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    Trump, Iran and the Specter of Iraq: ‘We Bought All the Happy Talk’

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    President Trump is pondering swift military action in Iran. There were similar expectations that the war in Iraq would be quick and triumphant.A little more than 22 years ago, Washington was on edge as a president stood on the precipice of ordering an invasion of Baghdad. The expectation was that it would be a quick, triumphant “mission accomplished.”By the time the United States withdrew nearly nine years and more than 4,000 American and 100,000 Iraqi deaths later, the war had become a historic lesson of miscalculation and unintended consequences.The specter of Iraq now hangs over a deeply divided, anxious Washington. President Trump, who campaigned against America’s “forever wars,” is pondering a swift deployment of American military might in Iran. This time there are not some 200,000 American troops massed in the Middle East, or antiwar demonstrations around the world. But the sense of dread and the unknown feels in many ways the same.“So much of this is the same story told again,” said Vali R. Nasr, an Iranian American who is a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. “Once upon a time we didn’t know better, and we bought all the happy talk about Iraq. But every single assumption proved wrong.”There are many similarities. The Bush administration and its allies saw the invasion of Iraq as a “cakewalk” and promised that U.S. troops would be greeted as liberators. There were internal disputes over the intelligence that justified the war. A phalanx of neoconservatives pushed hard for the chance to get rid of Saddam Hussein, the longtime dictator of Iraq. And America held its breath waiting for President George W. Bush to announce a final decision.Today Trump allies argue that coming to the aid of Israel by dropping 30,000-pound “bunker buster” bombs on Fordo, Iran’s most fortified nuclear site, could be a one-off event that would transform the Middle East. There is a dispute over intelligence between Tulsi Gabbard, Mr. Trump’s director of national intelligence, who said in March that Iran was not actively building a nuclear weapon, and Mr. Trump, who retorted on Tuesday that “I don’t care what she said.” Iran, he added, was in fact close to a nuclear weapon. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Defying Calls for De-Escalation, Israel and Iran Exchange Deadly Fire

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      As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to fight “as long as it takes,” Iran fired missiles at Israel, and Israeli warplanes attacked air defenses around Tehran.Israel widened its targets in Iran on Saturday to strike at oil and gas installations, as leaders of both countries vowed to intensify their attacks despite international pleas for de-escalation.In a sweeping assault on Iranian nuclear and military assets that began early Friday, Israel initially focused on Iranian nuclear sites, air defenses and military targets. But the strikes on Saturday went a step further, targeting an energy industry that is vital to Iran’s economy. So far, Israel has killed more than 70 people, including four top security chiefs and several nuclear scientists, damaged Iran’s main nuclear site at Natanz and systematically degraded air defenses, particularly around the capital, Tehran.Iran, in turn, has launched barrages of ballistic missiles and drones at Israel targeting what it says are military assets, but with less apparent success. At least three people have been killed and dozens more wounded.The fighting, the most intense in decades between the two heavily armed countries, has stirred anxiety over the prospect of an increasingly deadly conflict that could draw in the United States and other major powers.The salvos of missiles scuttled talks between the United States and Iran aimed at curbing the Islamic Republic’s progress toward obtaining a nuclear weapon. The talks had been scheduled to resume in Oman on Sunday, but American and Omani officials said they were canceled.A spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, Esmail Baghaei, said on Saturday that the negotiations would remain suspended until Israel ends its attacks, and he accused Washington of supporting the Israelis.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      A Miscalculation by Iran Led to Israeli Strikes’ Extensive Toll, Officials Say

