(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-01-09 16:08

The US Navy video tape and audio recording that the Pentagon released Tuesday of the confrontation between a three-ship Navy convoy and five small Iranian boats in the Persian Gulf is 4 minutes and 20 seconds long.

The guided missile cruiser USS Port Royal (CG 73) sails through the Pacific Ocean in this file photo taken on December 13, 2005. Five Iranian boats made aggressive maneuvers and showed hostile intent towards three US Navy ships at the weekend in the Strait of Hormuz, a major oil shipping route in the Gulf, the Pentagon said on January 7, 2008. [Agencies]

It begins with a crew member speaking into a ship-to-ship radio after the Iranian boats are spotted.

US crew member: "This is coalition warship. I am engaged in transit passage in accordance with international law." After a pause he resumes: "This is coalition warship. I am engaged in transit passage in accordance with international law. I intend no harm. Over."

Mostly inaudible internal ship communications follow.

At one point a crew member is heard saying the Iranian boats are "approximately two miles from coalition warships."

The video recording was made separately from the recording of the radio communications; they were put together by the Navy.

As the video camera tracks movement of two or three of the Iranian boats at a distance, the US crew member is heard repeating his radio message: "You are approaching coalition warship operating in international waters. Request you establish communications, identify yourself and state your intentions. Over."

What follows is internal, barely audible ship communications tracking the movement of the Iranian boats, at one point saying that one of the boats has an outboard engine, at another point saying the US crews are "conducting level one on bridge to bridge, flashing lights."

Then a US crew member's voice, apparently on an internal or ship-to-ship communication, says, "Five small unidentified small surface ..." and indicates that the craft are inbound.

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