The United States could end the month-old cease-fire and resume its attacks on Iran, President Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Tuesday, a day after Mr. Trump dismissed Tehran’s latest offer to end the war as “garbage.”
“We’re either going to make a deal or they’re going to be decimated,” Mr. Trump told reporters in Washington as he prepared to travel to Beijing for a summit with China’s top leader, Xi Jinping. “One way or the other, we win.”
Mr. Hegseth told a congressional hearing: “We have a plan to escalate, if necessary. We have a plan to retrograde, if necessary. We have a plan to shift assets.” He declined to provide details, saying it would not be appropriate in a nonclassified hearing.
Iran’s demands to end the war included U.S. war reparations, recognition of Iranian sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz and the end of American sanctions, the state broadcaster reported on Monday.
Mr. Trump dismissed that position and said the truce was “on massive life support.” Paying reparations and recognizing Iranian control of the strait would almost certainly be non-starters for the Trump administration, analysts said. Ending sanctions would be on the table only if Iran were willing to make major concessions on its nuclear program, they added.
With the truce on shaky ground, both sides seemed to be raising the stakes on Tuesday.
A spokesman for the Iranian Parliament’s national security committee, Ebrahim Rezaei, warned that Iran could enrich uranium to 90 percent purity, a level considered weapons grade, if it were attacked again. It was unclear how seriously Iran was considering such a move or how capable it was after the strikes on its nuclear sites, and Mr. Rezaei said only that Parliament could review the option.
