WASHINGTON/GAZA – US President Donald Trump said Monday that the US remains committed to reaching a nuclear agreement with Iran but warned that Washington is prepared to use military force if diplomacy fails, insisting Tehran must never acquire a nuclear weapon.
“We’re either going to make a deal or we’re going to finish the job. Okay, and it won’t be tough to finish the job. I’d rather make a deal, because I don’t want to affect 91 million people,” Trump told reporters at the White House.
Trump said the US has the capability to strike Iran’s infrastructure if necessary.
“We can knock down their bridges in one hour, we can knock out their energy supply … They don’t have any money now. We haven’t given them any money.”
The president again ruled out Tehran having nuclear weapons.
“Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. I’m not looking for regime change,” he added.
Later, speaking at a Rose Garden Club Lunch at the White House, Trump said recent US military operations had weakened Iran’s military capabilities and again urged Tehran to reach an agreement.
“We wiped out their navy, their air force, their radar, their leaders. We wiped out everybody,” Trump said. “And then I heard they’re doing very well. No, they’re not doing well at all.”
Iran wants to make a deal “so badly,” Trump said.: “We’ll see what happens. They have to make the right deal, because they cannot have a nuclear weapon.”
“We’ll see what happens. We’re gonna win one way or the other. We’ll win the nice way or the not nice way.”
Trump’s remarks came after indirect US-Iran talks concluded last week without any public indication of progress toward a broader agreement, despite a 60-day ceasefire intended to provide space for diplomacy following the conflict that began with US and Israeli strikes on Iran on Feb. 28.
US President Donald Trump also says Iran has offered concessions in the nuclear talks, before admitting that those proposals aren’t final. “We’ve gotten concessions, now they have to hold [to] those concessions,” Trump tells reporters in the Oval Office.
Trump insists that the US will be allowed to extract Iran’s stockpiles of highly enriched uranium, even though Tehran has never confirmed agreeing to that.
The US president then goes on to insist that the goal of the war was never to collapse the Iranian regime, even though on the first night of the operation, he called on Iranians to take over their government once the US-Israeli bombing campaign ceased.
Talks between the US and Iran aren’t currently taking place, as the sides agreed to pause for the week of the slain supreme leader Ali Khamenei’s funeral proceedings.
“I’d rather make a deal because I don’t want to affect 91 million people,” he adds, noting that he has held off on targeting much of Iran’s civilian infrastructure but could decide to do so if deemed necessary.
