Re: Re: @Matt Bryant
"......I believe it will cause damage without destroying the programme....." Complete destruction is probably out of the question, but making it too painful to Iran to complete is another matter.
"......Crucially, the Iranians have the knowledge...." The core knowledge is pretty much available in most highschool libraries. In the '80s a grad in the US wrote his dissertation around making a home-built nuke, handed in his paper, and then went straight into hiding under FBI guard. Nowadays the FBI probably wouldn't bother. BUT, having the knowledge and being willing to use it is another thing, and the attacks on Iranian scientists have not only thinned out the Iranian knowledge pool but also made others less than keen to get involved. Meanwhile, both Israel and the US have moved to stop other countries assisting Iran, meaning each Iranian scientist assassinated is now an unreplaceable asset.
"....there's nothing for them to lose by closing the Straits with conventional forces...." There actually is a lot for Iran to lose as their economy is still heavily dependent on oil exports. Whilst the rest of the World can ramp up production to get over losing Iranian production, Iran is highly dependent on oil dollars.
".....Although Iran did harm non-combatant vessels in the incident to which you refer......" They had quite a history of attacking shipping belonging to other non-combatant nations (as did Iraq at the time), which is why the USN got involved in the first place.
".....A brief look at Iranian patrol boat, mini-submarine, and mine layer numbers tells you what their thinking is....." The US (and allies) has taken more than a brief look and already has plans for such Iranian strategies. IIRC, the first publicly-released USN studies on defeating swarm attacks were made available in 2002, long after they had been written. With Iran also being cut off from foreign sources of weaponry, they are also unable to re-stock such items as the very expensive and complex mines they bought during the Iran-Iraq war, or the Western-built speedboats they have required.
".....But high tech has been of little use in pacifying Afghanistan....." Well, apart from teh fact the Taleban are have been kicked out of power and driven into the Pakistani hills, you mean? And the Taleban are hiding behind civillians, not sitting in speedboats on open water. Currently the fastest boat the Iranian's have (the cladestinely bought Bradstone Challenger) can be overhauled by every helicopter in the USN arsenal, and long before it gets in range of attacking an USN ship with the anti-tank missiles it has been fitted with.
".....I think that Iran can and would inflict quite a lot of damage to neighbouring countries energy assets....." Very unlikely as, apart from Iran's desire to be seen as a leading Islamic country, nothing would be more likely to result in full-blown US reprisals. Iran would be happy to hit at Israel, but not any neighbours.
"..... But the Western economies would be plunged back into recession by the spiking cost of oil and gas....." Since the US began sanctions the European countries have all being buying oil from other sources (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16674660). Those other countries would both be happy to supply more oil but also to keep Iran off the market for a longer period as it makes them richer.
I would suggest a quick read here (http://www.cfr.org/iran/iran-wont-close-strait-hormuz/p26960) for a pretty good summation of the Iranian sabre-rattling.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
