This article was originally published in Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL). Read the original article.

By Amos Chapple

Arild Syvertsen is one of many retired sailors reliving traumatic memories of the Strait of Hormuz amid the current crisis in the waterway.

“We have this [Post Traumatic Stress Disorder] flashing up again during this war,” he told RFE/RL from his home in Norway, “seamen that were there in the 1980s are having a bad time because all of the memories are coming back."

Syvertsen captained vessels through the Strait of Hormuz during the height of the tanker war, a 1981-1988 conflict that echoes today’s crisis in the Persian Gulf.

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The tanker war was an offshoot of the Iran-Iraq war that began in 1980 with Iraq’s invasion of Iran. The conflict soon spread to the waters of the Persian Gulf as Iraq, and then Iran, targeted the other side's oil facilities and shipping.

By the mid 1980s Iraq, using French-supplied jets and anti-ship missiles, was targeting neutral vessels carrying Iranian oil, while Iran used naval frigates and speedboats to attack third-country tankers using Kuwaiti and Saudi Arabian ports. Both Arab countries were backing Iraq in the war.

Hundreds of ships were attacked in the maritime conflict and more than 100 merchant sailors were killed.

Despite the risks, sailors were convinced to serve on tankers transiting the Persian Gulf in part by hazard pay, or danger money, that in some cases doubled their salaries for each day they spent in risky waters. Syvertsen said senior crewmen also felt an obligation to keep energy supplies moving through the vital waterway.

“We wanted to do our duty because the ship owners told us that we had to hold the Hormuz Strait open and get energy out, otherwise the economy of the whole world would collapse,” he said.

Olav Myklebust worked as an engineer aboard ships plying the Persian Gulf through the 1980s and survived two attacks from Iraqi aircraft. During one of those strikes, off the coast of Dubai, an anti-ship missile narrowly missed his boat before slamming into a nearby vessel, killing several people inside the engine room. He still works today as an oil tanker manager.

The industry veteran said the same tactics ships used in the 1980s to avoid detection are probably being adopted by some of the vessels that have transited the Strait of Hormuz in recent days.

Tankers in the gulf in the 1980s moved mostly under the cover of darkness, he said. “No lights, no lanterns,” and all portholes of crew quarters blacked out. “We were hardly using the radar, only on and off, because that can give a signal to shore. So that is what they will do [today], they slip through.”

Additionally, he said, ships may be switching off the transponders used to avoid collisions since such devices also flag vessel locations to maritime tracking websites.

Syvertsen, who has written a book about the conflict, remains heavily affected by a decision he made as a tanker captain nearing the Strait of Hormuz in August 1987.

Traveling by night through the Persian Gulf, Syvertsen's blacked-out ship moved in radio silence as he attempted to slip his ammonia tanker unnoticed through the Strait of Hormuz.

A sudden flash of light on the sea nearby indicated another vessel attempting the same crossing was coming under attack from a swarm of Iranian speedboats.

“We saw the rockets and we heard it on the VHF [radio]. The captain was desperate,” Syvertsen recalls. As a frantic mayday message arrived over the radio, the retired seaman said, “I was in conflict with myself.” Turning to offer assistance would be near-suicidal, but the Norwegian could pass on the call for help by radio in what sailors refer to as a mayday relay.

“But I knew if I called him and sent out a relay, the attacking Iranian vessels will know there is another tanker close by,” Syvertsen said. He made the decision to remain silent.

“I had to think about the other 24 people on board on our ship and just continue in the dark with no reply.”

After hundreds of ships were attacked by Iraq and Iran through the 1980s, the US sent warships to escort tankers through the Gulf. But the intervention would have tragic consequences. In May 1987 the USS Stark was hit by two Exocet missiles fired from an Iraqi jet. Baghdad later said the pilot mistook the warship for a tanker. Thirty-seven American sailors were killed in the incident.

A year later, after "liberalized” rules of engagement were issued to US ships escorting tankers in the Persian Gulf, the USS Vincennes mistook an Iranian passenger jet for an incoming warplane.

After warning the aircraft to change course, the Vincennes fired two missiles that blasted the aircraft out of the sky. All 290 people aboard the plane were killed.

The Iran-Iraq war ended in August 1988 and a month later US naval vessels ended the operation to escort tankers through the Persian Gulf.

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Veterans of the 1980s tanker war say today the Strait of Hormuz could be forcibly reopened by the US Navy. But Syvertsen believes such a step “would just make [the current conflict] worse.”

Myklebust points to a July 1987 incident in which a tanker under escort from US warships struck a sea mine as evidence that “even with one of the world’s strongest navies present, the environment cannot be fully controlled.”

Copyright (c)2025 RFE/RL, Inc. Used with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty 

(GP)

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