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Friday, June 07, 2019, 16:09
US general says Mideast buildup prompted Iran 'step back'
By ​Associated Press
Friday, June 07, 2019, 16:09 By ​Associated Press

In this April 14, 2018, file photo, then-Marine Lt-Gen. Kenneth "Frank" McKenzie speaks during a media availability at the Pentagon in Washington. McKenzie, the top commander of US forces in the Mideast says Iran appears to have decided to "step back and recalculate" in response to a US military buildup in the Persian Gulf area. (ALEX BRANDON, FILE/AP)

BAGHDAD — Iran has chosen to "step back and recalculate" after making preparations for an apparent attack against US forces in the Persian Gulf region, but it is too early to conclude the threat is gone, the top commander of American forces in the Mideast said Thursday.

Gen. Frank McKenzie, the head of US Central Command, said he would not rule out seeking additional US forces to bolster defenses against Iranian missiles or other weapons

In an interview with three reporters accompanying him to the Gulf, Gen. Frank McKenzie said he remains concerned by Iran's potential for aggression, and he would not rule out requesting additional US forces to bolster defenses against Iranian missiles or other weapons.

READ MORE: Supreme Leader: Iran will continue resisting US pressure

"I don't actually believe the threat has diminished," McKenzie said. "I believe the threat is very real."

McKenzie, the head of US Central Command, and other military officials are trying to strike a balance between persuading Iran that the US is prepared to retaliate for an Iranian attack on Americans, thus deterring conflict, and pushing so much military muscle into the Gulf that Iran thinks the US plans an attack, in which case it might feel compelled to strike preemptively and thus spark war.

Tensions between the US and Iran have worsened since President Donald Trump withdrew from a 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and several world powers, and reinstated sanctions on Tehran. Last month, in response to what American officials characterized as an imminent threat, the US announced it would rush an aircraft carrier and other assets to the region.

The US also blamed Iran for last month's attacks on oil tankers in a United Arab Emirates port.

On Thursday, United Nations ambassadors from the Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Norway told UN Security Council members that investigators believe those attacks were led by a foreign state using divers on speed boats who planted mines on the vessels. They did not name Iran.

Earlier, the Saudi ambassador to the UN, Abdallah Al-Mouallimi, said Saudi Arabia also blames Iran for the sabotage.

In Baghdad, McKenzie told reporters from The Associated Press and two other media organizations that US redeployments to the Gulf have "caused the Iranians to back up a little bit, but I'm not sure they are strategically backing down."

The general said the US is showing enough force to "establish deterrence" without "needlessly" provoking its longtime adversary. "We're working very hard to walk that line."

He said he is confident in the moves he has made thus far.

"We've taken steps to show the Iranians that we mean business in our ability to defend ourselves," he said, referring to the accelerated deployment to the Gulf area of the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group, four Air Force B-52 bombers and additional batteries of Army Patriot air-defense systems.

Trump, speaking beside French President Emmanuel Macron in Caen, France, said US sanctions are crippling Iran's economy, possibly yielding a diplomatic opening.

"And if they want to talk, that's fine," the US president said. "We'll talk. But the one thing that they can't have is they can't have nuclear weapons."

Speaking at the Baghdad headquarters of the US-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria, McKenzie said he also has repositioned surveillance aircraft to more closely monitor the situation in the Gulf and in Iraq, where the US has 5,200 troops on the ground, and has given Iran a "new look" by introducing more aerial patrols by land- and carrier-based fighters.

Tensions between the US and Iran have worsened since President Donald Trump withdrew from a 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and several world powers, and reinstated sanctions on Tehran

"Cumulatively, all of these have caused them to sort of step back and recalculate the course that they apparently were on," he said.

McKenzie did not mention it, but other officials have said that in early May Iran had cruise and perhaps short-range ballistic missiles configured for potential use aboard a small number of dhows sailing off its coast. More recently, those missiles, which were deemed a potential threat, were offloaded, officials have said.

He said the intelligence on Iranian threats in the first days of May was "compelling" and that the threats were "advanced, imminent and very specific."

Tensions between the US and Iran have worsened since President Donald Trump withdrew from a 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and several world powers, and reinstated sanctions on Tehran

The pattern of intelligence on Iranian preparations for potential attacks emerged as the Trump administration took a pair of highly public actions meant to penalize Iran. The first was the State Department's designation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization. The second, perhaps more consequential, move was a April 22 announcement that waivers for American sanctions on buyers of Iranian oil would not be renewed when they expired May 2, meaning Iran lost vital oil export revenues.

ALSO READ: Pompeo says US ready to talk to Iran with 'no preconditions'

US intelligence was then picking up what Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said last week looked like a pattern of Iranian plotting against US and other targets in the region. Dunford said that on May 3, the US sent a message to Iranian officials "just to make it clear they understood that we would hold them accountable should something take place in the region."

Two days later, Trump's national security adviser, John Bolton, announced the movement of the carrier, prompting an explosion of questions about what new threats Iran had posed to prompt such a highly unusual White House declaration. McKenzie said the carrier request was his, in consultation with Dunford, and that he faced no political pressure to make the request.


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