Iranian Navy Commander Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari (photo) blasted the US officials for their remarks against Iran’s wargames in the Persian Gulf, and said his forces will hold 20 specialized exercises in the current Iranian year (started on March 20).
“The Iranian Navy will have 20 specialized missile, subsurface, intelligence, etc. drills and these series of wargames will start next month with an electronic warfare exercise,” Sayyari told reporters in Tehran earlier this week.
He also said the massive Velayat 95 drills will most likely be conducted next February.
Asked about the US officials’ remarks against Iran’s military exercises in the Persian Gulf, Sayyari said, “Although they aren’t interested in our military might, they should know that we are deployed in this region with all our power and stage our wargames here and this issue is no way related to them.”
In relevant remarks in April, Sayyari announced that his forces will stage massive wargames in international waters this year.
“The massive Velayat 95 wargames will be held in international waters by the end of the current (Iranian) year (started on March 20),” Sayyari told Fars News Agency (FNA) last month.
The Commander said that the Navy also plans to hold joint drills with other countries' warships which berth at the Iranian ports and during reciprocal visits.
Elsewhere, he said that the Iranian Navy’s 40th fleet of warships, comprising Alborz and Tonb warships, is now present in the Gulf of Aden to protect the country’s cargo ships and oil tankers from pirate attacks.
Iran ran major Velayat naval wargames in its territorial waters in the Persian Gulf late January.
The high-profile Velayat exercises is an annual event and all shipping lines and naval vessels in the region are informed of the area of the drills according to international maritime and naval standards that require all foreign ships and vessels to keep some 5 nautical miles away from the wargames zone.
During the wargames in March, the US Navy warship received a serious warning from several Iranian destroyers to keep away from their drill zone near the Strait of Hormuz, an incident that could keep frictions high after Iran captured 10 US marines in the Persian Gulf in the same month.
Also, the Iranian Navy’s Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and a submarine recorded images of a US aircraft carrier on the third day of the main phase of the massive wargames along the country’s Southeastern Makran seashores on the rims of the Persian Gulf.
The Navy’s drone captured a video during the surveillance mission over the US aircraft carrier.
Meantime, a Qadir-class submarine also belonging to the Iranian Navy was deployed close to the US aircraft carrier with a mission to gather intelligence and capture video of the US vessel's moves.
The Iranian submarine managed to take clear pictures of the aircraft carrier without catching the attention of the staff on board.
Also in the wargames, the Iranian Naval forces launched multiple torpedoes from heavy Tareq-class and Qadir-class submarines that successfully hit the targets. Also Jamaran and Alvand destroyers fired torpedoes at surface and subsurface vessels on the fourth day of the main phase of the massive wargames in the Persian Gulf.
