In the summer time of 2024, the menace to maritime delivery in the Red Sea was at its peak.
Houthi rebels in Yemen had been firing on worldwide vessels, forcing marine site visitors to keep away from one of the world’s most important waterways and to sail hundreds of miles round Africa as a substitute. By August, they sank two ships and killed a number of crew members, as US and UK strikes failed to discourage them.
Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, then the No. 2 at US Central Command, wanted to see the drawback for himself.
Cooper, who was in cost of developing with a plan to fight the Houthis, knew the waters nicely as former commander of the Navy’s Fifth Fleet primarily based in Bahrain, stated Dan Shapiro, who labored at the Defense Department on Middle East Affairs. Experiencing the drawback firsthand meant that Cooper could be inserting himself beneath the command of officers far junior to himself.
“Rather than just take in the reports of the commanders of those vessels, he went out and sailed with them. He put himself in harm’s way,” Shapiro instructed NCS. “It says something about his understanding of the connection between the real-time details on the ground and the strategy.”
Two years later, Cooper, now an admiral, is in cost of Central Command, or CENTCOM, which is main the joint US-Israeli war effort against Iran. The day earlier than Donald Trump gave the order to launch the operation on February 28, Cooper briefed the president at the White House on navy choices.
But as the war expands throughout the area, with Iran attacking US property, Gulf neighbors and business vessels, the endgame has turn out to be much less and much less clear. And the stakes have risen significantly.
Like generals Norman Schwarzkopf and David Petraeus, CENTCOM commanders who oversaw earlier US war efforts in the Middle East, Cooper is beneath immense stress to ship a decisive battlefield victory. But he’s additionally been requested to execute a war plan in opposition to Iran that has existed inside the Pentagon in some form or type for years. Past presidents in the end selected to not perform these plans — partially as a result of of the repercussions now unfolding.
US CENTCOM launched video it says exhibits strikes on Kharg Island
Markets are roiled by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most important power delivery lane. Thirteen American service members have been killed, with one other 140 wounded. And bipartisan lawmakers are urgent for solutions on what led the US to strike an Iranian girls’ school that killed 168 kids.
It’s now as much as Cooper to maintain the navy marketing campaign on monitor till a political choice is made to finish it — nonetheless lengthy that will take.
Sources who’ve labored carefully with Cooper say he’s significantly well-equipped for this second — not simply as a consequence of his battlefield acumen but additionally as a result of of his political instincts, having realized to navigate each the contested waters of the Middle East and the corridors of energy in Washington. A spokesperson for CENTCOM stated Cooper was not accessible to be interviewed for this story.
But interviews with present and former navy officers, protection officers, lawmakers and congressional aides reveal that over a naval profession spanning greater than three a long time, Cooper has proved efficient each in his interactions with lawmakers in Congress who oversaw his budgets in addition to together with his allied counterparts in the Middle East.
That was very true of the Israel Defense Forces now collectively conducting navy operations with the US in opposition to Iran.
“After five years in the region, I don’t believe there was a general in Israel who did not know him,” a present Israeli navy official instructed NCS of Cooper’s tenure main the Navy’s Fifth Fleet. Cooper visited Israel so many instances that he got here to know many Israeli colonels by title, too, the official stated.
Cooper has spoken virtually every day — and typically a number of instances a day — with the Israeli navy chief, Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, the Israeli official stated.
In a rarity for a navy officer, Cooper additionally joined Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and US envoy Steve Witkoff final month for indirect diplomatic talks with Iran in Oman. Kushner and Witkoff visited the USS Abraham Lincoln plane service the following day at Cooper’s invitation.
Since taking on in August 2025, two months after US strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, Cooper is simply the second Navy admiral to steer CENTCOM.
Officials say he’s a distinction to his predecessor, retired Army Gen. Michael “Erik” Kurilla, who had a giant and at-times brash persona however largely most popular to remain behind the scenes, whereas Cooper is extra comfy in the highlight.
Kurilla, whose navy profession included commanding particular operations forces, holds a virtually mythological standing in components of the Army as a consequence of his time in fight, together with a deployment to Iraq when he was shot a number of instances however continued combating. An imposing determine and persona, “nobody wondered who was in charge” when Kurilla was in a room, a former protection official instructed NCS.
Kurilla was a “brilliant operator,” the official added. But Cooper — smaller in stature and extra soft-spoken, with a profession largely spent serving aboard US Navy ships — appears to have eased into the extra political points of his job quicker than Kurilla ever did, the official stated.
“He’s a politician, he shakes hands, seems genuinely interested in whatever you’re talking about, remember’s people’s names — he’s got the four-star piece figured out way better than Kurilla,” the former official stated.
Under Cooper, CENTCOM’s messaging has turn out to be in some methods extra political, with extra references to Trump in press releases and movies, the former official stated. His language additionally seems at instances to echo that of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth: In a message to service members as operations in opposition to Iran started, Cooper instructed troops to be “relentlessly lethal,” a time period steadily utilized by Hegseth and his crew in the Pentagon.
