“We’ve been told that the killing in Iran is stopping—it’s stopped—it’s stopping,” U.S. President Donald Trump said on Jan. 14 in widely reported remarks to reporters at the White House. “And there’s no plan for executions, or an execution, or execution—so I’ve been told that on good authority.” Trump said that he had received the information from “very important sources on the other side” and that he would “find out” later if it was accurate. He did not disclose who had provided the account.
When asked on Jan. 14 whether military action was now off the table, Mr. Trump replied:, “We’re going to watch and see what the process is, but we were given a very good statement by people that are aware of what’s going on.” He did not say what the statement said or who the people were. The New York Times noted that Trump’s remarks could be interpreted as Trump taking a step back from any imminent plans for attack. But in June, right before the U.S. military conducted airstrikes on three nuclear sites in Iran, Trump issued a statement that said he would make a decision “within the next two weeks.” In reality, he had largely made up his mind by then to strike.
Unnamed sources told NBC News that if the U.S. decides on military action against Iran, Trump wants it to be decisive but that the Pentagon couldn’t guarantee that. Trump had reportedly told his national security team that he would want any U.S. military action in Iran to deliver a swift and decisive blow to the regime and not spark a sustained war that dragged on for weeks or months, NBC News’ sources said. “If he does something, he wants it to be definitive,” said one source.
But Trump’s advisors have so far not been able to guarantee to him that the regime would quickly collapse after an American military strike, sources familiar with the discussions said, and there is concern that the U.S. may not have all the assets in the region it would need to guard against what administration officials expect would be an aggressive Iranian response.
