Republican officials in the US have criticized what they call the Obama administration's failure in dealing with Iran, following the detention of US sailors in the Persian Gulf last week.
The leading Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump, wrote on his Twitter account: "Do you think Iran would have acted so tough if they were Russian sailors? Our country was humiliated."
Ed Royce (R-CA), the head of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, accused Obama of not having a backbone and said that his failure to curb Iran's aggression is destabilizing the entire region.