US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that the United States is prepared to continue its military assault on Iran for “four to five weeks" if necessary, while acknowledging the likelihood of additional American casualties.
In a brief telephone interview with The New York Times, Trump said the Pentagon had sufficient resources to maintain the operation “if we have to."
Asked how long the United States and Israel could sustain the current level of attacks, he replied, “Well, we intended four to five weeks."
“It won’t be difficult," Trump added. “We have tremendous amounts of ammunition. You know, we have ammunition stored all over the world in different countries."
Speaking from Mar-a-Lago approximately 36 hours into the conflict and shortly after receiving news of three American casualties, Trump said, “Three is three too many as far as I’m concerned. If you look at projections, they do projections, it, you know, it could be quite a bit higher than that."
“We expect casualties," he added.
During the roughly six-minute call, Trump outlined what he described as “three very good choices" for leadership in Iran but declined to name them. He offered several possible visions for how power might be transferred in Tehran, without committing to a single course of action.
Among the options he referenced was an outcome similar to what he said he had engineered in Venezuela, in which only former President Nicolas Maduro was removed during an American military strike while much of the existing government structure remained in place but became more willing to work pragmatically with the United States.
Earlier on Sunday, Iran’s top national security official, Ali Larijani, said that an interim committee would run the country until a successor to the supreme leader was chosen. Trump did not answer when asked whether he believed Larijani could lead Iran’s government.
Pressed on his plans for a transition of power, Trump said he hoped Iran’s elite military forces, including officers of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, would relinquish their weapons.
“They would really surrender to the people, if you think about it," he said.
Trump also stated that he did not believe Arab states in the Persian Gulf needed to join the United States in striking Iran, despite Tehran targeting many of them and Israel with retaliatory missile and drone attacks.
He expressed confidence that Iran would ultimately yield. “The country has been very substantially weakened, to put it mildly," he said.
According to Trump, US and Israeli forces have already eliminated several of Iran’s military leaders, creating a power vacuum that Iranian authorities are seeking to fill.
He said he would consider lifting sanctions on Iran if new leadership demonstrated a willingness to act as a pragmatic partner.
At the same time, Trump declined to specify whether or how the United States would defend the Iranian public if they sought to overthrow the current government.
“I don’t make a commitment one way or the other; it’s too early," Trump said. “We have work to do and we’ve done it very well. I’d say we’re quite ahead of schedule."
Trump added that the joint US-Israeli military strikes had “knocked out a big portion" of the Iranian navy, including nine ships and the navy headquarters.