Trump Claims US Military Secretly Aided 200 Ships Through Strait of Hormuz

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that the U.S. military has secretly helped 200 commercial ships and more than 100 million barrels of oil through the Strait of Hormuz.

"This wildly successful effort is because the UNITED STATES of AMERICA CONTROLS the Strait of Hormuz — NOT Iran," Trump said in a Truth Social post. "Their military is defeated, and their economy is lost."

Trump disclosed the operation earlier Wednesday during remarks to reporters in the Oval Office. He credited the clandestine exports with keeping oil prices around $90 per barrel instead of surging above $200.

But ship traffic through Hormuz is still well below prewar levels, said Helima Croft, global head of commodity strategy at RBC Capital Markets. The world is losing significant volumes of oil every day, Croft told CNBC in an interview.

About 20% of global petroleum supplies, or 20 million barrels per day, passed through Hormuz before the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28. Traffic through the strait plunged after Iran retaliated by attacking ships and mining the sea lane. The effective closure of Hormuz has led to the loss of more than 1 billion barrels of oil, the largest supply disruption in history.

JPMorgan said last week that more oil might be moving through Hormuz than was publicly visible. The bank estimated around 2 million barrels per day might be getting out on tankers that switched off their transponders.

"Despite the ongoing naval blockade and the steep decline in commercial traffic, surprising volumes of crude and petroleum products still appear to be transiting the Strait," the JPMorgan analysts said in a June 4 note.

In May, Trump announced and then abruptly halted a mission called Project Freedom that sought to escort tankers stranded in the Persian Gulf. U.S. officials subsequently hinted that the Navy was quietly assisting ships through Hormuz but did not disclose the scale of the operation.

U.S. forces are not escorting vessels, a defense official told CNBC last week. The military is communicating and coordinating with ships that seek to freely and safely transit Hormuz, the official said.

U.S. Central Command had indicated the military was protecting ships from attack. It said clashes between U.S. and Iran last week began when Tehran launched drones toward "civilian mariners that were rightfully transiting regional waters."

Secretary of State Marco Rubio confirmed to Congress last week that the U.S. was responding to Iranian attacks on commercial ships. Iran's drones are not precise and could hit any part of the vessel, which risks an ecological disaster, Rubio said.