Energy Secretary Wright says U.S. 'not ready' to escort tankers through Strait of Hormuz yet

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: CNBC

Published Thu, Mar 12 2026 7:50 AM EDT Updated 8 Min Ago


The U.S. Navy is not ready to escort oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, Energy Secretary Chris Wright told CNBC in an interview Thursday. “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.”

Wright said it is likely that the Navy will be in a position to escort tankers by the end of this month. “I’ll be over at the Pentagon later today — that is what the military is working on,” the Energy secretary said.

Brent oil prices, the international benchmark, touched $100 per barrel earlier Thursday as attacks on commercial vessels in the Persian Gulf continue.

Wright’s comments come after a post on his social media account wrongly claimed on Tuesday that the Navy had escorted a tanker through the Strait. The post was quickly deleted from his account, but it sent oil prices plunging more than 17% at their lows Tuesday.

Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/03/12/energy-secretary-wright-says-us-not-ready-to-escort-tankers-through-strait-of-hormuz-yet.html

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“It’ll happen relatively soon but it can’t happen now,” Wright said. “We’re simply not ready.

It's NOT going to happen "soon" because it's NOT going to happen "at all". There are not enough ships to do anything of the sort and they are ALL vulnerable to drone swarms. There are no Patriot Missile interceptors aboard ships.

I expect this is why they are testing those lasers.

[tanyev]

1. Gosh, it's like you can't believe anything Trump says.

[EX500rider]

2. The Navy has 76 operational Destroyers

And the Destroyers don't need Patriot missiles for slow moving drones or cruise missiles.

The RIM-162 Evolved Sea Sparrow Missiles (ESSM), Standard Missile-2 (SM-2), and SM-6 , alongside the Phalanx Close-In Weapon System (CIWS) and 5-inch guns ought to be enough.

[Hugin]

3. Why does the DoE have anything to do with escorting tankers?

This guy is covering for Kegsbreath an the toddler who would be king.

[wolfie001]

4. This was posted earlier by someone else but it's an amazing watch, 32 minutes long

This is probably why our navy doesn't have the capability to guarantee safe passage at the moment.

[quakerboy]

10. I wonder

Which country who's name starts with an R would have helped with this. Huh.

[Girard442]

5. Do these numbnuts even know what mines are and how they work?

These people learned everything they know by watching "Reacher." He's such a badass that unarmed, he can take down ten guys without breaking a sweat.

Unless...one of them is a scrawny 14-year-old kid standing across the room with a shotgun.

[JohnnyRingo]

6. They say Trump is playing chess and he's six moves ahead of us.

Unfortunately that only applies to dirty campaigning.
When it comes to the economy, homeland security, and war, he's winging it as he goes along. One problem just leads to another.

Top brass and experts at the Pentagon are where war plans are made, but I think this one was plotted out entirely on the Resolution Desk with a Sharpie.

[ananda]

9. More like 3-dimensional tiddly winks...

with only orange pieces.

[Prairie Gates]

7. You would need a 250,000 troop invasion of the Iranian side of the Strait

And you'd need to occupy pretty much all of Hormozgan and probably Bushehr provinces with a foothold 20 miles from the shore, minimum. So basically 10s of thousands of square miles and about 3.5 million Iranians.

Good luck.

[Strelnikov_]

8. This is why the W admin dropped any talk of taking on Iran

After their ‘big win’ in 03.

DoD did a war game, same conclusion every time, no way to reopen Hormuz with sea/air power alone, many ships lost. Anti ASM defences need distance, something not there in Hormuz.

And this was before modern drones.

Like the Koksun guns of North Korea for wiping out Seoul, tucked away in caves, Iranians have been hardening the coast along Hormuz for decades.