Combined Maritime Forces

Broad area of activity

Roughly 3.2 million square miles of international waters from the Gulf to the western Indian Ocean

Notable history

CMF is the standing multinational structure of Gulf maritime security, and its membership is the point: 47 nations including Iraq, Pakistan, Türkiye and all six GCC states, alongside the United States and its European allies. It runs five combined task forces — maritime security outside the Gulf, counter piracy, maritime security inside the Gulf, Red Sea maritime security and maritime security training — and describes its own purpose as countering illicit non-state actors and promoting stability, not as confronting a state. That stated purpose is what separates it from the American campaign, even though one officer commands both. This module authors it because the Gulf's maritime-security architecture cannot be explained without the distinction, and misreading coalition activity as belligerent activity is the specific error the record exists to prevent.

Strengths

Breadth of membership that no national command can match, a permanent headquarters, and a task-force structure that lets states contribute to some missions without joining others.

Limitations

Its mandate is against non-state actors and it is not designed for, and does not claim, a role in an interstate war. Its self-description of purpose is a participant's account of itself and this module treats it as a stated position rather than an independent finding. The shared command with NAVCENT means the boundary is institutional rather than physical, and reporting frequently blurs it. No vessels, contributions, deployments or operations are described here.

Related organisations

• US Naval Forces Central Command / Fifth Fleet Institutionally linked to · as of 2026-09 · high confidence

  One officer, three commands. A US Navy vice admiral simultaneously commands the Combined Maritime Forces, NAVCENT and the Fifth Fleet, all co-located at Naval Support Activity Bahrain. The commands are not merged: CMF is a 47-nation partnership with its own stated mission against illicit non-state actors, and its members are not parties to the American war by virtue of belonging to it.

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