Rubio says further US military action is not needed against Iran
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(AP) -- The U.S. military said it intercepted two Iranian attack drones headed toward Bahrain, as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard claimed it struck a U.S. early warning radar system in the kingdom. Iran also said a tanker struck a naval mine while attempting to sail through the Strait of Hormuz.
Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Friday that further U.S. military action against Iran is unnecessary because the economic pain the U.S. is inflicting on a weakened Islamic Republic is so great.
Rubio’s comment in a speech to the Federalist Society reinforced a statement by U.S. President Donald Trump earlier in the week that the war “militarily is effectively over.”
“And right now, frankly, the economic pain that we are inflicting on that regime is so great that there’s no need for military action because we’ve weakened them so much,” Rubio said. “But I think victory is ensuring that they never have a nuclear weapon.”
Rubio also acknowledged the economic pain Americans have experienced as a result of the war, which has driven up fuel costs and affected nearly every sector of the global economy.
It would have been easy for Trump to ignore the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear program, avoid an unpopular war and “leave it for the next person to worry about,” he said, adding that the president decided he was “not going to leave it unaddressed.”
“But it’s hard,” Rubio said. “It’s not easy and it’s difficult. And oftentimes it inflicts, you know, pain, economic pain and otherwise. So we recognize that.”
The U.S. military said Friday it shot down two Iranian attack drones headed toward Bahrain, denying Iran’s claim that it had struck a U.S. radar system in the kingdom. CENTCOM, the U.S. command center covering the region, said there were no injuries or damage.
Iran’s official IRNA news agency cited a Revolutionary Guard statement that said the attack on the radar system followed a U.S. strike on a telecommunications pole in the southern Iranian port of Sirik. It was Iran’s first report of targeting a facility in Bahrain since September.
Bahrain’s Ministry of Information did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard said Friday that a liquefied petroleum gas tanker struck a mine, causing an explosion, while trying to sail through the Strait of Hormuz, according to the state-run IRNA news agency.
The Guard said the vessel ignored repeated warnings while transiting the eastern part of the strait. The claim could not be independently verified.
In a related development, the United Nations said October had the highest number of incidents against commercial ships in the contested waters since February, when the Iran war began.
The UN’s International Maritime Organization said 25 seafarers died and many others were injured or remain missing following some 134 incidents in the Strait of Hormuz and the wider Middle East maritime area as of Nov. 11.