![\"Speaker](\"https:\/\/media.cnn.com\/api\/v1\/images\/stellar\/prod\/c-2026-03-02t223833z-1101705974-rc2mwjak3tw8-rtrmadp-3-iran-crisis-usa.jpg?c=original&q=w_1280,c_fill\/f_avif\")
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\n Speaker Mike Johnson on Monday stressed that the US operation Iran would be \u201climited in scope\u201d and \u201climited in objective,\u201d offering his first public remarks on Capitol Hill on the rapidly intensifying Middle East conflict.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cI think that operation will be wound up quickly, by God\u2019s grace it will,\u201d Johnson said in response to a question from CNN\u2019s Manu Raju, immediately after attending a classified \u201cGang of Eight\u201d briefing for top lawmakers on Capitol Hill.\n <\/p>\n
\n Johnson also said he believed that the joint US and Israeli strikes on Iran this weekend \u2014 which have since spilled into the wider region \u2014 did not amount to an official start of a war.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cIt\u2019s not a declaration of war,\u201d Johnson told reporters, arguing that strikes were \u201cdefensive in nature and in design.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n Johnson\u2019s remarks echoed earlier comments from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who stressed that the US operation was \u201cdefensive,\u201d arguing that Israel had planned to strike Iran \u2014 and would have triggered immediate retaliation against the US regardless.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cAnd if we had waited to respond before acting first, then those losses would have been far greater than if we had done what we did,\u201d Johnson said.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cIf the president, the commander chief, had not acted as he did, those same officials would have been hauled in here by members of Congress and asked them, Why in the world, they waited it,\u201d Johnson said, adding: \u201cI am convinced that they did the right thing.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n The speaker predicted that GOP leaders had the votes to stifle a Democratic-led war powers effort, which would amount to a major symbolic rebuke of the president\u2019s military push if it passed.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Speaker Mike Johnson on Monday stressed that the US operation Iran would be \u201climited in scope\u201d and \u201climited…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":500147,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":{"0":"post-500146","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-united-states-of-america","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","14":"tag-us","15":"tag-usa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500146","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=500146"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500146\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/500147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=500146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=500146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=500146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}