Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have escalated their rhetoric as Gulf tensions spike, accusing the U.S. of bluffing strength at sea while openly daring Washington to send its Marines into what Tehran hints could be a deadly naval trap. At the same time, the Pentagon is surging amphibious forces into the region, with the USS Boxer, USS Portland, USS Comstock and USS Tripoli moving thousands of Marines toward the Middle East in one of the largest recent U.S. Marine deployments linked to the Iran crisis.
