Navy lists two earlier encounters with Iran

CAIRO —  The U.S. Navy said Friday that one of its ships fired warning shots at a small Iranian boat in the Strait of Hormuz in December during one of two serious encounters that month.

The Whidbey Island, a dock landing ship, fired the warning shots Dec. 19 after a small Iranian boat approached it rapidly, a U.S. Navy official said.

“One small [Iranian] craft was coming toward it, and it stopped after the Whidbey Island fired warning shots,” said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

It was the first account of the Navy firing warning shots in any recent confrontation with Iran in the Persian Gulf region.

In the second incident that month, the frigate Carr encountered three small Iranian craft on Dec. 22, two of which were armed, the official said. The Carr did not fire warning shots, but sent warning blasts on the ship’s whistle, which persuaded the boats to turn around.

The reports come a day after the U.S. lodged a formal diplomatic protest with Iran over an incident Sunday in which Iranian speedboats allegedly harassed its warships.

Adm. William J. Fallon, the top U.S. military commander in the Mideast, said Friday that Iran ran the risk of triggering an unintended conflict if its boats continued to harass U.S. warships in the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran denied that its boats threatened the U.S. vessels and accused Washington of fabricating its video issued to the media.

While there are questions about the origin of verbal threats over the radio during the incident, Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Friday that the encounter was the most “provocative and dramatic” he had seen.

“The incident ought to remind us all just how real is the threat posed by Iran and just how ready we are to meet that threat if it comes to it,” he said.

Both Mullen and Fallon said they could not tell if the threats heard in a Pentagon-released audio came from the Iranian boats.

The Navy Times, a private newspaper, reported Friday that some Navy ship drivers think the threats may have come from a local heckler they call the “Filipino Monkey.”