US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Monday said Qassem Soleimani was killed as part of a broader strategy of deterring challenges by US foes that also applies to China and Russia, further diluting the assertion that the top Iranian general was struck because he was plotting imminent attacks on US targets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In his speech at Stanford University\u2019s Hoover Institute, Pompeo made no mention of the threat of imminent attacks planned by Soleimani. It only was in response to a question that he repeated his earlier assertion that pre-empting such plots was the reason for the Jan. 3 American drone strike on Iran\u2019s second most powerful official.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Democratic and some Republican lawmakers have challenged the administration over the self-defence rationale supported by undisclosed intelligence over imminent attacks. US President Donald Trump has said the potential targets included four US embassies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On Sunday, Defense Secretary Mark Esper said he had seen no intelligence forewarning of imminent attacks on embassies.Trump on Monday added new fuel to the controversy by saying \u201cit really doesn\u2019t matter\u201d whether Soleimani posed an imminent threat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYour adversary must understand not only that you have the capacity to impose cost but that you\u2019re in fact willing to do so,\u201d Pompeo said, adding that the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal from which Trump withdrew in 2018 had emboldened Tehran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAmerica now enjoys the greatest position of strength regarding Iran we\u2019ve ever been in,\u201d he said, pointing to the damage done to the Iranian economy by US sanctions that Trump re-imposed following his withdrawal from the nuclear deal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe importance of deterrence isn\u2019t confined to Iran,\u201d Pompeo said. \u201cIn all cases, we must deter foes to defend freedom. That\u2019s the whole point of President Trump\u2019s work to make our military the strongest it\u2019s ever been.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He cited the resumption of lethal military aid to Ukraine for defence against Russia-backed separatists, Trump\u2019s withdrawal from an arms control accord with Moscow and tests of a new US intermediate-range cruise missile.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Monday said Qassem Soleimani was killed as part of a broader strategy of deterring challenges by US foes that also applies to China and Russia, further diluting the assertion that the top Iranian general was struck because he was plotting imminent attacks on US targets. In his speech […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":78235,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-78234","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78234","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78234"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78234\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78236,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78234\/revisions\/78236"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}