Former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Mike Mullen said Sunday that he has anxiety around the potential for a lasting U.S. conflict in Iran — which has led to the deaths of seven U.S. service members as of Sunday.
“We’ve got friends and allies out there. We’ve got the economy of the world, in great part, depending on the open waters at the Strait of Hormuz and how markets react to this. You’ve got a tourism, economic — livelihood in the region that’s actually completely stopped right now,” Mullen told ABC News’s Martha Raddatz on “This Week.”
“So, there’s an awful lot in play that we can’t anticipate. And certainly, that was the case in Iraq and Afghanistan. And I worry about this getting drawn out. These wars just don’t end quickly. At least, they certainly haven’t in the last several decades,” he added.
Last week, the U.S. and Israel launched strikes against Iran following weeks of American-Iranian tension. Iran retaliated shortly after by striking Israel and Gulf states, including Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
U.S. Central Command (Centcom) announced on Sunday that a seventh U.S. service member had died in the Iranian conflict. Centcom said on social media that the service member died as a result of “injuries received during the Iranian regime’s initial attacks across the Middle East” on March 1.
