Hegseth: RIP Iran’s Ballistic Missile Production, Hormuz Open, Where’s Mojtaba? UPDATE: Marines Coming

The US and Israel have conducted all-out aerial and naval warfare against Iran for 14 days. The regime remains in place, at least nominally, and the IRGC still poses a threat to its neighbors and the oppressed people of Iran. Oil prices have shot up as oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz get shot at. The media keeps putting pressure on the Trump administration to win big, even though this may already be the most one-sided war ever seen at scale between combatants of these sizes.

Pete Hegseth held another briefing this morning, and made sure to shape the media battlefield right out of the gate. Responding to a CNN report that suggested the Pentagon had gone into this war unprepared to deal with threats to shipping in the strait, the Secretary of War responded that he can’t wait for Paramount’s acquisition to finalize:

Hegseth: No quarter, no mercy for our enemies. Yet some in the press just can’t stop. More fake news from CNN reports that the Trump administration underestimated the Iran war’s impact on the strait of hormuz. The sooner David Ellison takes over that network, the better. pic.twitter.com/BehjVYK0Hy

— Acyn (@Acyn) March 13, 2026

Brian Stelter immediately responded, claiming that Hegseth was misrepresenting what they wrote. David Harsanyi rebuked CNN’s media analyst just as quickly:

Except CNN didn’t only say that admin was “underestimating.” It wrote that the military “did not plan for the possibility of Iran closing the strait in response to strikes,” which is preposterous. https://t.co/0FnjBDPUFZ

— David Harsanyi (@davidharsanyi) March 13, 2026

Who’s right? If you said CNN, please apply immediately for VIP membership. May I suggest VIP Platinum, sirs and madams? It’s right in the link that Stelter provides, and Harsanyi bothered to read (emphasis mine):

Top Trump officials acknowledged to lawmakers during recent classified briefings that they did not plan for the possibility of Iran closing the strait in response to strikes, according to three sources familiar with the closed-door session.

Ahem. We have war-gamed the closing of the Strait at least since Operation Praying Mantis in 1988. The US and Iranian navies went to war in the Gulf, our most significant naval engagement since World War II, and it resulted in a lopsided victory for the US. In the one-day battle, we sank two of their battleships and severely damaged another, along with two surveillance platforms and three armed speedboats. The speedboats attempted to force a closure in the Strait by attacking oil tankers, managing hits on three of them and spooking shipping companies for a brief period. 

The idea that we had no plan for Iran’s attempts to close the Strait is absurd. We have all sorts of plans; the administration thought the Iranians would likely avoid that, because it’s the only access they have to hard currency, and they need that money more desperately than ever. Now that they have attacked shipping in the last few days, we have plenty of resources to respond to that strategy. However, Hegseth claims that the Strait is open and that there is no evidence that Iran has successfully mined it yet:

The Strait of Hormuz is open for transit, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said. “The only thing prohibiting transit in the straits right now is Iran shooting at shipping,” he said. “It is open for transit should Iran not do that.” …

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said there is no clear evidence that Iran has mined the Strait of Hormuz. “We’ve heard them talk about it, just like you’ve reported recklessly and wildly about it, but we have no clear evidence,” he told reporters.

Hegseth is the latest Trump administration official to cast doubt on reports that Iran has begun to lay sea mines. President Trump has said he doesn’t believe the waterway has been mined, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said yesterday that because some ships have been able to cross, including Chinese-flagged tankers, the U.S. doesn’t believe Iran has mined the strait.

Iran’s ability to shoot at tankers and at oil facilities in the region will shortly come to an end, Hegseth suggested, as well as its ability to produce replacements. Hegseth declared that all production facilities for ballistic missiles have no been destroyed, and that the US and Israel will target the rest of the IRGC’s military-industrial infrastructure in the days ahead:

Hegseth: Soon, very soon, all of Iran’s defense companies will be destroyed. For example, as of two days ago, Iran’s entire ballistic missile production capacity has been eliminated. pic.twitter.com/3ixIO3Rek5

— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) March 13, 2026

The implications for this will take some time to appear in the battlespace. The US and Israel is also targeting the existing stockpiles of missiles, and that has had a major effect on Iran’s launch pace. It has not yet stopped the attacks, though, and the Iranians will likely refuse to negotiate in good faith while their current inventories survive. Now that their ability to produce replacements has been eliminated, though, they may have to carefully consider target selections, which have been aggressively indiscriminate and have even included nominal allies like Turkey and Oman. 

Those are the tactical considerations for these devastating losses. The strategic implications are far more severe. The deterrent value of their ballistic missiles has been shown to be nil, as has the deterrent of their threats to the Strait of Hormuz. The US and Israel have continued the war even when Iran deploys these threats. The rest of the region has not forced an end to the fighting on Iran’s terms after putting these deterrents in action. Iran has no defenses now, and no deterrents of any value. They are as exposed militarily as they will be politically if they continue this war much longer. The US and Israel have multitasked their targeting to now attack the struts that keep the people from effectively deposing the regime, and a few more days of those attacks may be all that’s needed. 

Hegseth took aim at the gutlessness of Iran’s current leadership to point this out:

WATCH: Secretary Pete Hegseth says Iran’s new leader Mojtaba Khamenei is injured and “likely disfigured.” pic.twitter.com/PHdPLnJXpC

— Kassy Akiva (@KassyAkiva) March 13, 2026

Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth ridiculed Iran’s leadership Friday — claiming the theocracy’s “rat”-like executives had “gone underground” and that new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei is “likely disfigured.”

“Iran’s leadership is in no better shape, desperate and hiding. They’ve gone underground, cowering. That’s what rats do,” Hegseth jeered at a press conference.

“We know the new so-called not-so-supreme leader is wounded and likely disfigured,” he added. …

“Iran has plenty of cameras and plenty of voice recorders. Why a written statement? I think you know why?” he continued.

“His father dead, he’s scared, he’s injured, he’s on the run and he lacks legitimacy. It’s a mess for them. Who’s in charge?”

That’s the best-case scenario. It’s more likely that Mojtaba died in the same blast that killed his father. Some of Iran’s officials were seen on the street today, but none of them hold any real power anymore. The people who do hold power are all in the IRGC’s military junta, and none of them will show their faces on the street. 

We’re not even halfway through a reasonable time frame to destroy Iran as a threat to the US and its neighbors. We have accomplished much in dismantling what the mullahs created in 47 years, but 14 days is not quite enough to finish the mission. We’re still more than 14 days safer than we were when this began. 

Update: The WSJ reports that the Pentagon has dispatched a Marine expeditionary force to the theater:

The Pentagon is moving a Marine expeditionary unit to the Middle East, as Iran steps up its attacks on the Strait of Hormuz, according to two U.S. officials. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has approved a request from U.S. Central Command, responsible for American forces in the Middle East, for the expeditionary unit, typically consisting of up to 2,500 Marines, the officials said.

What can 2500 Marines do in this conflict? Kharg Island may be the likely target, which would capture Iran’s capacity to export oil entirely and allow the US leverage to stop attacks on shipping the Strait.  

Editor’s Note: For decades, former presidents have been all talk and no action. Now, Donald Trump is eliminating the threat from Iran once and for all.

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