The impact of the Iran conflict on energy markets will be temporary and a "small price" to pay for US military goals, US Energy Secretary Chris Wright told Fox News on Wednesday.
US and Israeli strikes on Iran and the subsequent response by Tehran have widened regional tensions and paralysed shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, disrupting vital Middle East oil and gas flows and sending energy prices higher. Oil prices rose on Thursday in Asia amid growing concern over the prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
"This will definitely be temporary," Wright told the "Ingraham Angle" programme on Fox News.
"We have the world just massively well-supplied, abundant oil around the world, and American production at record highs. So we'll get through this, it'll be a bump on the road."
US President Donald Trump has pledged to provide insurance and naval escorts for ships exporting energy from the region to contain soaring costs.
Wright said the closure of the Strait of Hormuz was a temporary event, and that the US Navy would soon be escorting oil tankers through the waterway that typically carries about a fifth of the world's daily oil consumption.
"We'll do that as soon as we can. Right now, our navy, and of course, our military, is focussed on other things, which is disarming this Iranian regime," Wright said, when asked if any commercial vessels had requested US Navy assistance.
"Are we going to have a transient bump up as we've seen in gasoline prices? We do a little bit, but I think a very small price to pay to remove the nation that's killed more American soldiers in the last 20 years than any nation on earth," Wright said on Fox News.
(Reporting by Ismail Shakil; Editing by Christian Schmollinger, Donna Bryson and Tom Hogue)