“I don’t think I created a culture of secrecy,” Austin said.
His comments to reporters came three days after his return to the Pentagon on January 29, and about a week after three American soldiers were killed in a drone attack in northeastern Jordan. President Biden has promised retaliation, and Austin reiterated that retaliation is coming.
A firestorm erupted when it was learned that Austin, 70, had kept White House officials and his deputy at the Pentagon, who took over twice during his treatment, in the dark when he developed major problems related to the surgery. This drew criticism from lawmakers from both parties. A congressional oversight committee asked him to testify about the incident this month.
Austin's illness occurred as the Biden administration confronts escalating violence across the Middle East, posing a major challenge to the president's goal of containing instability linked to Israel's war against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip.
On Sunday, a drone attack killed three service members and wounded dozens at a US site in Jordan, marking the first death of US personnel by hostile fire since the Gaza war led to a sharp rise in hostilities across the region. Biden pledged revenge against the Iran-backed militants responsible for the attack in Jordan and more than 160 others who have targeted US forces in Iraq and Syria since October.
The Pentagon has carried out a series of air strikes in both countries in recent weeks, and opened a military campaign against other Iranian-backed militants in Yemen, who have upended commercial shipping off the Arabian Peninsula with numerous attacks on commercial ships.
Austin, who until this week was working from his home in Northern Virginia after his release from Walter Reed on Jan. 15, acknowledged that he “could have done a better job” of keeping the public informed, through the media, of his whereabouts and condition.
The Pentagon did not announce his hospitalization until four days after he was readmitted to Walter Reed and did not initially reveal that he was in intensive care.