“He’s a people pleaser. You can see it when he testifies — he has this kind of Alabama ‘aw shucks’ demeanor,” the former protection official instructed NCS.
After the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel in 2023, Kurilla and Cooper labored carefully collectively as the war in Gaza unfolded.
“Erik and Brad were a tremendous team during perhaps one of the most challenging periods the Middle East had ever seen,” stated Brett McGurk, former White House coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, who labored extensively with Cooper throughout the Biden administration.
“History has not yet recorded the true story of what we confronted during this period, with Iran opening fronts across the Middle East, attacking American personnel in Iraq, Syria, Jordan and American ships in the Red Sea,” stated McGurk, now a NCS world affairs analyst.
In an announcement to NCS, Hegseth stated Cooper “has my full and complete confidence” and that Cooper’s “deep understanding of the region and focus on the fight is critical to the mission and continued success of our warfighters supporting Operation Epic Fury today.”
Hegseth stated the present operation wouldn’t have been potential with out the “total success” of final summer time’s strikes on Iran’s nuclear amenities, overseen by Kurilla. “Under both commanders, CENTCOM has strengthened coordination with key regional partners, while keeping our forces focused on defeating threats and protecting American interests,” Hegseth stated.
As Kurilla ready to retire, the former protection official stated he lobbied for Cooper to get the job, telling Trump instantly that Cooper ought to take over as the subsequent CENTCOM commander regardless of different names being floated. And Trump, who revered Kurilla, took his suggestion to coronary heart, the former official added.
The son of a profession Army officer, Cooper graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1989. He studied worldwide relations at Harvard and Tufts and acquired a grasp’s diploma in strategic intelligence from the National Intelligence University.
Cooper’s profession contains stints main instructions primarily based in Japan, South Korea and Bahrain, the place he held a number of instructions earlier than main the Navy’s Fifth Fleet.
In Washington, he served as an govt and navy assistant at the White House, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and was head of the Navy’s legislative affairs workplace.
As a navy assistant in the White House beneath Barack Obama, Cooper was in cost of an initiative championed by then-first girl Michelle Obama to safe jobs and training for veterans as the president wound down US troop presence in Iraq.
The Navy legislative affairs job put Cooper in contact with congressional committees that now oversee the US war in Iran — and any supplemental spending requests to fund it. It’s a job that’s useful for senior commanders to study to navigate the “political” waters of Washington, stated retired Rep. Mac Thornberry, a Texas Republican who chaired the House Armed Services Committee.
“Any of our combatant commanders are going to make decisions that will receive a lot of scrutiny. The Leg (Affairs) job helps sensitize them to some of those factors,” Thornberry stated. “Plus, obviously, it helps them see firsthand where their funding comes from.”
Cooper started assembly extra lawmakers when he took over the Fifth Fleet. A House Democrat lively on navy points praised Cooper as “smart and thoughtful,” pointing to an progressive job power he led utilizing drones in the Strait of Hormuz.
“He’s known as a straight shooter,” a Democratic congressional aide instructed NCS. “I think generally folks on the Hill enjoy him as a person, but in our experience he’s also a professional, very forthcoming.”
For years, Cooper has had a deep connection to Israel — one which comes “from his heart,” based on a former senior Israeli navy official who has labored carefully with him.
That relationship dates to Cooper’s time as the commander of the Fifth Fleet.
“There was unprecedented cooperation with the Israeli navy,” the former Israeli navy official stated. “One of the main decisions made at the time was to place an American liaison officer in the Israeli navy and an Israeli liaison officer at the naval base in Manama, which shows the extent of the partnership.”
The former official stated Cooper organized conferences between the navies in the area and linked the naval commanders to create a “regional maritime watch against terrorism.”
Cooper’s relationship with Israel goes past the skilled. In November, he spoke at the funeral of Israeli American hostage Omer Neutra, whose stays had been launched by Hamas after two years of war in Gaza. “Omer made the ultimate sacrifice we hope no soldier ever has to make, but many have made it nonetheless, in service to a higher cause,” Cooper stated.
After Iran first launched ballistic missiles and drones at Israel in April 2024, Kurilla raced round the Middle East, establishing a regional missile protection community between nations that didn’t all have diplomatic relations with Israel.
When Cooper was promoted to the head of CENTCOM final August, he picked up the place Kurilla left off, officers instructed NCS, deepening the relationships his predecessor had seeded.
He carried out his personal debriefing of the US and Israeli operations in opposition to Iran final June, the Israeli navy official stated, as he remained in contact together with his predecessor. The official stated the two nations started to determine tips on how to “collaborate and coordinate” in the occasion of one other spherical, sharing classes realized and exploring regional situations.
The discussions set the stage for final month’s joint US-Israeli assault on Iran.
“It helps that you have the same spirit and nothing changes in a dramatic fashion,” an Israeli navy official stated, “and that the commander continues in the path of the earlier commander.