U.S. President Donald Trump has ordered a “massive” U.S. naval force to head toward Iran, while also suggesting it may not be used, as tensions between Iran and the U.S. continue to rise.
“We have a lot of ships going that direction just in case. We have a big flotilla going in that direction. And we’ll see what happens,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One as he returned from Davos after attending the World Economic Forum.
“We have an armada. We have a massive fleet heading in that direction, and maybe we won’t have to use it. We’ll see,” Trump said.
Earlier, Mohammad Pakpour, chief commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps, warned the U.S. and Israel to “refrain from any miscalculation” to avoid a “more painful and regret-inducing fate.”
Pakpour stressed that Iranian forces had their “fingers on the trigger,” were “more prepared than ever,” and were ready to carry out orders from Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Fear of U.S. forces attacking Iran rose during Iran’s December-January protests, after Trump threatened to intervene if Iranian authorities used force against protesters.
Trump has repeatedly called on Iranians to take over institutions “if possible,” saying the U.S. was “locked and loaded” to protect protesters.
The Iranian government has blamed the U.S. and Israel for the violence and casualties during the nationwide protests. Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi said earlier this week that U.S. threats against Iran “gave plotters an incentive” to pursue what he described as a strategy of “maximum bloodshed.”
During a televised statement last Saturday, Khamenei stated that he considers “the U.S. president criminal for the casualties, damages and slander he inflicted on the Iranian nation.”
According to a report by Iranian state television station IRIB on Wednesday, 3,117 people were killed during the unrest, with 2,427 of the dead classified as “innocent civilians and security forces.”