The area in the box on the right side of the map is the Strait of Hormuz. To the south lie all the major oil terminals of Saudi Arabia, the U.A.E., Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and Iraq. To the north lies Iran, which has recently threatened to shut the Strait and "disinvited" an American carrier from returning to the Persian Gulf on the west side of the Strait. Normally this would be laughable, except that Iran could potentially do it from a multiplicity of land-based missile positions under the control of the ever unpredictable Ahmadinejad and the Mad Mullahs. The missiles incidentally have been supplied by the Russians, Chinese, and North Koreans. At the very least, the U.S. Navy would take substantial casualties from a missile barrage. What to do?
Did you know that Iran does not refine its own gasoline? True story. If incoming gas and diesel were cut off, it could be tough to get around in this fairly large country. It is also worth noting that oil storage tanks and pipelines are hard to hide and make excellent fixed targets for cruise missiles. Did I mention that just one of our our converted ballistic missile subs in that area has 132 cruise missiles aboard? Finally, cities and nuclear facilities alike need electrical power and power generating stations also make big fat fixed targets. I am sure that there are other targets of interest. Just thinking out loud. It would be
most unfortunate if all this came to pass.
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