Transcript of Pentagon Press Secretary Sean Parnell Press Briefing

Additionally, U.S. Northern Command announced on Saturday that the Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer, the USS Gravely, departed Naval Weapons Station Georgetown for a scheduled deployment to the Gulf of America.

We’re actually making some history from the podium today. It’s the first time we’ve recognized the Gulf of America in the Pentagon Press Briefing Room, which is kind of cool. So it’s not only vital for the United States to have control of our border via land, it’s equally important to control our territorial waters. And this deployment directly supports U.S. Northern Command’s mission to protect our sovereignty.

And lastly, Secretary Hegseth spoke with Qatari Minister of State for Defense Affairs, His Excellency Sheikh Saoud Al-Thani, to discuss operations to eliminate the Houthi threat to American commerce and restore American freedom of navigation. The Secretary acknowledged Qatar’s strong partnership in addressing shared security challenges across the region, including Syria and the Red Sea.

And with that, I’ll turn it over to my counterpart, Grinch, for some more opening comments on CENTCOM’s strikes. General, the floor is yours.

Operational Update on Houthi Strikes

LIEUTENANT GENERAL GRYNKEWICH: Okay. Thank you, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, thanks for the opportunity to provide you a brief operational update on our operations against the Houthis.

On Saturday, the 15th of March, shortly after 1 p.m. Eastern time, at the direction of the President, U.S. Central Command began precision strike operations against the Houthis to restore freedom of navigation and American deterrence.

The initial wave of strikes hit over 30 targets at multiple locations, degrading a variety of Houthi capabilities. These included terrorist training sites, unmanned aerial vehicle infrastructure, weapons manufacturing capabilities, and weapons storage facilities. It also included a number of command and control centers, including a terrorist compound where we know several senior Houthi unmanned aerial vehicle experts were located.

On Sunday, strike operations continued against additional headquarters locations, weapons storage facilities, as well as detection capabilities that have been used to threaten maritime shipping in the past. Today, the operation continues, and it will continue in the coming days until we achieve the President’s objectives. Thanks, and I look forward to your questions.

Questions from Reporters

SEAN PARNELL: And with that, in this very crowded briefing room, I’ll take some of your questions and then first I’ll go to Logan from Newsmax.

REPORTER: John, thank you for taking my question. This really is for both of you. A question about the Bashad, that’s the Iran spy ship that has been directing the Houthis throughout this conflict. Is it still operating in support of the Houthis? If so, do you know where it is?

SEAN PARNELL: General, I’ll turn it over to you to address that.

LIEUTENANT GENERAL GRYNKEWICH: Sure. We know that the Iranians have provided a variety of assistance to the Houthis over the years, including some suspected intelligence. We do know that some had previously come from the Bashad. The Bashad is not currently being used for those operations, but we do know that other vessels are contemplating for those.

SEAN PARNELL: …sorts of operations, so we’re watching very closely to see if they return to the AO. I would also say that when you look at how the previous administration conducted business with Iran, they really empowered Iran to fund and export terror all around the world, whether it’s with Hezbollah, Hamas, specifically with the Houthis. It’s very clear, I think President Trump has made it very clear that he’s put Iran on notice. I’m sure that you saw his tweet today that essentially saying, and I’m paraphrasing, that any shot fired at U.S. forces by the Houthis would be considered a shot from Iran. This is the President showcasing leadership from the Oval Office, and frankly, bringing moral clarity back to the United States of America. We know who the enemies of this country are and the enemies of a free world are, and President Trump has put them on notice, as you saw with Iran this morning.

REPORTER: Thank you for taking my question. I wanted to run back to TDA and MS-13 deportations to El Salvador’s terrorism confinement center. Do we anticipate to renew that partnership as it will conclude after one year? If yes, what does that look like from a cost perspective, and how is Guantanamo Bay factored into dealing with criminal aliens and terrorists, considering this new Pentagon is more focused on securing the border?

SEAN PARNELL: Well, that’s a great question. I think part of your question about El Salvador should be referred to the State Department, but I’ll say that the Department of Defense is proud to defend our homeland and our sovereignty in helping to deport transnational criminal organizations like Trend AI. We’re proud to support that mission. I don’t know, General, do you have anything to offer about Guantanamo Bay and our force posture there?

