The estimated 10,200 additional troops will join the 50,000 American personnel that the Pentagon has said are already involved in the Iran war
The fragile ceasefire announced on April 7 is currently slated to expire next Tuesday(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
The Pentagon is reportedly shipping thousands of additional troops to the Middle East in the coming days despite a statement from President Donald Trump earlier this week that said the Iran war is “very close to being over.”
About 6,000 service members will arrive in the region aboard the USS George H.W. Bush and a number of escort warships, with about 4,200 others Marine Corps members expected to follow near the end of the month, U.S. officials told The Washington Post. The troops’ arrival appears to align with the end of the fragile two-week ceasefire on April 22, and serves as a source of mounting pressure on Iran as the Trump administration weighs the possibility of more strikes or ground operations.
“I think it’s close to over, yeah,” Trump told FOX Business in an interview on “Mornings with Maria” this week. “I view it as very close to being over.”
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The continuing build up of troops in the Middle East has been characterized by White House officials and outside experts as a reserve measure for the chance that negotiations with Iran and the expiring ceasefire goes wrong, according to the Post.
Asked about the growing military presence this week, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that Trump “has wisely kept all options on the table in the event that the Iranians will not forgo their nuclear ambitions and make a deal that is acceptable to the United States.”
“Unlike the Americans who are afraid of continuous war, we are fully prepared and familiar with a long war,” an Iranian military adviser reportedly said(Image: US NAVY/AFP via Getty Images)
They will join the estimated 50,000 American personnel that the Pentagon has said are already involved in the Iran war.
The newly appointed military adviser to Iran’s supreme leader on Wednesday said he does not support extending the two-week ceasefire, according to Iranian state media.
“We are subject to the decisions of the relevant officials, but personally I do not agree to extend the ceasefire,” said Mohsen Rezaei, formerly a commander in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps who now advises Mojtaba Khamenei on military affairs, Iranian state media reported.
Rezaei also urged officials to be more cautious than they had been before in negotiations over economic matters with the U.S., The Associated Press reported.
The newly appointed military adviser to Iran’s supreme leader reportedly said he does not support extending the two-week ceasefire(Image: DVIDS/AFP via Getty Images)
He said Iran was setting the preconditions in the next round of talks, not the U.S.
“Unlike the Americans who are afraid of continuous war, we are fully prepared and familiar with a long war,” he said, according to the report.
Leavitt meanwhile said the U.S. had not “formally requested an extension of the ceasefire” with Iran. The ceasefire announced on April 7 is currently slated to expire next Tuesday.
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“At this moment, we remain very much engaged, in these negotiations, in these talks,” Leavitt said, adding that there are “discussions” about more talks being held in person “but nothing is official until you hear it from us here at the White House.”
She said that the possible next rounds of talks “would very likely” be in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad as they were previously.
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