The White House and the US Department of Defense are considering sending at least 10,000 additional troops to the Middle East in the coming days, the Wall Street Journal and the news website Axios reported today.
The goal is for US President Donald Trump to have more military options, the WSJ noted, citing Defense Department officials, as the Republican extended by 10 days the ultimatum he has issued to Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz.
This force, which will likely include infantry and armored vehicles, will be added to the approximately 5,000 Marines and thousands of paratroopers of the 82nd Airborne Division already deployed in the area, the WSJ reported.
«We don't know exactly where the forces will be deployed in the Middle East, but they will obviously be within striking distance of Iran and the island of Hargh, a key centre for oil exports off the Iranian coast,» the newspaper noted.
«This is a new indication that serious preparations are being made for a US ground operation in Iran», Axios pointed out.
A senior US defence official, quoted by Axios, expects that the decision to send additional troops will be taken next week, and noted that these troops will be from different combat units than those already deployed in the region.
According to Axios, the Pentagon is developing military options for a «final blow» to Iran, which may include the use of ground forces and a massive bombing campaign.
Trump has not yet decided whether to pursue any of these scenarios, the news site notes, but sources say he is ready for an escalation if the talks with Iran do not yield tangible results soon.
D. Trump extended the duration of his visit to Iran - The Hormuz Strait on the G7 menu
Donald Trump has extended for another six days the duration of his ultimatum to Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz because otherwise he will order the bombing of its energy infrastructure, assuring that the talks with Tehran - which was bombed by the Israeli air force early this morning - are «going very well».
His government's diplomatic chief Marco Rubio arrived in France today, an AFP reporter noted, for the second day of the G7, during which he is expected to put pressure on his counterparts to help open the Strait of Hormuz in the midst of the war.
To ensure unimpeded passage through this key sea route for the global hydrocarbon trade, the Republican president has threatened to destroy power plants in Iran «starting with the largest».
But «at the request of the Iranian government,» he said, he extended the duration of his ultimatum ’until Monday, April 6, until 20:00« (Washington time; 03:00 on Tuesday, April 7, Greece time) before ordering the destruction of power plants in Iran, he announced yesterday.
The new postponement somewhat stabilized oil prices, which fell slightly today. The price of a barrel of North Sea Brent, a benchmark variety on international markets, fell by around $107 - though remaining over 40% more expensive than on the eve of the war.
To the great satisfaction of US President Trump, Iran, according to him, allows ’ten ships« a day to pass through the Strait of Hormuz.
For days now, the US president seems to have been pendulum swinging, on the one hand threatening to hit the Islamic Republic «harder than ever» and on the other assuring that the armed conflict will end very soon.
«The talks (with Iran) are going on and, despite what the fake news media says (...) they are going very well’, Donald Trump claimed via Truth Social, still insisting that Tehran wants more than him to negotiate to end the war.
Tehran, on the other hand, continues to refuse to use the term «talks». According to an unnamed Tasnim news agency source, Iran has transmitted «officially» and «through intermediaries» a response to the 15-point plan proposed by the US.
It has set its own conditions for silencing the guns and is now waiting for «a retaliation from the other side».
In anticipation, the Revolutionary Guards announced in the early hours of the morning that they had attacked with missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles against military and energy targets in Israel and Gulf States, according to the Iranian news agency FARS.
«In the heart of Tehran»
Tomorrow, Saturday, the war completes its first month; it broke out with the joint US-Israeli attack on Iran on 28 February, before spreading throughout the Middle East, adding to the atmosphere of concern about the consequences for the world economy and for oil and gas supplies.
While Washington seems to be looking for a diplomatic door out of the war, Israel does not cease to stress its determination to intensify its operations - today it bombed again, almost simultaneously, the capitals of Iran and Lebanon.
The Israeli army announced in the early hours of the morning that it had launched «a wave of large-scale strikes targeting the Iranian terrorist regime's infrastructure in the heart of Tehran», while shortly before that, powerful explosions were heard in the south of Beirut, the Lebanese capital, an area which Israel considers to be a stronghold of the Shiite Hezbollah movement, which is close to Iran.
Lebanon was dragged into war on March 2 with the Hezbollah attack in retaliation for the assassination of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and is paying a very heavy price, with over 1,100 dead and over a million uprooted, according to official figures.
Israel has so far been silent on the talks allegedly taking place between the US and Iran, via Pakistan, to end the war.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's decision by his army to wage simultaneous wars in Iran and Lebanon has no longer secured the opposition's consensus, with opposition leader Yair Lapid criticising operations «without strategy, without the necessary means and with too few soldiers».
Israeli army spokesman Effie Defrin acknowledged last night that the units need «additional forces».
