Hegseth says most intense U.S. strikes coming

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Tuesday said, “Today will be, yet again, our most intense day of strikes inside Iran.”

“Iran stands alone, and they are badly losing on Day 10 of Operation Epic Fury,” Hegseth said at a press conference at the Pentagon with Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Hegseth said that in the past 24 hours, the United States had seen “Iran fire the lowest number of missiles they’ve been capable of firing yet,” even as he condemned Iran for attacking its Gulf neighbors, some of whom it had been allied with in the past, without provocation from those nations.

He vowed the U.S. would send “the most fighters, the most bombers, the most strikes” against Iran on Tuesday to press to accomplish three military objectives.

Those objectives, he said, are destroying Iran’s missile stockpiles and ability to make missiles; “destroy their Navy;” and “permanently deny Iran nuclear weapons forever.”

“We’re crushing the enemy in an overwhelming display of technical skill and military force,” he said. “We will not relent until the enemy is totally and decisively defeated.”

But he also said that the Trump administration would not become bogged down in so-called nation-building efforts, like ones by the Bush and Obama administrations in Iraq and Afghanistan during wars there.

Hegseth’s aggressive and confident comments echoed those made a day earlier by President Donald Trump to reporters at his Miami-area golf club.

Trump had predicted that the war would end “very soon,” because the destruction of Iranian military assets was happening much fast than he expected when attacks began by the United States and Israel on Feb. 28.

He also warned Iran’s ruling regime against withholding oil from world markets after the war.

“If Iran does anything that stops the flow of Oil within the Strait of Hormuz, they will be hit by the United States of America TWENTY TIMES HARDER than they have been hit thus far,” Trump wrote later Monday night in a Truth Social post. 

Hegseth, who initially had predicted that the war could last between three to eight weeks, told reporters on Tuesday that Trump now “gets to control the throttle” for the pace of the war, adding that the president is “the one deciding … when we’re achieving particular objectives.”

“And so it’s not for me to posit whether it’s the beginning, the middle, or the end,” Hegseth said. “That’s his, and he’ll continue to communicate that.”

As Hegseth spoke, authorities in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, confirmed that a drone attack by Iran had ignited a fire at the oil refinery in the Ruwais Industrial Complex. No injuries were immediately reported.

Trump told Fox News in an interview on Monday evening that he is “not happy” that Iran picked Mojtaba Khamenei as its new supreme leader, to succeed his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed at the beginning of the war.

“I don’t believe he can live in peace,” Trump said of Mojtaba Khamenei.

Trump also told Fox that “it’s possible” he would be willing to speak with Iran’s leaders.

“I’m hearing they want to talk badly,” he said.

At his news conference on Tuesday, Hegseth said of Khamenei, “He would be wise to heed our president and not pursue nuclear weapons.”