GENERAL BRINK: Sure. I just had a couple of things for you, Gabby. We do continue to have a substantial presence at Guantanamo Bay to ensure that we’re ready to receive any illegal aliens that the Department of Homeland Security would like to send there. We’re monitoring their requirements closely, and we’re in daily contact with them to make sure that we can meet them to the best of our ability.

Potential Iranian Ship Targeting and Casualty Reports

REPORTER: Sean, if the Iranian ships that are operational start helping the Houthis, will they be targeted? And for the General, any sense of the number of military casualties so far and any civilian casualties in Yemen?

SEAN PARNELL: Well, that’s a great question, General. You’ll permit me to answer it?

GENERAL BRINK: Sure, go ahead.

SEAN PARNELL: I think that I certainly don’t want to get out in front of the Commander-in-Chief and the Secretary as it pertains to clearance of strikes and who will be targeted, but I think the President’s made very clear that all options are on the table.

GENERAL BRINK: Yeah, Tom, just on your question of casualties, military casualties, we have some initial estimates. I hesitate to say what they are because they’re very much estimates that we have at this point, but I think in terms of dozens might be a safe overall characterization.

REPORTER: Dozens of military?

GENERAL BRINK: Yeah, dozens of military casualties so far, but I really can’t characterize it much better than that at this point. We’ll learn more as we go. On the civilian casualty side, no indications of any civilian casualties. We, of course, have seen some of the accusations by the Houthis. We look at those closely when they do come in, but we have no credible indications of any civilian casualties.

SEAN PARNELL: You know, I’d like to add to what General Brink said. Any time you’re close to an operation like this, having been in combat front towards enemy before, the fog of war is a real thing. So before we announce something here from the podium, we’re going to make sure that we get it right, and I think part of that is just taking the time to evaluate and doing a proper battle damage, BDA battle damage assessment, sensitive site exploitation, and frankly that stuff just takes time. And so before we make any sort of those announcements, we’re going to do a real hard look and make sure that we get it right before we announce it to you.

Anti-DEI Initiatives and Military Strength

REPORTER: Yes, thank you, John. Just changing the subject slightly. Is the DOD considering rescheduling the performance of young musicians in the Marine Band that was canceled because of the anti-DEI executive order? And in a broader sense, is there a concern that anti-DEI initiatives may have a negative impact on recruitment?

SEAN PARNELL: Well, I think the President and the Secretary have been very clear on this, that anybody that says in the Department of Defense that diversity is our strength is frankly incorrect. Our shared purpose and unity are our strength. As somebody who led a combat platoon in Afghanistan that was probably the most diverse platoon that you could possibly imagine. I mean, we had blacks serving next to white, Christians serving next to atheists, Northerners next to Southerners, and yes, Democrats and Republicans in the very same foxhole. But the reason why we were so lethal in Afghanistan, and again my platoon took an 85% casualty rate over 485 days. But part of the reason why we were able to accomplish the mission and the commander’s intent was because we put aside our many differences as Americans. There were no hyphenated Americans with us in that isolated hilltop in the border region of Afghanistan. We were all just Americans.

And really, when you talk about America’s greatest strength, yes, we’ve got, as I’m sure the general can attest, yes, we’ve got lots of cool, sexy equipment and lots of exceptional military training. I think it helps set us apart from everybody else. But what makes us exceptional fighters on the battlefield is our ability to put aside our many differences and unite under a common banner as Americans. I mean, for goodness sake, when we put aside our many differences as Americans, we went to the moon with less technology than many of you all have in your pockets in your cell phones right now. We’re talking about a force that stormed the beaches of Normandy, scaled the cliffs that point to Hawks, fought through hedgerows and beat back the Nazi war machine and saved the world when we put aside our many differences as Americans. And I know President Trump understands that our focus on unity and shared purpose is what makes us lethal, and so does Secretary Hegseth. So their guidance has been clear on this, and we’re going to continue to focus on that guidance.

