US military ready to 'strike Iran' as jets head to area after Trump's eerie threat
The president has not yet indicated whether he has made a decision on strikes as US forces build up in the region
The US military is ready to 'strike Iran' as the US Air Force moves planes into the region.
Reports have said that potential strikes could happen this weekend, though it appears that Donald Trump has not yet made a final decision on ordering a strike.
Multiple news outlets, including the New York Times, CBS News and CNN, have cited unnamed sources claiming that the US is ready for strikes as soon as the weekend.
However, Reuters has information from an unnamed senior US official which suggests a longer timeline, with sufficient military forces ready by mid-March.
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Trump has made repeated demands to Iran that it cease its nuclear program, and has threatened the use of force if the Islamic Republic does not comply.
However, the precise timeline remains unclear, as White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt did not answer a question about any deadline that Trump had issued to Iran to reach a deal in a press conference on Wednesday (February 18).
She said: “Iran would be very wise to make a deal with President Trump."
Leavitt went on to say that Trump's administration 'totally obliterated Iran’s nuclear facilities', and that the 'first option' would be 'diplomacy'.
The press secretary went on to say that talks in Geneva had nonetheless seen a 'little bit of progress', but 'we're still very far apart on some issues'.
CBS News has reported that the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier group is already present in the region.
Meanwhile, it is understood that a second carrier group with the USS Gerald Ford is also on its way, and open-source researchers and vessel tracking data suggested it was off the coast of West Africa as of Wednesday.
Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei took to social media on Tuesday (February 17), sharing an AI-generated image of the ship in a grave with the caption: “More dangerous than that warship is the weapon that can send that warship to the bottom of the sea.”
Iran has also announced that it is carrying out military drills alongside Russia in the Strait of Hormuz.
The strait is a strategically important location between Iran's south coast and the United Arab Emirates which could be used to control access to the the Persian Gulf.
Trump has previously ordered strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities last summer, with the US president saying this week: "We could have had a deal instead of sending the B-2s [US stealth bombers] in to knock out their nuclear potential."
He added: "And we had to send the B-2s."
Topics: News, US News, World News, Iran, Donald Trump, Politics
Kit Roberts