{"id":454589,"date":"2026-03-03T02:42:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T02:42:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/454589\/"},"modified":"2026-03-03T02:42:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T02:42:09","slug":"trump-says-iran-war-to-last-four-to-five-weeks-but-could-go-far-longer-donald-trump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/454589\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump says Iran war to last four to five weeks but could go \u2018far longer\u2019 | Donald Trump"},"content":{"rendered":"

Donald Trump has laid out four goals<\/a> in Iran and said the US campaign had been projected to last four to five weeks but could \u201cgo far longer than that\u201d.<\/p>\n

On Monday, the US president offered his most extensive comments yet about the war, going beyond two video messages<\/a> and a series of brief phone interviews with reporters that offered sometimes conflicting objectives.<\/p>\n

But Trump undercut the gravity of his remarks by abruptly pivoting to tout his plans for a new White House ballroom<\/a>, boasting that it would be the \u201cmost beautiful ballroom in the world\u201d, coming in \u201cunder budget\u201d and \u201cahead of schedule\u201d for \u201c$400m or less\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"DonaldDonald Trump makes comment on White House drapes and ballroom during medal ceremony<\/p>\n

The banging of construction work on the ballroom was audible at a Medal of Honor ceremony in the East Room, where the president sought to justify Saturday\u2019s intervention<\/a>, which killed Iran\u2019s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and mocked criticisms that he was likely to get \u201cbored\u201d and move on.<\/p>\n

Trump said he had ordered the attack on Iran<\/a> to thwart Tehran\u2019s nuclear development and a ballistic missile programme that was \u201cgrowing rapidly and dramatically\u201d and \u201cposed a very clear, colossal threat to America and our forces stationed overseas\u201d.<\/p>\n

The president asserted without evidence that Iran \u201cwould soon have had missiles capable of reaching our beautiful America\u201d \u2013 a claim disputed by national security experts. Trump added that other countries backed US efforts to stop Iran pursuing a nuclear weapon but \u201cthey just didn\u2019t have the courage to say so\u201d.<\/p>\n

The president then took aim at his predecessor and rival. \u201cI was very proud to have knocked out the Iran nuclear deal<\/a> by President Barack Hussein Obama,\u201d he said. \u201cThat was a horrible, horrible, dangerous document. They would have had nuclear weapons three years ago and they would have used them. But I\u2019ll not let that happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump said the Iranian regime had a history of attacking the US and killing Americans, including through roadside bombs. \u201cThis was our last best chance to strike \u2013 what we\u2019re doing right now \u2013 and eliminate the intolerable threats posed by this sick and sinister regime.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said the objectives of the war included destroying Iran\u2019s missile capabilities, annihilating their navy and stopping from them from having a nuclear weapon. Trump said a third objective was a longstanding US goal, to prevent Iran from supporting militant groups elsewhere in the region.<\/p>\n

The president noted the loss of four American service personnel in the fight so far, adding: \u201cIn their memory, we continue this mission with ferocious, unyielding resolve to crush the threat this terrorist regime poses to the American people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump continued: \u201cWe\u2019re already substantially ahead of our time projections, but whatever the time is, it\u2019s OK, whatever it takes, we will always and we have from right from the beginning.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe projected four to five weeks but we have capability to go far longer than that. We\u2019ll do it \u2026 Somebody actually said, from the media, I think you\u2019ll get bored after about a week or two. No, we don\u2019t get bored. I never get bored, if I got bored, I wouldn\u2019t be standing here right now. I guarantee you that. To go through what I had to go through.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ceremony bestowed the Medal of Honor to three service members, including staff sergeant Michael Ollis, who died in Afghanistan. But it was Trump\u2019s ballroom comments that caused a stir on social media.<\/p>\n

Susan Glasser, a staff writer at the New Yorker, posted on <\/a>X: \u201cBragging about his \u2018beautiful ballroom\u2019 while he\u2019s supposed to be explaining the somber decision to go to war. It\u2019s one of the most politically tone deaf things I\u2019ve ever seen from a POTUS, including this one\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Donald Trump has laid out four goals in Iran and said the US campaign had been projected to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":454590,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-454589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=454589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454589\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/454590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=454589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=454589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=454589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}