REPORTER: Wait, in terms of the concert, are you thinking about rescheduling that?

SEAN PARNELL: I’ll have to take that question for you. I don’t have an answer for you, but we’ll get back to you on that.

Ukraine Military Aid

SEAN PARNELL: Oh, let’s go to the phones. I’m getting a signal. We should go to the phones.

REPORTER: Hey, Sean. Thank you for doing this. I have a question about Ukraine. Can you assess how the U.S. military… assess the status of U.S. military aid to Ukraine and the intelligence sharing, how it’s going since it was disrupted a few, maybe a week or so ago, and then restarted? What’s being shared? What’s being given? What’s happening with that?

SEAN PARNELL: Well, I can tell you that U.S. military aid to Ukraine has been turned back on, as well as intelligence sharing with our Ukrainian partners. But I’ll tell you this. The President has been very clear since his time on the campaign trail that his focus with the war in Ukraine is bringing about peace and putting a distinct focus on peace, and really to stop the dying. And so President Trump, along with his national security team, have been heavily involved in, along with Secretary Hegseth as well, heavily involved with Ukraine and Russia to try to broker that peace, understanding that there will likely be difficult conversations to be had on both sides when you’re talking about the release of hostages, when you’re talking about potential ceasefire agreements, when you’re talking about territory. As someone who’s negotiated with some tough people on the battlefield, I can tell you it’s a tough, imperfect, nuanced, and complicated process. And President Trump and Secretary Hegseth certainly understand that, with on the forefront of their mind, peace as their first and foremost priority. General, do you have anything to add?

GENERAL BRINK: No, I would just echo what you said, sir, which is, yeah, the status of U.S. military aid, it has been turned back on. We’ve got confirmed reports that it is continuing or is flowing back into Ukraine. And, of course, daily reports on the outcome of the intelligence sharing and those efforts. So all of that is as it was previously.

SEAN PARNELL: So I’m going to stick with the phones here just a second. I got Christina from…

REPORTER: Breitbart on the phones. Thanks so much for doing this, Sean. Two questions. After U.S. strikes against the Houthis on Saturday, the Houthis fired drones and missiles at the Truman. Will there be a response to those attacks? And secondly, regarding the USS Gravely – can you tell us a little about what it will be doing there, exactly what its mission will be?

SEAN PARNELL: So I’ll address the first part of your question first, Christina, and then General, I’ll let you chime in. The question of the Houthis – remind me what the first part of your question was, Christina.

REPORTER: Will there be a response to the Houthi attacks on the Truman?

SEAN PARNELL: Sorry, got it. So first of all, we did get reports of the Houthis firing ballistic missiles and some one-way attack drones against U.S. forces in the region. Those attacks were largely ineffective and didn’t come anywhere near U.S. forces in the region. The commanders in command of those vessels were completely on point with regards to defending. They were not effective attacks.

And so to the second part of that question – the response is ongoing. This isn’t – there’s going to be a very clear end state to this. And I think a lot of that has to do with how the Houthis respond. Firing at U.S. military personnel in the region and shooting at our ships and shooting at our drones and putting American lives at risk is not a good way to end this conflict. The Houthis could stop this tomorrow if they said, we’re going to stop shooting at your people. But they’ve clearly chosen not to do that. And so this campaign will be relentless to degrade their capability and to open up shipping lanes in the region and to defend our homeland. But for General Grynkewich.

GENERAL GRYNKEWICH: Thanks, Sean. The only thing I would add is the Houthis claim to have tried to attack the Harry S. Truman. Quite frankly, it’s hard to tell because while we’re executing precision strikes, they missed by over 100 miles. So I would just tell you, their effectiveness – I would question anything that they claim in the press that they’re doing or not doing. It’s very hard to tell what they are just based on their level of incompetence that they’ve demonstrated so far.

Yes, that’s correct. There’s also been a number of other attempts to interdict vessels in the Red Sea using UAVs and some cruise missiles as well. All of those have been easily defeated by our fighter aircraft that are there.

SEAN PARNELL: General Grynkewich throwing shade at the Houthis from the podium.

