The deployment adds to a growing US military buildup in tense Gulf waterways vital to the global oil trade and led Tehran on Monday to accuse the US of inflaming regional instability.
The US military says Iran has either seized or attempted to take control of nearly 20 internationally flagged ships in the region over the past two years.
The US sailors and Marines entered the Red Sea yesterday after transiting through the Suez Canal in a pre-announced deployment, the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet says in a statement.
They arrived on board the USS Bataan and USS Carter Hall warships, providing “greater flexibility and maritime capability” to the Fifth Fleet, the statement from the Bahrain-based command adds.
The deployment adds to efforts “to deter destabilizing activity and de-escalate regional tensions caused by Iran’s harassment and seizures of merchant vessels,” Fifth Fleet spokesman Commander Tim Hawkins tells AFP.