WP: Trump Launched The Operation Against Iran Under The Influence Of Two Countries
- 1.03.2026, 10:33
The Allies argued that now was the time to strike.
President Donald Trump has launched a wide-ranging attack on Iran after weeks of efforts by two US allies in the Middle East, Israel and Saudi Arabia. This is reported by The Washington Post, citing its sources.
According to four people, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has called Trump repeatedly on private phones over the past month, advocating a US attack. Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continued his long-running public campaign for a U.S. strike.
In talks with U.S. officials, the Saudi leader warned that Iran would become stronger and more dangerous if the United States did not strike now, sources said.
Mohammed's position was backed by his brother, Saudi Defense Minister Khalid bin Salman, who held private meetings with U.S. officials in Washington in January and warned of the negative consequences of not attacking.
This joint effort prompted Trump to order a massive air campaign against the Iranian leadership and army that killed Khamenei and several other senior Iranian officials in the first hour.
"The attack came despite U.S. intelligence assessments that Iranian forces were unlikely to pose an immediate threat to the U.S. mainland over the next decade. The operation was a departure from the longstanding U.S. practice of refraining from full-scale efforts to overthrow the regime of a country of more than 90 million people. It also marked a dramatic shift from Trump's previous military operations, which until now had been much narrower in scope," the publication noted.
Was there an immediate threat?"
Earlier Saturday, Trump said the United States faced an "imminent threat from the Iranian regime. Tehran continued to work on nuclear weapons and the development of "long-range missiles that ... could soon reach U.S. territory."
But both of these claims are controversial. Trump himself has categorically claimed that the U.S. "destroyed" Iran's nuclear program with airstrikes last summer. The International Atomic Energy Agency has said there is no evidence that Iran resumed its uranium enrichment program after those strikes or that it has an active plan to build a bomb. In an assessment last year, the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency cited no indication that Iran was beginning to develop an intercontinental ballistic missile. If it had decided to do so, the Intelligence Agency said, it would have taken a decade.
Attack Ahead
In a briefing Tuesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio indicated to lawmakers that the timing and objectives of the mission were determined by the fact that Israel was going to attack with or without United States involvement, according to one source.
"So the only remaining question seemed to be whether the United States would launch the operation in conjunction with Israel or whether it would wait for Iran to retaliate against U.S. military targets in the region and then engage," the source told the outlet.