GENERAL GRYNKEWICH: Some of the folks in here know that in my previous job, I dealt with the Houthis quite a bit.

SEAN PARNELL: Yes, you did. Yes, you did.

GENERAL GRYNKEWICH: I’m happy to throw shade at them.

On the question about the USS Gravely that you had, Christina. She’s deploying under General Geo, the commander of US Northern Command’s authorities for maritime homeland defense missions. She’ll go down, as Sean mentioned, into the Gulf of America and surrounding areas and be involved in the interdiction mission for any of the drugs and whatnot that are heading in. It’ll be partnered very closely with the United States Coast Guard. So we won’t share, of course, her actual scheme of maneuver here, but know that that’s the mission that she’s going down there for and we look forward to seeing what she can do.

SEAN PARNELL: And on that point about the USS Gravely, I think it’s really important that the president and the secretary have made very clear 100% operational control of our southern border. We’ve got probably close to 10,000 troops on our southern border. We’re surging a striker brigade combat team down there to reinforce the land border as well. But there’s a sea component to this as well, and that’s part of the mission of the USS Gravely is to secure the water routes in defense of our southern border.

Afghanistan Withdrawal Accountability

REPORTER: Erin, Daily Caller. Thank you, Sean. Will the Department of Defense commit to firing or otherwise disciplining any remaining leadership that were directly involved in the Afghanistan withdrawal?

SEAN PARNELL: So we’re in the process of figuring out what that investigation will look like. But I’ll tell you as somebody who served in Afghanistan and watched that unfold, I mean, I was horrified in a lot of ways. You know, you think about how much time and blood and treasure in American life that was lost in Afghanistan over 20 years. You think about that for a second. I’m 43 years old. This country was at war in Afghanistan for 20 years. So almost half of my life, this country was at war in Afghanistan.

And I personally watched the men in my platoon, but also my larger brigade combat team, which was a part of the 10th Mountain Division, 3rd Brigade. We bled the ground red in Afghanistan, and I watched my men do extraordinary things in support of a grateful nation and in support of the mission there. And to watch Afghanistan be surrendered in the way that it was, was extremely difficult.

And I think something that President Trump and Secretary Hegseth really understand is that when America makes the decision to get involved in any conflict, we have a moral obligation to have a clear-cut end state to what that operation looks like, a clear exit strategy to what that operation looks like, and to make sure that victory is clearly defined. And I think in Iraq and certainly in Afghanistan over the last 20-some years, I think maybe we’ve struggled a little bit with those finer points.

But I’ll say that President Trump and Secretary Hegseth, they understand that when America gets involved in a fight, it’s our job to also end that fight as fast as humanly possible, because we have a moral obligation to win and win decisively. Otherwise, you’re going to have an entire generation of American warriors wondering what the hell it was all for.

And I know, listen, I know that every day I wake up and I draw breath, I think about the men who I served with, who were my friends, who never came home from that fight. I’ve lost 30 friends in my support of the Afghan War, 30. And you ask yourself, you look yourself in the mirror, you ask yourself, what do we have to show for it? Not a whole lot.

And so your question of will people be held accountable? I think we have an obligation both to the American people and to the American warfighters who fought in Afghanistan to hold the leadership accountable in some way. Now, we don’t know what that looks like right now, but to hold the leadership that was in charge of the Afghan withdrawal accountable. Because look, if you have a private that loses a sensitive item, that loses night vision goggles, that loses a weapon, you can bet that that private is going to be held accountable. The same and equal standards must apply to senior military leaders.

Defining the End State of Houthi Operations

REPORTER: I just want to follow up on what you just said. You said that there needs to be a clear end state. And I know the goal is to have the Houthis stop their attacks, but what is the end state? What happens if the Houthis don’t stop their attacks or don’t agree to say they’ll stop their attacks? It doesn’t seem like there is a clear end state, that this could just go on and on.

SEAN PARNELL: Well, in fairness, it’s a great question, but in fairness, the operations will only be going on for 48 hours. And the president and secretary have been very clear on this, that the Houthis can determine when this ends. And until then, the campaign will be unrelenting until we, one, protect our homeland, and two, open up the shipping lanes there. So make sure that we have freedom of maneuver in that area. But, General, you have something to add.

