Esper Says ‘Most Believe’ Beirut Explosion Was an Accident

(Bloomberg) -- U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper, asked about Tuesday's deadly explosion in Beirut, said that “most believe it was an accident as reported.”

He didn't elaborate, but Esper's comment Wednesday to the annual Aspen National Security conference was at odds with President Donald Trump's observation the day before that U.S. military officials “seem to think it was an attack. It was a bomb of some kind.”

The explosion killed at least 100 people and wounded thousands more. Authorities blamed a quantity of ammonium nitrate equivalent to 1,800 tons of TNT that had been stored at the port, without saying what triggered the blast.

The ammonium nitrate was unloaded from the cargo ship Rhosus in 2014, according to two letters issued by the director general of Lebanese Customs. For reasons that are unclear, dockworkers unloaded the chemical, which can be used to make fertilizers and explosives, and put it into storage.

Read More: Lebanon Officials Ignored Warnings on Chemical Tied to Blast

Lebanon is “struggling right now in a number of ways, and it's a shame to see it happen,” Esper said. “When you see the video, it's just devastating.”

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