In the ongoing war with the United States and Israel, Iran has been threatening to mine the vital Strait of Hormuz, with reports suggesting it may have already placed devices in the narrow shipping chokepoint. It has set the stage for a possible complex and risky U.S. Navy operation to reopen the waterway using new mine-clearing technology.
On Tuesday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the U.S. was taking steps to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, but did not say what measures were being taken. The U.S. Fifth Fleet based in Bahrain has also posted video showing strikes against Iran's navy, including what it says are minelaying vessels.
Mines pose a significant threat to the tankers and other commercial shipping vessels that pass through the Strait. They are also a serious danger to warships. Since World War II, sea mines have caused a disproportionate share of damage to U.S. Navy vessels — sinking or crippling 15 of them, more than from all other weapons combined. These incidents include three U.S. warships damaged by sea mines in the Persian Gulf since 1988 that injured dozens of sailors.
Despite the danger, however, mine warfare — which encompasses both the deployment and clearance of naval mines — has received minimal attention and funding from the Navy, overshadowed by higher-profile weapons systems, according to maritime security expert Scott C. Truver.
Funding for mine warfare accounts for "less than 1% of the Navy's total budget," he says. Some people call it a "stepchild of the U.S. Navy," he says.
Switching to the LCS
Just as Iranian sea mines are again a threat in the Persian Gulf, the Navy is in the midst of retiring its older, wooden-hulled Avenger-class ships that have been used since the 1980s for minesweeping. They are being replaced by the Independence-class of Littoral Combat Ships (LCS), which rely on unmanned systems and helicopters to find and destroy them.
The U.S. "is investing in uncrewed systems to do this mission instead," according to Bryan Clark, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, a center-right think tank that focuses on national security and defense policy. All the LCS ships have to do is "stand clear of the minefields and then allow their unmanned systems and helicopters to do the locating and mine neutralization," he says.
But the LCS have suffered from development delays, cost overruns and other problems that have earned them the epithet "little crappy ship" from critics. A 2022 report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) noted "several significant challenges" with the LCS, "including the ship's ability to defend itself if attacked and failure rates of mission-essential equipment."
But whether the Navy's replacement is really ready is an open question. Weeks ago, two Independence-class LCS ships, the USS Santa Barbara and the USS Tulsa — were in Singapore." A third, the USS Canberra, is equipped with mine-countermeasures packages — but is also in Asia.
Emma Salisbury, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, says she is "honestly completely baffled" as to why the Navy wouldn't have mine-clearing resources near the Middle East at the start of the conflict. "Having a mine countermeasures capability that is not in theater is not particularly helpful," she says.
NATO allies may be better prepared than the U.S.
Trump has repeatedly called on NATO allies to provide ships to help secure the Strait. On Tuesday, Hegseth chastised other countries, making a veiled reference to Britain in particular, for not doing more. Those countries have largely declined to help.
When it comes to mine clearance, "The U.S. Navy is in a bit of a bind," Salisbury says. She notes that many European nations are better-equipped for this task than the U.S. Poland, for instance, has more than two dozen mine-clearing ships in its fleet, and the U.K., France and Turkey also have sizable numbers of such vessels.
And in past decades, the U.S. has turned to these nations for help: In the Gulf War and the Iraq war, Salisbury says, "The U.S. has relied on European NATO allies to provide mine-clearing capability."
Meanwhile, the new mine hunting and clearing system, with the LCS at its core, remains unproven. The MCM package, which integrates unmanned surface and underwater vehicles, MH‑60S helicopters, and sonar systems, is designed to detect, identify, and neutralize sea mines — but it has yet to be demonstrated under real-world conditions.
In a report released in March, the Pentagon's director of Operational Test and Evaluation — the office responsible for assessing the effectiveness of military systems — noted that in fiscal year 2025, the Navy conducted no operational testing of the Independence‑variant Littoral Combat Ship equipped with the mine countermeasures (MCM) mission package. The director added that operational effectiveness "cannot determine operational effectiveness … due to insufficient performance data."
Salisbury describes herself as an LCS critic. She says that, at best, the mine countermeasures technology on these ships is a question mark. "What worries me is not necessarily can it work once or twice, but can it work over and over at the tempo that would be needed," if only LCS ships were being used, she says.
A "dirty and dangerous" job
Retired Adm. James Foggo, dean of the Center for Maritime Strategy, says past experience has shown that mines should be one of the Navy's top priorities. "Mines tend to be an asymmetric weapon," he says. "They also tend to be a poor man's tool to exert pressure on larger, more powerful nations."
Mine clearing is a "dirty and dangerous job" that is also time-consuming, Truver says. A single device can take hours to clear — and in the meantime, "you're essentially standing still while operations are underway."
"You are essentially performing controlled explosions… for each individual mine," Salisbury says. "Your ships are going to be in that dangerous area for a long time."
Ideally, then, mine-clearance would begin after hostilities with Iran end, Cichon says. But the conditions would still be fraught; he notes that, in the 1980s, "minesweepers had to operate while commercial ships and even larger frigates risked striking mines."
Destroying them is just one hurdle, though. Before minesweepers head in, says Foggo, there will need to be a combat air patrol in place above the Strait. After minesweepers do their work, destroyers would be sent in to escort oil tankers. If that effort began today, it would still take a month to get underway, he says.
Trump has insisted that European nations find a military way to open the waterway, addressing them this week: "You'll have to learn how to fight for yourself, the U.S.A. won't be there to help you anymore, just like you weren't there for us," he said. "Iran has been, essentially, decimated. The hard part is done. Go get your own oil!"
But Europe doesn't have the military resources, such as aircraft refueling tankers, or the necessary naval forces. Any large military operation to open the Strait would likely require a joint effort, led by the U.S.
If all goes well, Foggo says he has "every confidence" that shipping lanes through the Strait could be cleared relatively quickly. "We're a very professional force. And it's a big challenge," he acknowledges. "People just need to have strategic and tactical patience."
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