The US Navy has launched its most aggressive maritime assault of the Iran war so far, hitting more than 30 Iranian ships across the northern Indian Ocean in a sweeping campaign that officials say is designed to “neutralise Iran’s blue‑water reach” before it threatens global trade.

Pentagon sources say a mix of submarines, destroyers and carrier‑based aircraft struck logistics vessels, intelligence trawlers, missile boats and armed “drone motherships” operating between the Arabian Sea and waters south of Sri Lanka. Night‑vision footage shows burning hulls, listing tankers and rescue flares piercing the darkness as scattered Iranian crews abandon ship.

Washington frames the operation as a direct response to Iranian missile and drone attacks on US assets and Israeli targets, insisting every vessel hit was “part of the regime’s war machine” – feeding targeting data, refuelling raiders or moving weapons toward choke points. Israeli officials quietly confirm their jets provided surveillance and cover for some of the strikes.

Tehran calls the onslaught “open piracy in the Indian Ocean,” claiming several of the damaged ships were carrying fuel and food, not munitions, and warning that “no commercial lane from Hormuz to Malacca will be safe” if the attacks continue.

In New Delhi and Colombo, alarm is rising as wreckage and oil slicks creep closer to key shipping routes. Insurance rates for tankers have spiked overnight, and regional navies are rushing extra patrols into waters they once sold to the world as stable and secure. The fear now gripping capitals from Washington to Jakarta is simple: has the Indian Ocean just become the next front in a war that was already too big to contain?