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The U.S. Navy will begin escorting ships through the Strait of Hormuz as soon as “militarily possible,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Sky News on Thursday.
“That was always in our planning, that there’s the chance that the U.S. Navy or perhaps an international coalition will be escorting oil tankers through,” Bessent said in that interview.
“My belief, that as soon as it is militarily possible, the U.S. Navy and perhaps with an international coalition, will be escorting vessels through,” he said.
Bessent’s comments came as the Strait of Hormuz has been effectively closed to shipping because of the war against Iran by the U.S. and Israel that began Feb. 28. The strait is the world’s most sensitive chokepoint for oil tankers, and its closure has caused crude oil prices to spike.
The Trump administration, for more than a week, has suggested that U.S. Navy vessels would escort oil tankers through the strait without that happening.
Earlier Thursday, Energy Secretary Chris Wright told CNBC in an interview that the Navy is not ready to escort oil tankers through the strait.
“It’ll happen relatively soon but it can’t happen now,” Wright said. “We’re simply not ready. All of our military assets right now are focused on destroying Iran’s offensive capabilities and the manufacturing industry that supplies their offensive capabilities.”
President Donald Trump on Wednesday said he believed that the CEOs of major oil companies should send tankers through the narrow strait. Also on Wednesday, the U.S. government said that Chubb said it would act as the lead underwriter for a federal government-led program to insure ships that transit the strait.
Bessent on Thursday said the U.S. did “scenario analysis for months, for weeks, leading into this” war, related to its effect on oil shipping.
He said that “as soon as it is possible to ensure safe passage” for oil tankers with Navy escorts “we will do it.”
Bessent said, “We have complete control of the skies.”
“They have no air force, the [Iranian] Navy is sunk literally and figuratively,” he said.
Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, earlier Thursday said the Strait of Hormuz should remain closed as a “tool to pressure the enemy.”
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