area sweeping of mines the MH-53 can perform.

 

While this latest threat from Iran is legitimate, the U.S. Navy has decades of experience with Iranian mine and cruise missile attacks in and around the Strait of Hormuz, going back to the Tanker War and Operation Praying Mantis in the late 1980s. Yes, Iranian mining and missile capabilities have much increased since that time, but consider also the reduction of Iranian ability to lay mines and launch missiles, as seen in Operation Epic Fury.

 

The truth of the matter is this: The Strait of Hormuz could be as much a trap for warships as was the Dardanelles Strait for British and French battleships in 1915. However, the U.S. Navy and its CENTCOM joint command are taking prudent, logical steps with systems superior to those of the last century to suppress threats to shipping prior to merchant vessel escort operations.

 

The U.S. Navy has not forgotten how to neutralize mines. The U.S. Navy has not forgotten the USS Cole. Mines may be “weapons that wait,” but the U.S. Navy has been waiting to return the favor.