Trump considers targeted attack on Iran, followed by larger offensive

President Donald Trump has told aides that if diplomacy or an eventual targeted first strike from the United States do not lead Iran to give in to his demands to abandon its nuclear program, he will consider a much larger offensive in the coming months aimed at removing the country’s leaders from power, according to people briefed on the administration’s internal deliberations.

Negotiators from the United States and Iran are due to meet in Geneva on Thursday in what appears to be a last-ditch attempt to avoid a military conflict. At the same time, Trump has been evaluating options for action if negotiations fail.

While no final decision has been made, advisers say Trump has been leaning toward carrying out an initial strike in the coming days to demonstrate to the Iranian leadership that it must agree to give up its ability to produce a nuclear weapon.

Targets under consideration range from Iran’s Revolutionary Guard headquarters to nuclear facilities and the country’s ballistic missile program.

If those measures fail to convince Iran to meet his demands, Trump told aides he would leave open the possibility of a military strike later this year aimed at helping topple Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

There are doubts, including within the government, about whether this objective can be achieved with air strikes alone. Behind the scenes, a new proposal has been considered by both sides that could create an alternative to military conflict: a very limited nuclear enrichment program that Iran could conduct exclusively for research and medical treatment purposes.

It’s unclear whether either party would agree. The last-minute proposal comes as two aircraft carrier groups and dozens of fighters, bombers and tankers are positioned within striking distance of Iran.

Trump discussed plans for attacks on Iran in the White House Situation Room on Wednesday. The meeting included Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, General Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, and White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles.

This article is based on conversations with several U.S. officials with knowledge of the meeting, including officials with different views on the best course of action. None of them allowed their names to be released, citing the sensitivity of discussions involving military operations and intelligence assessments.

During the meeting, Trump asked Caine and Ratcliffe to speak out on the broader strategy toward Iran, but neither has typically publicly advocated specific policy positions. Caine discussed what the Armed Forces could do from an operational point of view, and Ratcliffe preferred to address the current situation on the ground and possible developments of the proposed operations.

During discussions about last month’s operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, Caine told Trump there was a high probability of success. In the case of Iran, however, he has not offered the same assurances, largely because it is a much more difficult target.

Vance, who has long advocated greater caution in military actions abroad, did not oppose an attack but questioned Caine and Ratcliffe intensely at the meeting. He asked them to share their assessments of the options and sought further discussion about the risks and complexity of an attack against Iran.

Previously, the United States had considered options that included sending special forces teams on the ground to carry out raids and destroy Iranian nuclear or missile facilities. This included deeply buried manufacturing and enrichment operations, beyond the reach of American conventional munitions.

But any such incursion would be highly dangerous and would require special forces to remain on the ground much longer than in the operation to capture Maduro. Several U.S. officials said plans for a commando raid have been put aside for now.

Army, Navy and Air Force officials have also raised concerns about the impact that a prolonged war with Iran, or even continued preparation for such a conflict, could have on the readiness of Navy ships, Patriot anti-missile systems, which are in short supply, and already overstretched transport and surveillance aircraft.

The White House declined to comment on Trump’s decision-making process.

“The media can continue speculating about what the president is thinking all they want, but only President Trump knows what he can and cannot do,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said in a statement.

Even before the Iranians presented what appears to be their final proposal — officials said they expect it to be sent to the Trump administration on Monday or Tuesday — both parties appeared to harden their positions. Steve Witkoff, the president’s special envoy, told Fox News that Trump’s “clear directive” to him and Jared Kushner, his co-negotiator and the president’s son-in-law, is that the only acceptable outcome for a deal is for Iran to move to “zero enrichment” of nuclear material.

But Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi reiterated in an interview with CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday that the country is not willing to give up what it considers its “right” to produce nuclear fuel under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. With this statement, the decision on whether the United States is about to attack targets in Iran — apparently with the aim of further weakening Khamenei’s government — appears to depend on a compromise that allows both parties to present the result as victory.

One such proposal is being debated by both the Trump administration and the Iranian leadership. According to several authorities, the initiative came from Rafael Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, a United Nations body that inspects Iranian nuclear installations.

Under the proposal, Iran could produce very small amounts of nuclear fuel for medical purposes. The country has been producing medical isotopes for years at the Tehran Research Reactor, a nearly 60-year-old facility located outside the capital that, in an episode of modern nuclear history, was originally supplied to the pro-American shah of Iran by the United States under the “Atoms for Peace” program.

If adapted, the proposal would allow Iran to claim that it continues to enrich uranium. Trump could argue that the country was closing all facilities that would make it possible to build a weapon — many of which remained open and operating at low levels under the 2015 deal between Iran and the Obama administration. Trump left that agreement in 2018, which led to Iran blocking inspectors and producing weapons-grade uranium, setting the stage for the current crisis.

Still, it is unclear whether the Iranians would be willing to reduce a now vast, industrial-scale nuclear program, in which they have invested billions of dollars, to such a limited initiative.

It is also unclear whether Trump would allow any nuclear production, even if restricted to cancer research and other medical purposes, given his public statements of “zero enrichment.”

Government officials have been unclear about their objectives in confronting Iran, a country of more than 90 million people. While Trump often talks about preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, Rubio and other aides have offered other justifications for military action: protecting protesters killed by Iranian forces last month, eliminating the missile arsenal that could be used against Israel and ending Tehran’s support for Hamas and Hezbollah.

Military action by the United States, however, could also provoke a nationalist response, including among Iranians who want an end to Khamenei’s control.

European officials attending the Munich Security Conference this month said they doubted that military pressure would lead the Iranian leadership to abandon a program that has become a symbol of resistance to the United States.