By Bo Erickson and Timothy Gardner
WASHINGTON, June 10 (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that the United States will attack Iran if no peace deal is secured and that the U.S. military secretly escorted ships carrying more than 100 million barrels of oil out of the Strait of Hormuz.
“We’re going to be attacking them, attacking them very hard,” Trump told reporters at the White House. He said the U.S. would strike Iran on Wednesday, in response to Iran’s downing of an Apache helicopter in the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump said later on Truth Social that he had directed last month the U.S. military to execute a secret mission to support oil tankers and other commercial ships through the strait, a narrow waterway between Iran and Oman, through which 20% of the world’s oil and gas flowed before the war began on February 28.
The world consumes about 100 million barrels of oil in one day. Trump suggested that global oil prices had fallen as a result of the secret mission. “That’s why it’s at $85-$90 a barrel, instead of $250,” Trump told reporters, earlier at the White House. Iran, a major OPEC oil producer, “just figured it out” that the oil had been taken through the strait.
“We took out the other night 22 ships, late at night with no lights, because they don’t have any radar because we blasted the crap out of it,” Trump said.
ENERGY SECRETARY SAYS NONE OF THE TANKERS WERE IRANIAN
Separately, U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright told a congressional hearing on Wednesday that an increase of oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz over the last week is the result of “using the U.S. military to increase flows of oil” in the waterway.
Wright said the vessels making it through the strait were not Iranian. Other countries that ship oil through the strait include Saudi Arabia, Iraq, the UAE, Kuwait and Qatar.
Trump said the United States is still looking to make a deal with Iran.
“We want a deal that is meaningful, we want a deal that works,” Trump added about the negotiations with Iran.
Trump said that Iran has already agreed not to obtain a nuclear weapon, but the agreement still needs to be signed.
(Reporting by Bo Erickson and Timothy Gardner; Editing by Doina Chiacu, Michelle Nichols, Cynthia Osterman and Deepa Babington)
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