Washington, Feb 26 (IANS) Senator Mark Warner on Thursday pressed President Donald Trump to explain whether the United States is edging towards a prolonged conflict with Iran, warning that American troops could soon be placed in harm’s way without a clearly articulated objective.
Chairman of the powerful Senate Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Warner told reporters that he had been briefed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio “as part of the Gang of eight earlier this week” amid what he described as a “massive buildup of forces in the Eastern Mediterranean, also adjacent to Iran and in other areas.”
“The question is, you know, will we soon be at war?” he said, adding, “I believe it is incumbent upon the President of the United States to come and make the case to the American people if he’s going to put our troops into what will be. Even the administration acknowledges a prolonged conflict, potentially with Iran.”
Warner cautioned that any future operation would differ from the limited past strikes. “This would be unlike the lightning strike that took out Maduro or the one-time attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities,” he said, noting that if the effort goes forward, it “could have much longer consequences.”
Responding to questions about Iran’s nuclear capabilities, Warner said: “Well, they were never obliterated, you know, the president was wrong. The bombing raid never had the capacity to totally obliterate Iran’s nuclear capabilities.”
He added that while the earlier raid was “very successful,” it “couldn’t obliterate Iran’s nuclear capabilities.” He also criticised the dismissal of a senior intelligence official, saying General Kraus “got fired for telling the truth.”
On whether he would support military action, Warner said Congress must be formally consulted. “If we’re about to go to continued conflict with Iran, we need to have a War Powers Act,” he said.
“The president needs to come to the Congress and explain to us, and more importantly, to the American people what his goals are and why it’s in America’s interest to, to, to engage in this conflict.”
Warner also raised concerns that the administration may be broadening its objectives beyond nuclear issues.
“If we are going in and changing the definition from precluding Iran from having nuclear weapons to saying, no, we don’t even want Iran to have any missile capability at all. Well, that’s a different kind of argument, and I’m not sure that argument has been made.”
He described the Iranian regime as “awful” and a “perpetrator of, of anti-Western and anti-American propaganda,” but insisted that if US troops are to be put “in harm’s way, the president needs to explain what his goal is, what his motivation is, and why this is in America’s best interest.”
–IANS
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