- Donald Trump launched Operation Stunning Fury against Iran with multiple termination scenarios.
- He says it will take Iran several years to recover from the attacks.
- Trump identified the failure of nuclear negotiations with Iran as the main reason for the attacks.
American president Donald Trump he told the Axios server that he has several “points of departure” from Operation “Epic Fury” (Epic Fury), which the US and Israel launched in Iran on Saturday, reports TASR.
“I can run it for a long time and take control of it all, or I can end it in two or three days and say to the Iranians, ‘I’ll see you again in a few years if you start rebuilding’ (your nuclear and missile programs).” Trump said in a five-minute phone interview with Axios. “In any case, it will take several years for them to recover from this attack,” he stated.
Axios claims that these the statements of the US president indicate that he is still open to a diplomatic solution even after recent US-Iran nuclear talks failed to produce progress. A short operation followed by new ultimatums would be a significantly different outcome than the Iranian regime change that some US and Israeli officials have identified as the goal, according to Axios.
Trump is under pressure in the US – including from his informal MAGA movement – to avoid prolonged intervention in the Middle East. The head of the White House gave two main reasons for launching attacks in Iran, while the first was the failure of the aforementioned negotiations, which were conducted this week by his envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. “The Iranians got closer and then pulled back – they got closer and then pulled back. My understanding from that is that they don’t really want a deal,” he said.
The second reason was Iran’s actions over the past few decades. Trump said that while he was writing his speech announcing the Iran operation on Friday, he asked his team to compile all the attacks linked to Iran around the world over the past 25 years. “We saw that every month they did something bad, blew something up or killed someone,” stated.
According to the US president, Iran has begun to restore some of its nuclear facilities, which the US and Israel intervened during last year’s 12-day Israeli-Iranian war. Axios reports that independent analysts have pointed to construction activity at some of these sites, but have not concluded that Iran has resumed its nuclear activities.
Trump repeated several times that the decision to launch last year’s operation made the current operation possible. He claims that if it hadn’t attacked Iran’s nuclear facilities in June 2025, Iran could already have developed a nuclear weapon, making any attack impossible.
The US-Israeli plan for the operation, according to the US official, assumes that a massive bombing campaign will last at least five days. But Trump told Axios that that timeline could change depending on developments on the ground – including the fate of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was targeted in Saturday’s strikes along with other senior Iranian officials.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has since announced that there are indications that Khamenei is dead. Trump spoke with the Israeli prime minister on Saturday after the start of the joint operation. “I had a great conversation with Bibi – we’re on the same page,” he said, using the nickname Netanyahu. According to the statement of the spokeswoman of the White House, Karoline Leavitt Trump also spoke with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on Saturday and the leaders of Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
