Navy disciplines sailors who wandered into Iranian waters

Tribune Newspapers

WASHINGTON — The Navy on Thursday announced disciplinary action against nine service members in connection with an embarrassing international incident this year that resulted in the temporary detainment of 10 U.S. crew members by the Iranian military.

The partially redacted report, which examined how and why two small Navy speedboats mistakenly wandered into Iran’s territorial waters, was formally released at the Pentagon by Adm. John Richardson, chief of naval operations.

The investigation found the sailors and commanding officers did not conduct proper mission planning Jan. 12 for the 300-mile journey from Kuwait to Bahrain, and veered off course almost immediately after leaving port to take an unauthorized shortcut through Iranian territorial waters.

To complicate matters, a diesel engine on one of the camouflaged riverine boats broke down, about which the sailors failed to communicate with home base once they ran into trouble. The sailors were left stranded about two miles from a military pier on Iran’s Farsi Island — where the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps operates a base.

The boats were quickly surrounded by the Iranian military, and the crew members were held for 15 hours, an incident that provoked international headlines and several rounds of high-level diplomacy before the release of the sailors and their vessels.

“Those sailors clearly know our actions on that day in January did not live up to our expectations of our Navy,” Richardson said. “We have an obligation to continually examine our personal and professional conduct to ensure that we always execute our mission.”

The report found the “boat captains and crews were derelict in performing their duties to expected norms and standards.”

The Navy said three officers were relieved of command in connection with the incident and six other service members likely will face disciplinary action.

The mission was riddled with mistakes from the beginning. The crews had just 24 hours’ notice that they were going to make the journey and stayed up all night to fix the boats for the trip, the longest the crews had attempted. They left four hours late and tried to save time by taking a direct route, an unauthorized shortcut that took them through both Saudi and Iranian waters.

The commander of the crews’ task force ordered the trip on short notice and “severely underestimated” the risks of the journey. While the report redacts names, the Navy identified the commander last week as Capt. Kyle Moses.

“He lacked a questioning attitude, failed to promote a culture of safety, and disregarded appropriate backup from his staff and subordinate commands,” the report said.

U.S. Naval Forces Central Command, based in Bahrain, announced that two commanding officers had been removed from their positions. Moses and Cmdr. Eric Rasch, squadron commander, were relieved of command and reassigned to other jobs.

The mechanical problems were only part of a litany of troubles that befell the U.S. Navy that evening in the middle of one of the most volatile waterways in the world. The crew members did not realize they were near Farsi Island because they did not correctly use their navigation system’s map.

“Had any crew member zoomed into the purple dot, they would have discovered the purple dot was Farsi Island,” the report said.

The situation became further complicated when a U.S. aircraft carrier task force led by the Harry S. Truman, on patrol in the gulf, quickly launched U.S. F/A-18 fighter jets. F-15 fighters also were scrambled from a nearby air base.

As U.S. officials began considering a possible rescue operation, the commander of the Navy’s 5th Fleet ordered guided missile cruiser Anzio and a Coast Guard vessel into the area of Farsi Island.

That sparked a frantic series of phone calls between top State Department and Pentagon officials, supported by the White House and their Iranian counterparts as both sides sought to prevent an apparent accident from escalating into a hostage standoff and a potential armed confrontation.

The incident embarrassed the Pentagon and put the White House on the defensive as President Barack Obama delivered his State of the Union speech that same day. He heralded the first major step of the nuclear deal — the dismantlement of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and the easing of United Nations sanctions — but did not mention the detainment.

After the sailors’ release, a video on Iranian television purported to show several Americans kneeling, with their hands clasped behind their heads while armed Iranian forces stood nearby.

The investigation found Iran was correct in probing why two American boats were bobbing in its territorial waters, beyond the internationally recognized 12-mile limit. But the report said it was wrong to hold them at gunpoint, record them and then publicly release the footage.

The report revealed crew members told Iranian interrogators the top speed of the boats and passwords to their phones and laptops, which violates Navy code of conduct.

“It is clear that some, if not all, crew members provided at least some information to interrogators beyond name, rank, service number and date of birth,” the report said.

Richardson said because of the litany of errors, the incident “will be a case study going forward” to officers and sailors on what not to do. “You can see that there are lessons that apply across our entire Navy, not just officers, but enlisted,” he said. “So this will be something that we can mine for a lot of lessons.”