Originally Posted by TLAM Strike (Post 1432089)

Doubt our ships would be giving off much of a smoke plume. They are gas turbine ships plus the diffusers work very well on US ships.

I would be more worried about an Iranian MPA (P-3 or Fokker F-27) detecting the carrier group. Or a fishing trawler "tattling" on them.

Iran also has two recon birds up in orbit. Sina-1 has low 50m resolution- not sufficient for military purposes. SMMS has a slightly better 20m resolution- that capability while still low could become worrisome.

A civilian ship with concealed C-802 launchers would also be a major concern. During the IRGCN's "Great Prophet 5" exercises they demonstrated a C-802 launcher built in to a mid size commercial truck.

Not hard to imagine a version mounted in a shipping container much like that new Russian system for the SS-N-27 'Sizzler'.

Originally Posted by jimbuna (Post 1432530)

I recognise and applaude your high level of in-depth knowledge but surely a carier battle group would have more than sufficient layers of defence, besides...surely an exclusion zone would include 'civilian' shipping?

Originally Posted by TLAM Strike (Post 1432613)

The Indian ocean is the 'Hub' of some of the most active shipping lanes in the world. You have the shipping coming from the Persian Gulf, Malacca strait and from the Red sea passing though the region.

It could be impractical to have a EZ around a carrier is such waters simply because there would be so much shipping to be rerouted. The CSG would spend more time warning ships away then conducting strikes against targets. Any EZ would probably be small- a few miles wide to stop suicide attacks. Putting a 60 nm (C-802 range) EZ around every ship in the CSG would quickly take up a wide area especially if they have an extended ASW screen to counter Iranian Kilos.