Washington – President Trump delivers an inaugural address to revive the country war in Iran Wednesday night, as he predicted that the moon operation will continue for several weeks and threatened to withdraw the US from NATO.
“Over the past four weeks, our troops have achieved quick, decisive, and dramatic victories on the battlefield,” the president said. “A victory like few have seen before.”
The President praised the destruction of Iran’s military and the country’s “significantly reduced” ability to launch missiles and drones. He said the “critical strategic objectives” of the war are “moving toward the edge,” which is sort of what the White House has been saying in recent days.
“In the history of wars, there has never been an enemy that has lost so many things in a few weeks,” he continued. “Our enemies are being defeated and America, as it has been five years under my leadership, is winning, and now it is winning more than ever.”
The president took a moment to recognize the 13 members of the U.S. “who have put their lives on the line in this fight to prevent our children from ever having to face a nuclear Iran.”
“We salute them now and we must honor them by completing the work they sacrificed their lives for,” he said.
The president reiterated an argument he made earlier: That without this intervention in Iran, “the most violent and violent regime in the world would be free to carry out its campaigns of terror, coercion, conquest and mass murder behind a nuclear shield.”
Mr. Trump also said there wouldn’t be “a Middle East and no Israelis right now” if he hadn’t ended the Obama-era Iran nuclear deal, and accused Iran of being “on the brink” of developing a nuclear weapon. The US intelligence community assessed last year that Iran did not have an active nuclear weapons program, and it did a few months away from converting its highly enriched uranium into a nuclear weapon if it chooses to do so.
“They also quickly built a large number of conventional missiles and soon they would have missiles that could reach America, Europe and anywhere else in the world,” he said.
Thirty-three days into Operation Epic Fury, the US is already halfway through the four-to-six week timeline the president and his administration had set for a joint US-Israel operation. The president told reporters this week that the US would withdraw from Iran in “two or three weeks,” potentially extending the military conflict beyond the six-week maximum, despite his insistence that war is premature. Mr. Trump said the war could end soon if the two sides reach an agreement.
A White House official told CBS News that the president will use Wednesday’s speech to reiterate his two-to-three-week timeline and “highlight the success of the U.S. military in achieving all of its stated objectives before the operation.” The official said the military’s performance is meeting or exceeding all its standards so far.
Nevertheless, hundreds of US Special Operations Forces and thousands of Marines and Army paratroopers are now in the Middle East, giving Mr. Trump more options for war on Iran if he chooses to expand the war, sources. he told CBS News earlier this week. If necessary, those forces could take part in operations to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, target Iran’s Kharg Island oil terminal or seize Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium.
Even if Mr. Trump, insisting that the main goal is to ensure that Iran never gets a nuclear weapon, told Reuters that he is not interested in Iran’s most enriched uranium stored in underground tunnels. If something is enriched, the the material can be used to get nuclear weapons, but it may need to hold such things dangerous US occupation. The American intelligence community assessed last year that Iran was not actively trying to build a nuclear bomb.
“That’s underground, I don’t care about that,” the president said of Iran’s enriched uranium, most of which is believed to be buried under debris from last summer’s US strikes. “We will always watch it via satellite.”
Mr. Trump said he would also address NATO allies in his Wednesday night speech, particularly his frustration with what he sees as their failure to help the US open the Strait of Hormuz, which normally carries one-fifth of the world’s oil. Iran’s successful closure of the strait disrupted oil supplies and sent prices skyrocketing.
The president said he is “absolutely” considering withdrawing the US from the alliance created after World War II, in response to the allies’ decision not to help the US in this crisis.
He told CBS News White House correspondent Weijia Jiang on Tuesday that he is not ready “just yet” to give up his efforts to force Iran to open the road to all shipping traffic. The president said other countries that rely on Middle Eastern oil “should come in and take care of it.”
“Iran has been reduced, but they will have to come in and do their own work,” he said.
At the beginning of the war, Mr. Trump has suggested he may escalate attacks on Iran and target the country’s energy infrastructure if it does not allow ships to sail freely through the Strait of Hormuz.
Meanwhile, the war abroad affects prices at home at a time when Americans look at the economy like struggling with the fear that war will make that worse. Average price of a gallon of gas in the US exceeded $4 this week for the first time in almost four years. The price of diesel has also increased, and good prices for consumers are likely to increase with it.
A CBS News poll from last month shows that most Americans are not sold on the Iran war, with 60% disapproving of the US taking military action in Iran and 67% saying they are not willing to pay for more gas during the conflict, even though most Republicans support the war.
Asked about the increase in fuel prices, Mr. Trump said on Tuesday: “All I have to do is leave Iran, and we’re going to do that very soon, and they’re going to go down.”
