Middle East

Crosetto: ships approach Hormuz but mission does not start

The Defence Minister: 'Bringing ships closer together: it would not be a Hormuz mission, but another type of mission that would take place within other missions. In this sense, a number of hypotheses have been put forward to me by the General Staff, among them Djibouti'

by Andrea Carli

11 May 2026

il Ministro della Difesa Guido Crosetto in occasione del Seminario Gruppo Speciale Mediterraneo e Medio Oriente dell’Assemblea parlamentare Nato. Camera dei Deputati, Roma Lunedì 11 Maggio 2026 LAPRESSE

4' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

Key points

Crosetto: "Only the US can do without NATO"
"NATO commitment summit in Ankara, no need to go to Washington"
"European defence is not just EU, it must be continental"
"There are expenses that bring more votes than Defence"

4' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

"It is one thing to bring the ships closer and quite another to direct them directly towards Hormuz. In the latter case, a new mission would have to be approved first, with a truce, then a legal framework and finally parliamentary authorisation. It is another matter to bring the ships closer together: it would not be a Hormuz mission, but another type of mission that would take place within other missions. In this sense, a number of hypotheses have been put forward to me by the General Staff, among them Djibouti. In any case, we will discuss it with Parliament from Wednesday'. These are the words of the Defence Minister, Guido Crosetto, to the Ansa agency.

The contours of a possible mission to Hormuz to re-establish freedom of navigation in the Strait, which the government would join only with a stabilised ceasefire, should in fact be clearer on Wednesday 13 May, when Crosetto and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani will appear before the Foreign Affairs and Defence Committees of the House and Senate 'on international initiatives to restore freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz'.

The Italian base in Djibouti

In the Republic of Djibouti, the Italian military operates the Italian military support base named after 'Amedeo Guillet'. It is a strategic outpost in the Horn of Africa, dependent on the Inter-Forces Operations Command and operational since 2014, providing logistical and operational support to all Italian and international operations in the area. It is a crossroads for maritime lines of communication that from the Mediterranean are directed, through the Suez Canal, to the Persian Gulf, South East Asia, South Africa and vice versa, it guarantees logistical support to national assets in transit on Djibouti territory and to those engaged in operations in the Somali region.

Crosetto: "Only the US can do without NATO"

Turning then to the relationship between the United States and the Atlantic Alliance, during his speech in the Chamber of Deputies at the seminar of the Special Mediterranean and Middle East Group of the Atlantic Alliance Parliamentary Assembly, Crosetto said that "there is only one nation in the world that could do without NATO tomorrow and that is the United States: none of our nations, if they left NATO, would have the same security and deterrence conditions. We all know that and in recent years we have been reminded that everyone had to do their part, but we had got used to not doing it, it was much more comfortable,' he concluded.

"NATO commitment summit in Ankara, no need to go to Washington"

As for the possibility that he might travel to the US to talk about Italy's NATO commitments and its relationship with the United States in light of the Trump administration's criticism of Italy's role in the current wars, the defence chief clarified: "There's no need for me to go to Washington because there's a meeting in Ankara soon (scheduled for next July, ed.) where the whole NATO group will meet, where Trump will also be, and where each country will have to report and explain its commitment to NATO in the coming years. At the same time, Crosetto rejected the US president's judgement that Italia was not on the US side in the Iran war: 'I don't understand what he means because we were there like all the other nations of the world. Nobody asked us to be part of this war, nobody knew that this war with Iran would break out. It seems to me that we behaved well'.

Crosetto then responded on the possibility that Washington intends to reduce NATO bases in Europe: "NATO bases in Italia or anywhere in the world are not bases that serve the nation in which they reside," the minister explained, "They are bases that serve NATO, that is, all the allies, and therefore equally Italy, the United States, Germany, and all those that are part of it. So I don't think it is in anyone's interest at this time to weaken the most powerful defence organisation in the world, precisely at a time when the world is most unstable. So the first interest of the United States in my opinion is to keep them open,' the minister stressed.

"European Defence is not just EU, it must be continental"

One passage of Crosetto's speech in the Chamber touched on the issue of European defence. 'When I speak of European defence I think of continental defence,' explained the Defence Minister, 'I don't just put in the 27 European countries, I put in the Balkans, I put in the UK, I put in the Ukraine, I put in Moldova, I put in Norway, I put in Turkey, that is continental Europe. We have to look further ahead, we have to look at a world that is increasingly insecure and where nations that share the same paths come together'.

"There are expenses that bring more votes than defence"

Finally, Crosetto had his say on the debate about whether resources should be allocated to defence rather than health and education. There are 'expenses that bring more votes than Defence, because Defence does not bring votes,' he said. 'Schools, hospitals, health, culture, pensions bring votes, not Defence, which is considered by many public opinions to be something ugly, because it is mentally linked to the ugliest thing humanity has created, which is war. However,' the minister added, 'the times we are living in have reminded us that there are no schools, no kindergartens, no hospitals if there is no peace'.