"Identification"
This is a shot of one of the ships involved in this incident. How close do you really think you'd have to get to read that number?
The video shows that the Iranian boats involved were small, and very fast. These weren't barges, or slow tenders. If one of these boats was full of high explosive, it would be a matter of less than a minute or so of decision time for one of them to change course and intercept a warship from a considerable distance. It is estimated that the U.S.S. Cole was holed by about 400 to 700 pounds of explosives.
Rational people can easily see the potential threat, and the lying from Iran.