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On July 23rd, US President Donald Trump swore in the new US Defense Secretary Mark Esper.
Mark Esper is a former lobbyist for Raytheon.
Raytheon is the third-largest US defence contractor. Raytheon is the manufacturer of Paveway precision-guided missiles Congress has sought to block from sale to Saudi Arabia over concerns about civilian casualties in Yemen. Trump supports the weapons transfer and just vetoed the disapproval passed by the House last week.
An Army veteran, Esper had served as a congressional aide and a Pentagon official under Republican President George W Bush, before working for Raytheon. He has been Army secretary since November 2017.
“The nominee is beyond qualified. His record of public service is beyond impressive. His commitment to serving our service members if beyond obvious. And the need for a Senate-confirmed secretary of defence is beyond urgent,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said.
Immediately, after assuming office, he took the same song that Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan was singing before, which was basically whatever US National Security Adviser John Bolton said.
ILLUSTRATIVE
In his first media briefing on July 24th, he spoke on various topics, including what an honor being Defense Secretary is and namely the Persian Gulf and Iran.
He provided some information on “Operation Sentinel” (HINT: not to be confused with the Operation Freedom Sentinel in Afghanistan) which is the US plan of ensuring safety of passage in the Persian Gulf, and specifically through the Strait of Hormuz and deterring alleged Iranian aggression.
“Q: Mr. Secretary, I wanted to ask you about Operation Sentinel. As you know, the Europeans have created their own maritime security force. Give us an update on Operation Sentinel and how would you work with the Europeans? Are you talking with them about a — some sort of a command and control? Because they claim they’re going to have their own for the European effort.
SEC. ESPER: Yeah, clearly I didn’t have the chance in the last two hours to talk to them, but they — they are trying to pursue something I — I describe as complimentary, if you will. You know, what we said all along is the key thing is here — are two-fold, one is maintaining freedom of navigation in the Strait — of course, the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman — and then secondly is deterring provocative actions from Iran.
And so whether we do that as one big group or as subgroups, I think as long as it compliments one another — there will be clearly coordination between us all, CENTCOM will be the coordinating authority. I will be down at CENTCOM next week, I am traveling down there to — just to check in with them, to get a briefing on a number of issues.
So I think it’s all helpful, it’s all sending the same messages we’re trying to send. That is freedom of navigation and no provocative acts in the Strait, and we’ve seen provocative acts obviously in the last, what, week or two since the first shoot down of our drone.”
Esper furthermore praised the European initiative, that was recently announced by the UK and said that it would complement the US one, regardless of the two being allegedly unrelated.
“No, I think it — I think it’s all complimentary. We — you know, this is not — this is something where all countries who — you know, most countries who transit the Strait should have an interest in this and want to participate and want to provide some type of forces to — to, again, ensure navigation of the Strait, freedom of the seas, and to deter provocative behavior.
So I — it’s — it’s all complimentary, it all works. The key is making sure we do those two things.”
He did, however, say that the US would actually provide intelligence to allies so that they can keep their own merchant ships safe, US warships would not escort ships that aren’t US-flagged.
“The key issues are two-fold: one is maintaining freedom of navigation in the Strait [of Hormuz], the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman. The second is deterring provocative action from Iran,” he said.
He said that these actions would be to the benefit of “most countries.”
“Most countries who transit the strait have an interest in this and should want to provide forces to ensure navigation of the strait, freedom of the seas and deter provocative behavior. It’s all complementary, it all works,” Esper said.
“The Brits are trying to escort their ships. We’re escorting our ships to the degree that the risk demands it. I assume that other countries will escort their ships.”
In terms of U.S. presence in the region, Esper said forces in the Middle East would maintain a presence around potential danger areas but stopped short of saying it would escort all American ships to prevent their seizure by the IRGCN.
“We would want to make sure we have the capacity to make sure that doesn’t happen. And in some cases that may be strictly an overhead capability. It may mean that there is a U.S. naval warship within proximity to deter that,” Esper said.
“I don’t necessarily mean that every U.S.-flagged ship going through the strait has a destroyer right behind it.”
Britain’s already doing a marvelous job, after the Stena Impero was seized by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on July 19th, after it wandered into Iranian waters, after Iran allegedly warned it, but to no avail.
Most recently, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani suggested that a tanker exchange might be possible – the UK-flagged Stena Impero, for the Iranian tanker seized in Gibraltar.
“Should they be committed to international frameworks and give up their wrong actions, including what they did in Gibraltar, they will receive a proportional response from Iran.”
Whether this concentration of forces would lead to anything positive or spark an accidental war comes down to speculation and anticipation.
MORE ON THE TOPIC:
- Russia Provides Concept To Ensure Persian Gulf Security: Is Anybody Willing to Listen?
- UK Outlines Plan To Send EU-Led Naval Joint Task Force To ‘Ensure Safety’ In Persian Gulf
- Iranian Defense Minister Says His Country Powerful Enough To Counter Any Threat
- Gulf Conflict Report: Prospects Of War Between Iran And U.S.
