\n<\/p>\n
When Donald Trump<\/a> launched Operation Epic Fury alongside Israel on 28 February, his administration had settled on a set of stated, and broad, objectives: destroy Iran\u2019s missiles, eliminate its navy, prevent a nuclear weapon.<\/p>\n Over a month later those objectives have multiplied, contracted and contradicted each other.<\/p>\n In the fifth week of the war alone, Trump said the war had nothing to do with oil, then posted that the US should \u201ctake the oil & make a fortune\u201d. He described the war as nearly over and simultaneously threatened weeks of escalating infrastructure strikes in a primetime address. And within 48 hours of that, he went from telling other nations they could reopen the strait of Hormuz themselves once the US left, to insisting Washington could \u201ceasily\u201d do it.<\/p>\n Here is how the story shifted over the week.<\/p>\n Aboard Air Force One, Trump told reporters<\/a> the diplomatic scene was peachy. Iran had agreed to most of the US\u2019s 15-point list of demands, he said, conveyed via Pakistan.<\/p>\n \u201cThey gave us most of the points. Why wouldn\u2019t they? They\u2019re agreeing with us on the plan. We asked for 15 things, and for the most part, we\u2019re going to be asking for a couple of other things.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n He also said Iran had shipped oil to the US as a show of good faith: \u201cto prove they\u2019re serious.\u201d<\/p>\n In a separate interview with the Financial Times<\/a> the same day, Trump said he wanted to \u201ctake the oil in Iran\u201d and was considering seizing Kharg Island, which handles 90% of Tehran\u2019s oil exports. \u201cMaybe we take Kharg Island, maybe we don\u2019t. We have a lot of options,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Iran\u2019s parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, rejected the ongoing negotiations the same day, saying Iran could not be forced into submission, according to state-linked media<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/section>\n On Truth Social, Trump announced<\/a> that the US was \u201cin serious discussions with A NEW, AND MORE REASONABLE, REGIME\u201d in Iran and that \u201cGreat progress\u201d had been made.<\/p>\n In the same post, he threatened to end the war by destroying all of Iran\u2019s power plants, oil wells, Kharg Island and possibly all its desalination plants if a deal was not reached \u201cshortly\u201d and the strait of Hormuz not reopened \u201cimmediately.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/section>\n With national gas prices hitting a $4-a-gallon average<\/a>, Trump offered reporters at the White House what amounted to a new exit strategy, and a quiet retreat from his earlier vow to force the strait of Hormuz open.<\/p>\n \u201cAll I have to do is leave Iran, and we\u2019ll be doing that very soon, and they\u2019ll become tumbling down. I would say that within two weeks, maybe two weeks, maybe three.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n On the strait, he added<\/a>: \u201cWe\u2019ll be leaving very soon. And if France or some other country wants to get oil or gas, they\u2019ll go up through the strait, the Hormuz Strait, they\u2019ll go right up there, and they\u2019ll be able to\u201d get it.<\/p>\n Earlier in the morning, Trump took another shot<\/a> at allies in Europe, singling out the United Kingdom:<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019ll have to start learning how to fight for yourself, the U.S.A. won\u2019t be there to help you anymore, just like you weren\u2019t there for us.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The call to London was one Pete Hegseth, the US secretary of defense, had also used earlier in the day at a morning press conference<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cLast time I checked, there was supposed to be a big, bad Royal Navy that could be prepared to do things like [getting involved in taking the strait of Hormuz] as well\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/section>\n<\/section>\n Before his primetime address, Trump posted on Truth Social<\/a>:<\/p>\n \u201c[Iran\u2019s] New Regime President, much less Radicalized and far more intelligent than his predecessors, has just asked the United States of America for a CEASEFIRE!\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The US would consider it, he wrote \u2013 but only once the strait of Hormuz was \u201copen, free, and clear. Until then, we are blasting Iran into oblivion or, as they say, back to the Stone Ages!!!\u201d<\/p>\n Iran\u2019s foreign ministry called the claim \u201cfalse and baseless.\u201d The Revolutionary Guard separately said that the strait \u201cis firmly and decisively under the control\u201d of its forces, and that it \u201cwill not be opened to the enemies of this nation through the ridiculous spectacle by the president of the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n That evening, Trump addressed the nation<\/a> from the White House. He said the war\u2019s \u201ccore strategic objectives are nearing completion\u201d. He threatened to hit \u201ceach and every one of their electric generating plants very hard, and probably simultaneously\u201d and to send them \u201cback to the stone ages\u201d<\/p>\n We are going to hit them extremely hard. Over the next two to three weeks, we\u2019re going to bring them back to the stone ages, where they belong.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n He also said the war had nothing to do with oil.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re now totally independent of the Middle East. And yet we are there to help. We don\u2019t have to be there. We don\u2019t need their oil. We don\u2019t need anything they have. But we\u2019re there to help our allies.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/section>\n<\/section>\n Hours after a US-Israeli airstrike destroyed the B1 bridge between Tehran and Karaj, killing eight people (which Trump also posted a video of<\/a>), Trump later posted<\/a> on Truth Social:<\/p>\n \u201cThe New Regime leadership knows what has to be done, and has to be done, FAST! The US hasn\u2019t even started destroying what\u2019s left in Iran. Bridges next, then Electric Power Plants!\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/section>\n<\/section>\nTalks are going great \u2013 and maybe we\u2019ll take Kharg Island<\/h2>\n
29 March<\/span><\/h3>\n
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\u201cGreat progress\u201d and total obliteration<\/h2>\n
30 March<\/span><\/h3>\n
Leaving soon and going after Europe<\/h2>\n
31 March<\/span><\/h3>\n
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Iran ‘asked’ for a ceasefire. Also, back to the ‘stone ages’<\/h2>\n
1 April<\/span><\/h3>\n
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‘Bridges next, then Electric Power Plants’<\/h2>\n
2 April<\/span><\/h3>\n
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‘Take the oil, make a fortune’<\/h2>\n
3 April<\/span><\/h3>\n