In April 1988, while sailing in the Persian Gulf, a U.S. advanced missile frigate was seriously injured by an old mine worth $1,000, losing nearly $100 million. When the President of the United States learned that it was a masterpiece of the Iranian Navy, he personally sent 6 warships to take revenge.
In the 1980s, the U.S. Navy's Perry-class guided-missile frigate "Roberts", as the world's most advanced warship, was equipped with powerful torpedoes, anti-aircraft missiles, anti-ship missiles, phased array fast guns, 12.7 mm machine gun and other advanced weapons. As a warship with strong three-dimensional combat capabilities at sea, there are also two anti-submarine helicopters on the deck. At that time, it could be said that no national warship could match, but such an advanced warship was blown up by an antique mine worth $1,000!
In the early morning of April 14, 1988, the guided-missile frigate Roberts, which had only been in service for two years, was sailing in the Persian Gulf after completing the escort mission of the Kuwaiti oil tanker. Suddenly, the crew noticed a mine not far from the starboard side, and the captain ordered an emergency maneuver to avoid it, but two more mines were found not far away. The captain wondered how so many mines had popped up at once when the warship passed by not long ago.
The captain did not think much of it and gave the order to evacuate from the minefield, but in the process of retreating, the stern of the Roberts still touched a hidden mine. Immediately there was a huge explosion at the bottom of the ship, the stern was blown up 5 meters high, the power of the explosion caused a chain reaction, the steel beam of the hull was seriously twisted, a huge fireball flew up sharply, triggering the explosion of the fuel tank, directly exploding a 5-meter hole on the starboard side, the ship's advanced equipment was spared, all were injured and blown up, and the Roberts also lost power.
The fire quickly spread near the ammunition depot, triggering a new round of explosions at any time, and the sea water quickly entered the cabin from the large hole. The captain ordered all the crew to fight the fire and drain the water, and the helicopter transported the wounded. After more than 30 hours of fighting, the fire was finally extinguished and the sea water was completely discharged. Although the Roberts will not sink into the sea, it has become a scrap of copper and rotten iron,
The next day, the U.S. military sent a large tugboat to pull the Roberts back to the U.S. Bath Steel Shipyard for overhaul. The U.S. Navy's minesweeper team salvaged a number of mines in the accident area and found that this was an old Soviet M08 mine purchased by Iran from North Korea in 1987 and was designed in 1908 to deal with submarines, warships, and ships.
The M08 mine is small and inexpensive, only $1,000 a piece, but the explosive power is enormous. A single M08 mine cost the U.S. Navy nearly $100 million and seriously injured more than 10 U.S. crews. It turned out that in October 1987, the US military had sent 4 warships into the Persian Gulf, blowing up an Iranian oil rig into scrap iron, and Iran dropped a large number of M08 mines near the Strait of Hormuz in order to prevent the US military from entering the Persian Gulf.
After President Reagan learned that the warship had been bombed, the maintenance cost alone was 100 million US dollars, almost enough to build a new warship, and he was so angry that he personally issued a "Mantis Operation" retaliation plan against Iran. The U.S. Navy sent the "Enterprise" aircraft carrier battle group as the backing, and 6 large warships directly broke into the Strait of Hormuz.
On April 18, six U.S. warships entered the Strait of Hormuz and formed three surface battle groups. The first surface battle group task is to destroy the Iranian "Sasan" oil rig. The second surface battle group is tasked with destroying Iran's mine-laying ships and missile speedboat bases.
The Third Surface Battle Group consists of the guided-missile destroyer Bagley, the guided-missile cruiser Wainwright, and the guided-missile frigate Simpson, tasked with destroying Iran's Siri rig. The U.S. military learned that the platform had long been changed into Iran's maritime "command tower" to send command signals to suicide speedboats and warships.
Soon, three U.S. ships surrounded the "Siri" drilling platform, and the Iranian oil well staff fled in a small boat. At 9 o'clock, the main guns of the three US ships were aimed at the drilling platform, and the three US ships fired wildly. Half an hour later, more than a dozen Iranian gunners who insisted on the platform were blown to ashes, and the drilling platform also exploded a pile of scrap copper and rotten iron!
Suddenly, an Iranian "Carman" class missile boat quickly approached the US ship, which was confirmed to be the "Jossen". The U.S. ship warned it to take a detour to leave, but the Jonsen was still rapidly approaching, and also fired a Harpoon anti-ship missile at the missile cruiser Wainwright. The missile launched by Iran was made by the United States, and the cruiser Wainwright responded by firing jamming foil strips, easily dodging the fatal blow.
The three US ships were furious and fired a number of "standard" SM-1 missiles at the Iranian "Jossen", and were shot consecutively by the "Jossen" who were beaten by the group. At this time, several "Ghost" F4 fighters of the Iranian Air Force came to support, but it was too late, and the "Jossen" with several missiles in it was directly sunk. The Simpson radar quickly locked on to the Phantom F4 fighter and quickly fired 2 Standard 2ER missiles, directly hitting a Phantom F4 fighter, and the rest of the Iranian fighters who did not carry anti-ship missiles fled back to the Iranian base.
Operation Mantis crashed a helicopter and killed two U.S. troops. Destroying two Iranian rigs, sinking a frigate, a missile boat and five suicide boats, wounding several Iranian warships and wounding a fighter jet, Iran killed hundreds of soldiers. This revenge of the United States has severely damaged Iran's navy, greatly reduced the strength of the Iranian army, and hastened the end of the Iran-Iraq War!
