January 12 at 11:09 PM

Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) took control of two U.S. Navy vessels and their crew Tuesday after the boats apparently strayed into Iran’s territorial waters, Washington Post cited U.S. officials.
The circumstances surrounding the incident, which comes at a volatile moment in U.S.-Iranian relations, remained unclear late Tuesday. Senior U.S. officials said they expected the crew of ten to be released from Iranian custody Wednesday morning.

The small boats, used largely on coastal waters and on rivers, had been en route from Kuwait to Bahrain in the Persian Gulf when they disappeared from the Navy’s scopes. Senior administration officials said the vessels appeared to have experienced mechanical trouble or ran out of fuel, but the IRGC news agency, Fars said the sailors had been “snooping.” The Iranian IRGC took the boats and their crews to Farsi Island, where Iran maintains a naval base in the northern Persian Gulf.
The run-in, which drew calls for reprisal from Republican lawmakers and candidates, comes at a sensitive time in the tumultuous relationship between the United States and Iran. Economic sanctions against Iran could be lifted as soon as this month under a landmark deal aimed at preventing the Iran from building a nuclear weapon.
A senior administration official said that, after communications between Secretary of State John F. Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, the State Department believed the situation had been resolved.
Another official, noting Iranian media reports that the sailors had been “arrested,” acknowledged that there is more than one power center in Iran but expressed cautious optimism that the sailors would quickly be released.
The incident marks the latest run-in between Iranian and U.S. crews. In December, Iranian gunboats fired unguided missiles about 1,000 yards from the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman.
A U.S. defense official said the small boats were believed to have been within 12 nautical miles of Iran when they broke down. Many officials stressed, though, that it is unclear exactly what happened.
Special Operations forces into smaller bodies of water.
The U.S. government has been in communication with Iranian authorities, according to a senior defense official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence issues.
“We have received assurances the sailors will promptly be allowed to continue their journey,” the official said.
Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter was updated throughout the afternoon about the incident and spoke with Secretary of State John F. Kerry and national security adviser Susan E. Rice.
In recent weeks, U.S. lawmakers have called for increased sanctions on Iran after the country tested two ballistic missiles in recent months. Since the tests, Iranian regime President Hassan Rouhani vowed to expand the country’s ballistic missile program.
Many U.S. politicians also complain of Iran’s support for allied militant
groups across the region and for
Bashar al-Assad in Syria.
Even though details about the incident were sparse, former Florida governor Jeb Bush, a Republican presidential candidate, quickly weighed in.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), who opposed the nuclear deal, said on CNN that “this kind of openly hostile action is not surprising. It’s exactly what I and so many others predicted when President Obama was negotiating the nuclear deal with Iran—that it would embolden their aggression towards the United States and our allies in the region.”