(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-01-13 15:56

MANAMA - A naval commander told President Bush on Sunday that he is taking the recent confrontation between Iranian and US Navy forces in the Persian Gulf "deadly seriously."

This image released by the US Navy Tuesday, Jan. 8, 2008, and shot Sunday, Jan. 6 from the bridge of the destroyer USS Hopper, shows a small blue boat, alleged to be Iranian, purportedly racing near the wake of US Navy ships in the Persian Gulf. [Agencies]

White House press secretary Dana Perino said Bush did not raise the showdown in the Hormuz Strait when he spoke with US Vice Adm. Kevin Cosgriff, commander of the US 5th Fleet, which patrols the Gulf. But Perino said Cosgriff told the president that he took it very seriously when an Iranian fleet of high-speed boats charged at and threatened to blow up a three-ship US Navy convoy passing near Iranian waters.

The Iranian naval forces vanished as the American ship commanders were preparing to open fire

Bush spoke with Cosgriff after he had breakfast with troops of the US 5th fleet based in Bahrain.

"All the military people remember what happened in the past, such as the USS. Cole," Perino said, referring to the October 2000 terrorist attack on a US warship, the USS Cole. The attack in Yemen's Aden harbor by a small boat laden with explosives killed 17 sailors and nearly sank the Cole.

After visiting with the troops here, Bush boarded Air Force One bound for the United Arab Emirates where he was to give a speech on Sunday in Abu Dhabi about regional security and his push for democratic reform in the Mideast.