{"id":375177,"date":"2026-04-11T23:27:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T23:27:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/375177\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T23:27:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T23:27:08","slug":"us-warships-enter-strait-of-hormuz-to-clear-shipping-lane-of-iranian-sea-mines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/375177\/","title":{"rendered":"US warships enter Strait of Hormuz to clear shipping lane of Iranian sea mines"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two United States Navy warships have gone through the Strait of Hormuz at the start of an operation to clear the strategic waterway of mines laid by Iran, US Central Command says. <\/p>\n

The announcement – which marks the first such transit since the US-Israeli war with Iran began – came shortly after US President Donald Trump said Washington had started \u201cclearing out\u201d the strait, through which a fifth of the world\u2019s crude oil passes.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday, we began the process of establishing a new passage and we will share this safe pathway with the maritime industry soon to encourage the free flow of commerce,\u201d said Centcom commander Admiral Brad Cooper.<\/p>\n

The USS Frank E. Peterson and the USS Michael Murphy are the guided-missile destroyers involved in the operation, but Centcom said that \u201cadditional US forces including underwater drones\u201d could join the effort in coming days.<\/p>\n

AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.<\/a><\/p>\n

Earlier, US media outlet Axios reported that the operation was not co-ordinated with authorities in Tehran.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re now starting the process of clearing out the Strait of Hormuz,\u201d Trump said on his Truth Social platform, calling it \u201ca favour\u201d to countries such as China, Japan and France that \u201cdon\u2019t have the Courage or Will to do this work themselves\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Strait of Hormuz is a critical chokepoint for global energy supply. Photo \/Copernicus Sentinel Data 2025<\/p>\n

He insisted that Iran is \u201cLOSING BIG!\u201d in the conflict, while acknowledging that Iranian mines in the strategic strait still pose a threat.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only thing they have going is the threat that a ship may \u2018bunk\u2019 into one of their sea mines,\u201d Trump wrote.<\/p>\n

The key shipping lane off the coast of Iran has been virtually blocked by Tehran since the US and Israel started bombing Iran on February 28, though reopening the strait was ostensibly a condition of the shaky ceasefire put in place this week.<\/p>\n

Senior Iranian and American officials held face-to-face negotiations in Pakistan in a bid to bring an end to a conflict that has plunged the Middle East into violence and sent shockwaves through the world economy.<\/p>\n

In an earlier post, Trump said that empty tankers were headed to the US from around the world to purchase oil, without providing details.<\/p>\n

– Agence France-Presse<\/p>\n

AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.<\/a>Save<\/a>Share this articleCopy LinkEmailFacebookTwitter\/XLinkedInReddit<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two United States Navy warships have gone through the Strait of Hormuz at the start of an operation…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375178,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1853,3470,17442,44185,2219,305,42,168436,16609,168147,15167,20112,163824,46664,43,1118,17286,312,3008,18533,4497,9939,14042,1521,210,61,40,38,41,39,9938,3040,105299,156774],"class_list":{"0":"post-375177","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-central","9":"tag-clear","10":"tag-command","11":"tag-enter","12":"tag-gone","13":"tag-have","14":"tag-headlines","15":"tag-hormuz","16":"tag-iran","17":"tag-iranian","18":"tag-laid","19":"tag-lane","20":"tag-mines","21":"tag-navy","22":"tag-news","23":"tag-of","24":"tag-operation","25":"tag-says","26":"tag-sea","27":"tag-shipping","28":"tag-start","29":"tag-states","30":"tag-strait","31":"tag-strategic","32":"tag-through","33":"tag-to","34":"tag-top-news","35":"tag-top-stories","36":"tag-topnews","37":"tag-topstories","38":"tag-united","39":"tag-us","40":"tag-warships","41":"tag-waterway"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375177"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375177\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}