US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that the United States would launch a “very powerful” attack on Iran if a peace agreement could not be reached.
“We will attack them, and it will be very, very hard,” Trump told reporters at the White House, referring to Iran’s downing of an Apache helicopter in the Strait of Hormuz.
Regarding the negotiations with Iran, Trump added, "We want a meaningful agreement; we want an agreement that can work." He stated that Iran had already agreed not to acquire nuclear weapons, but the agreement still needed to be signed.
Earlier on Wednesday, Trump said that Iran had taken too long to negotiate an agreement to end the war in the Middle East, and now it must “pay the price.”
“The dictator of the Middle East is dead!” Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social platform. “They took too long to negotiate a deal that would have been in their best interest, and now they have to pay the price!”
He stated that “the Iranian army is in a state of utter chaos. Most of it, such as the navy and air force, no longer exists… They have been utterly defeated.”
This announcement contradicts Trump's statements to reporters on Tuesday, when he said that negotiations for a permanent settlement to end the war were in their "final stages" and could be completed in "two or three days."
In a related context, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Wednesday that it would be unwise for Iran to challenge the United States any further, after Washington carried out nighttime airstrikes in response to the downing of a US Apache helicopter.
“At the moment, these are defensive strikes to ensure the protection of our people,” Hegseth added, during a visit to the US base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. “And again, it would be unwise for Iran to challenge us any further… President Trump is seeking an agreement, indeed a comprehensive agreement that is in the best interests of the American people, so that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon.”
Late Tuesday, US forces announced they had launched strikes on Iran in response to the downing of a US helicopter on Monday, with reports of explosions along the Islamic Republic's southern coast, according to Iranian media.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) later announced that U.S. air and naval forces had attacked command, control, defense, and surveillance centers. Iran announced that it had retaliated by attacking U.S. bases in Jordan, Bahrain, and Kuwait on Wednesday.
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