Trump says Iran war will end “very soon” at Florida news conference

Washington — President Trump said he expects the war in Iran to end “very soon,” but also called it “the beginning of building a new country,” as the administration offers different characterizations for how long the operation will last.

He also warned that Iran could pay an “incalculable” price if its military disrupts oil tankers, as oil importers grapple with higher prices since the war began.

Speaking to reporters at his Miami-area golf club in his first formal news conference since the U.S. and Israel began strikes on Iran, the president said he doesn’t expect the war to end next week, but “soon.”

“We’re very proud to be involved in this and it’s going to be ended soon,” he said. “And if it starts up again, … they’ll be hit even harder.” 

Mr. Trump said the U.S. is achieving “major strides toward completing our military objective.”

“Some people could say they’re pretty well complete,” he said of U.S. military objectives. “We’ve wiped every single force in Iran out, very completely.” 

Mr. Trump also said the U.S. has “left some of the most important targets for later,” saying those targets involve “electricity production and many other things.”

The president has said the United States’ core goal is to eliminate the threat of Iran developing a nuclear weapon. He argued that, if not for last summer’s U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, “they would have had a nuclear weapon within two weeks to four weeks.”

The actual timeline could be somewhat longer. Iran has built up a stockpile of highly enriched uranium that could be made into weapons-grade material within weeks, but several other steps are necessary to turn that material into a viable bomb. One U.S. report last year found it would take Iran three to eight months to build a nuclear device, unless it faced technical or logistical delays, CBS News has reported. 

U.S. intelligence agencies assessed last year that Iran was not actively building a nuclear weapon.

Trump calls it “the beginning of building a new nation”

Earlier Monday afternoon, the president told CBS News senior White House correspondent Weijia Jiang, “I think the war is very complete, pretty much.” The president made those remarks the same afternoon the Department of Defense posted on X, “We have Only Just Begun to Fight” and “no mercy.” The president was asked to explain those seeming discrepancies. 

“Well I think you could say it both. The beginning, it’s the beginning of building a new country,” he said, before talking about how the U.S. has destroyed Iran’s navy. 

Although the president has said he wants to approve Iran’s next leader, the Trump administration in the past has insisted it isn’t interested in nation-building like the U.S. tried in the Middle East in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. 

On Sunday, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei was named as Iran’s new supreme leader, a development the president has openly criticized. Khamenei is the son of the late leader killed on the first day of the U.S.-Israeli military operation.

Asked if the U.S. would take Khamenei out, the president said, “I don’t want to say that.” But he said he was “disappointed” in the selection, because it may lead to more of the same in Iran. 

The president said he likes the idea of an internal selection to lead the country rather than an outsider, and doesn’t want to repeat the situation in Iraq, where U.S. forces effectively purged former dictator Saddam Hussein’s government after the 2003 invasion — a decision widely blamed for helping to destabilize the country.

He cited Venezuela as a “formula that’s been very good so far.” In that country, the U.S. captured former President Nicolas Maduro but has sought to work with his successor, a Maduro loyalist.

But Mr. Trump has noted that U.S. and Israeli strikes have taken out some potential leaders. He said last week that “most of the people we had in mind are dead,” and told reporters Monday that “we’ve taken out the leadership twice and maybe three times.”

President says he blamed Iran for elementary school bombing because he doesn’t “know enough about it”

The president was also asked about the bombing of an elementary school in Iran that killed 168 people, many of them children. A preliminary U.S. assessment found American forces are “likely” responsible for the deadly attack but did not intentionally target the school, CBS News has previously reported.

In the past, the president has claimed Iran was responsible for the bombing, something other administration and defense officials are not saying. He was asked Monday why he’s the only high-ranking government official offering that explanation. 

“Because I just don’t know enough about it,” he said. “I think it’s something that I was told is under investigation.” The president said he’s “willing to live” with whatever the investigation reveals. 

Trump warns of “much harder” strikes if Iran blocks Strait of Hormuz

The president said Iran will get hit “at a much, much harder level” if Iran does anything to stop the world’s oil supply, as oil prices soar and commercial traffic through the Strait of Hormuz nearly grinds to a halt due to the war and Iran’s retaliatory strikes.

“I will not allow a terrorist regime to hold the world hostage and attempt to stop the globe’s oil supply,” he said.

The president reiterated that the U.S. is offering political risk insurance to any tankers in the Persian Gulf, and the U.S. could escort tankers through the strait if needed. 

“If they do anything, the price will be incalculable,” the president said of potential Iranian operations against oil tankers.

Markets are down since the war began over a week ago, and oil prices have jumped — though the price of crude oil dropped and major stock indexes closed in positive territory on Monday afternoon after Mr. Trump floated a takeover of the Strait of Hormuz in his interview with CBS News. Earlier in the day, oil prices had surged by double-digit margins.

President says he wants to finish the job

So far, seven American service members have died in the U.S.-Iran war. The president was asked how many deaths of U.S. service members he’s willing to allow. 

“Well as I said before, when you have conflicts like this, you always have death,” he said. 

The president said the families he met at the dignified transfer for six of the deceased service members urged him to finish the job in Iran. 

Mr. Trump, who has taken questions and a number of phone calls from reporters in the days since the war began, said on Truth Social he’s attending a fundraiser event for House Speaker Mike Johnson before the news conference. The Trump National Doral golf club is hosting the Republican Members Issues Conference, an annual retreat for congressional Republicans as they plot for the November midterm elections.