General Dan Caine, the chairman of the US’ Joint Chiefs of Staff, has outlined the goals of Project Freedom, as well as provided updates on the new operation.

“On Sunday, at the direction of the president, Centcom initiated Project Freedom, with the objective of facilitating the safe passage of international commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz,” he tells reporters at the Pentagon.

Gen Caine adds that over the past several weeks, Iran has “repeatedly threatened and attacked” commercial vessels in the Strait to “cut off commercial traffic and damage the global economy”.

Highlighting the US presence in those waters on a map, he points out the sites of kinetic attacks on commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz and Gulf of Oman.

“Since the ceasefire was announced, Iran has fired at commercial vessels nine times and seized two container ships, and they have attacked US forces more than 10 times, all below the threshold of restarting major combat operations at this time,” Gen Caine says.