During a portion of an interview aired on Tuesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Special Report,” President Donald Trump said that the objectives of ensuring Iran doesn’t have a nuclear weapon, keeping the Strait of Hormuz open, and degrading Iran’s military are “completed” and strikes on Iran will “continue until I say that’s enough.”
Fox News Chief Foreign Correspondent Trey Yingst asked, “So, your objectives are to ensure that Iran never has a nuclear weapon, to keep the Strait open, and to degrade the Iranian military. Can those objectives be completed in an air campaign alone or does this require a ground component?”
Trump responded, “I think they’re completed now, honestly. If we left right now, it would take them 20 years to rebuild what they have. The only way you can negotiate with these people is through strength, and the only strength is military strength, and that’s what we’ve done. And, literally, two days ago, we had a deal, and then they broke it at the last moment. They broke it.”
Yingst followed up, “Will these strikes continue?”
Trump answered, “They’ll continue until I say that’s enough. They’ll continue. They’ve been — the word the military likes to use is degrade. They’ve been degraded to a very low level, and they have fight. It’s like a great boxer, you think you have him beat, and then, all of a sudden, he comes back and he gives you a shot. They have some fight left, but they don’t have much, and their weapon degrading has been incredible at a level, nobody thought it was possible to do it this quickly.”
Trump also stated that he thinks the war will end with Iran being forced into signing a deal, but he’s also unsure if they will make a deal.
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