A group of IRGC Navy fast boats seen after their commissioning in March 2023. Despite America’s best efforts, much of Iran’s fast boat arsenal remains intact. (Fars News/Hossein Ghanbari)

The United States Has Crippled Iran’s Navy. Or Has It?

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Though most major Iranian surface combatants have been sunk or put out of action, the country’s fleet of “fast boats” pose a far more difficult threat.

Did Operation Epic Fury really cripple Iran’s navy? CENTCOM commander Admiral Brad Cooper recently claimed that it did. During testimony for the Senate Armed Services Committee, Admiral Cooper stated that Iran’s navy—both the conventional navy and the separate naval force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)—would probably require five to 10 years to rebuild.

However, Cooper acknowledged that Iran still retained its nuisance capability, including fast boats, drones, rockets, and proxy attacks—meaning that it could still exercise denial in the all-important Strait of Hormuz. So while the US may have destroyed Iran’s conventional navy, the asymmetric threat that actually worries the Pentagon may........

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