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US President Donald Trump said that country would impose major new sanctions on Iran on Monday, days after he abruptly called off a plan for airstrikes against the Islamic Republic based on the concept of proportionality after Iran shot down a US Navy drone.
The sanctions move, announced on Twitter with no additional detail, came as Trump spent the day at the Camp David presidential retreat having meetings and phone calls. The president foreshadowed the sanctions action earlier, in remarks at the White House.
Trump tweeted on Saturday:
Iran cannot have Nuclear Weapons! Under the terrible Obama plan, they would have been on their way to Nuclear in a short number of years, and existing verification is not acceptable. We are putting major additional Sanctions on Iran on Monday. I look forward to the day that Sanctions come off Iran, and they become a productive and prosperous nation again - The sooner the better!
Military action 'always on the table'
Trump told reporters he intended to impose additional economic sanctions and that military action is “always on the table until we get this solved” and that if Iran’s leadership “behaves badly, it’s going to be a very bad day for them.”
He also said that having the Strait of Hormuz open to shipping is less important to the US because of its large domestic oil production, and benefits China, Japan, Indonesia and other countries much more.
“We’ll see with Iran,” he said. “Everyone was saying I’m a warmonger and now they’re saying I’m a dove.” Instead, Trump offered, he is “a man with common sense.”
'I don't want to kill Iranians'
“I don’t want to kill 150 Iranians” unless it’s absolutely necessary, said Trump, expressing a fondness for Iranian people he’s known in New York. “Anything’s a lot when they shoot down an unmanned drone,” in terms of casualties.
Trump also said that Iran “had a plane in their sights, 38 people on the plane and they didn’t shoot it down. That was a very wise decision.”
That appeared to confirm a comment Friday by an Iranian Revolutionary Guard general that a manned US spy plane was flying near the drone on Thursday but that Iran chose not to target it. The US military’s Central Command hadn’t previously commented on the possible manned plane.
Trump praised General Joseph Dunford, who’s set to retire in October as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Dunford was against a military strike at this point, said Trump, who called him “a terrific man and a terrific general.”
Make Iran great again?
Regarding some of his more hawkish advisers, including National Security Adviser John Bolton, Trump said that having people on both sides of the debate is important but “the only one that matters is me.”
Echoing the types of comments he’s made about North Korea, Trump said he hoped he could “make Iran great again” over time.
“Iran right now is an economic mess,” he said.
Separately, Trump approved an offensive cyber strike Thursday night that disabled Iranian computer systems used for rocket and missile launches, the Washington Post reported citing people it didn’t identify. The cyber strikes against Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were carried out by US Cyber Command in coordination with US Central Command, the newspaper said.
Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif on Saturday sent a series of tweets with maps designed to show that the drone downed by Iran had been flying over its territorial waters, not international waters as the US has said.
That “hand-drawn map” isn’t credible, said Secretary of State Michael Pompeo, redoubling the US rhetorical hard line after Trump backed away from military action. The US “has shown beyond any doubt that Iran shot down a U.S. unmanned aircraft in international airspace,” Pompeo said.