GENERAL GRYNKEWICH: What I might add is, while we won’t talk about it publicly, just know that there is a design to the operation. There are specific effects that we’re trying to achieve, and there are specific targets that have been selected and approaches that we’re taking in order to achieve the president’s end state. So it isn’t that we’re just striking capabilities. There’s an intent behind every strike and every target that we go after.

REPORTER: To that point, you mentioned that this is not like it was before. So what is different about the targeting that you’re doing this time that wasn’t true under the Biden administration?

SEAN PARNELL: I’ll give the short answer to that, but again, without going into too many operational details for security reasons. But it’s a much broader set of targets that we’ve been able to action in this case. And the other key difference is the delegation of authorities from the president through Secretary Hegseth down to the operational commander. So that allows us to achieve a tempo of operations where we can react to opportunities that we see on the battlefield in order to continue to put pressure on the Houthis. Thank you very much.

REPORTER: Will this operation include sending ground troops into Yemen? If so, how do you achieve your objective of making them say enough without sending ground troops?

SEAN PARNELL: Well, I’ll tell you, it’s very difficult, if not impossible, for us to talk about forced posture from this podium. Because as a commander who’s been on the battlefield, it’s very, very important to keep the enemy guessing, keep your adversaries guessing. Now, that’s not to say that we’ve got ground troops in Yemen. That’s not to say that we’re sending ground troops in. But it’s difficult to talk about that stuff for operational security reasons from the podium. But generally, do you have anything to add?

GENERAL: No, nothing to add to that. I think that’s exactly right.

Questions About Sensitive Site Exploitation

REPORTER: John, can I follow up on that? You said that one of the things that you were waiting to do for the BDA was sensitive site exploitation. Does that include U.S. boots on the ground or any kind of American personnel on the ground to do that?

SEAN PARNELL: I can’t talk about that stuff from the podium. But we have ways of conducting sensitive site exploitations without ground troops on the ground.

GENERAL: Yeah, it does not always require boots on the ground. I’ll just leave it at that.

Houthi Capabilities and Leadership Targets

REPORTER: General, could I also ask you also about if there’s any U.S. military assessment? I know that BDA is ongoing, but is there any military assessment about how much of the Houthis’ capabilities were degraded by these first couple of rounds? And can you say anything, the President’s Truth Social mentioned going after leaders, which seems to be one of the things that’s different here. Can you say anything about any of the leaders that were targeted here?

GENERAL: Yeah, on the second part of the question, I’ll just go to my opening statement, where I mentioned that there was a unmanned aerial vehicle facility that was struck with several key leaders. Those were key individuals who led their unmanned aerial vehicle enterprise and were some of the technical experts in there. So think those types of individuals that we might be targeting as part of the command and control. And so we have destroyed command and control facilities, weapons manufacturing facilities, and advanced weapons storage locations. But again, this campaign is ongoing. It’s difficult to talk about all this stuff from the podium, and we’re not going to say anything from the podium until we’re 100% sure that we have it right.

Final Questions

SEAN PARNELL: I’ve got time for one more question.

REPORTER: You mentioned the President’s Truth Social. Is the U.S. military considering military options for Iran?

SEAN PARNELL: I don’t want to get out in front of the President or the Secretary, but I think the President’s Truth Social was pretty clear, and I think the meaning is right there. I think everybody understands what he means. I don’t want to get out in front of the President, but all options are on the table at this time. That’s all I got.

REPORTER: You said 30 targets. Is that over all three days?

SEAN PARNELL: No, that was on the first day. It was over 30 targets, so not a specific number for you, but over 30 targets, multiple locations, and then additional targets yesterday on Sunday and additional targets today that obviously I won’t go into because they’re executing now.

SEAN PARNELL: So thank you, everybody. Listen, we’re done. There will be more of these, I promise, but thank you. It was a great first press briefing. Really appreciate you all and your commitment to telling the story of the warfighters. Thank you. We’ll see you next time.

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