An Army AH-64 Apache attack helicopter crashed near the Strait of Hormuz late Monday and its two crew members were rescued, Pentagon officials said. The cause of the crash was not immediately clear. The Pentagon has not said whether Iran shot down the Apache.

The crash comes against the backdrop of a so-called ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran and the ongoing American military blockade of Iranian ports. AH-64 Apache helicopters have been a key U.S. asset enforcing the blockade. The United Arab Emirates has also used the helicopters to shoot down Iranian drones.

In a separate development Monday, U.S. forces disabled an oil tanker that attempted to evade the blockade by sailing toward an Iranian port. U.S. Central Command said a fighter jet fired into the engineering and steering space of the Palau-flagged M/T Marivex after it failed to comply with instructions from U.S. forces in the Gulf of Oman.

The Pentagon has determined that the Chinese electric auto maker BYD, tech giant Alibaba and search engine Baidu are working so closely with the Chinese military that they should be barred from receiving any U.S. defense contracts.

U.S. military officials on Monday added those Chinese businesses to the Pentagon’s official and growing list of “Entities identified as Chinese military companies operating in the United States.”

The list now sanctions well-known, non-state-owned Chinese companies that are not traditionally considered to be in the defense or security sector, according to The Associated Press. It reflects growing U.S. wariness of Beijing’s strategy of tapping the strength of non-state businesses for military purposes.

The European Union sanctioned two senior Iranian officials for their roles in Tehran’s scheme to restrict maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.

Mohammad Akbarzaedeh, one of the sanctioned officials, is the deputy commander for political affairs of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy. He has publicly threatened to use missiles and drones against merchant ships transiting the strait, European Union officials said.

Hamid Hosseini, a representative of Iran’s Oil, Gas and Petrochemical Products Exporters’ Union, was also sanctioned. So was the Hormozgan Provincial Command, a division of the IRGC Navy that screens vessels and determines which ones are allowed to transit the Strait of Hormuz, sometimes after paying tolls.

The developments on Monday came as European powers lean toward more robust engagement in the Strait of Hormuz crisis. France has recently moved its aircraft carrier strike group to the region for a potential French-British mission in the strait.

The Iran war has rattled the global economy, shaken the security assumptions of an emerging Gulf region and pumped up gas prices. It’s also created a major stress test for the longtime friendship between Mr. Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Speculation has swirled that the bromance between Bibi and Donald is over since Mr. Trump said he called Mr. Netanyahu “f——— crazy” during a tense discussion last week on the situation in Lebanon. The president was equally blunt in assessing whether Mr. Netanyahu would have to accept a U.S.-brokered deal with Iran.

Reporter Tom Howell Jr. examines the dynamics, citing experts who say talk of a lasting rift is premature. The coming days and twists in the war, which the U.S. and Israel started together on Feb. 28, could have a lasting impact on their relationship.

Across the Indo-Pacific, some of the “greatest strategic blunders today arise not from ignorance of history but from an obsession with it,” writes Miles Yu, director of the China Center at the Hudson Institute and an opinion contributor to Threat Status.

“Nations trapped by historical grievances, obsolete identities and long-dead geopolitical realities risk sacrificing the future for the sake of the past,” Mr. Yu writes in his Red Horizon column for The Washington Times.

“Critics frequently argue that any Indo-Pacific equivalent of NATO is doomed because of the collapse of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, which dissolved in 1977,” he writes. “This argument misunderstands both history and strategy.”

• June 11 — 2026 CNAS Virtual National Security Conference, Center for a New American Security 

• June 11 — The Future of American Airpower, Stimson Center 

• June 11 — The Arab Case for Israel: History, Mythology and Pathways to Peace, Foundation for Defense of Democracies 

• June 12 — Privileged but Powerless: Jieun Baek on Pyongyang’s Greatest Weakness, Atlantic Council

• June 12 — Winning the Innovation Competition (Featuring Under Secretary of War for Research and Engineering Emil Michael), Hudson Institute

• June 15 — How Should the United States Counter Russia and China’s Hybrid Warfare? Atlantic Council

• June 18 — Deterring Russia and China: Securing America’s Nuclear Future, Hudson Institute

• June 24 — IndoPac 2026 | Naval Dominance: Shipbuilding, Autonomy & C2, Threat Status Events