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      Interviews with half a dozen senior Iranian officials show that they were not expecting Israel to strike before another round of talks.Iran’s senior leaders had been planning for more than a week for an Israeli attack should nuclear talks with the United States fail. But they made one enormous miscalculation.They never expected Israel to strike before another round of talks that had been scheduled for this coming Sunday in Oman, officials close to Iran’s leadership said on Friday. They dismissed reports that an attack was imminent as Israeli propaganda meant to pressure Iran to make concessions on its nuclear program in those talks.Perhaps because of that complacency, precautions that had been planned were ignored, the officials said.This account of how Iranian officials were preparing before Israel conducted widespread attacks across their country on Friday, and how they reacted in the aftermath, is based on interviews with half a dozen senior Iranian officials and two members of the Revolutionary Guards. They all asked not to be named to discuss sensitive information.Officials said that the night of Israel’s attack, senior military commanders did not shelter in safe houses and instead stayed in their own homes, a fateful decision. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards’ aerospace unit, and his senior staff ignored a directive against congregating in one location. They held an emergency war meeting at a military base in Tehran and were killed when Israel struck the base.By Friday evening, the government was just beginning to grasp the extent of damage from Israel’s military campaign that began in the early hours of the day and struck at least 15 locations across Iran, including in Isfahan, Tabriz, Ilam, Lorestan, Borujerd, Qom, Arak, Urmia, Ghasre Shirin, Kermanshah, Hamedan and Shiraz, four Iranian officials said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Iran’s Supreme Leader Rebuffs Trump’s Outreach Over Its Nuclear Program

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      Iran’s supreme leader decried “bullying governments” and bristled on Saturday at the idea of negotiating over the country’s nuclear program with the United States in an apparent response to a letter sent by President Trump earlier in the week.Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the leader, indirectly addressed Mr. Trump’s suggestion that Iran negotiate over its rapidly advancing nuclear program or face potential military action, while speaking at a meeting with government and military officials for Ramadan. Though he did not explicitly mention the letter, Mr. Trump or even the United States by name, it was clear he was speaking about Washington’s recent gesture.“Some bullying governments insist on negotiations not to resolve issues but to impose,” Mr. Khamenei said, according to state media. He added that “negotiation is a path for them to make new demands, it’s not just nuclear issues to speak about the nuclear topic, they are making new demands which will definitely not be accepted by Iran.”Speaking on Friday in the Oval Office, Mr. Trump suggested that Iran’s nuclear capabilities — which now include enough near-bomb-grade fuel to produce about six weapons — were reaching a critical point. He said he had offered the country a chance to negotiate or risk losing its program in a military strike.The White House did not provide any specifics about the content of Mr. Trump’s letter, which the president said he sent on Wednesday.Iranian officials are currently at odds over whether the country should negotiate over the program. While the ayatollah denounced Mr. Trump’s offer, other moderate and reformist leaders have spoken in favor of opening negotiations, including President Masoud Pezeshkian, who took office last year. Ultimately however, Mr. Khamenei, who has long said Iran cannot trust the United States, has the final say.The 2015 nuclear accord negotiated by President Barack Obama had been effective, officials say. Iran had shipped nearly all its nuclear fuel stockpile out of the country, and international inspectors said the Iranians were abiding by the sharp restrictions on new production of nuclear fuel.But Mr. Trump, who had repeatedly criticized the accord, withdrew from the nuclear agreement with Iran during his first term and reimposed heavy economic sanctions on the country, gambling that Tehran would respond by pleading for a new deal more advantageous to the United States.Iran did not come back to the table, and now the program has reached a critical juncture, experts say.Mr. Trump has also potentially undermined his proposal by upending two U.S. programs that for decades have worked to expose Iran’s atomic bomb programs. One program has since been restored, but experts worry the disruptions will hurt the worldwide struggle to contain nuclear proliferation.Farnaz Fassihi More

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      Trump Offers to Reopen Nuclear Talks in a Letter to Iran’s Supreme Leader

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      The letter appears to be President Trump’s opening bid to see if a newly vulnerable Iran is willing to negotiate.President Trump said on Friday that he had sent a letter to Iran’s supreme leader offering to reopen negotiations over the country’s fast-advancing nuclear program, but warned that the country would have to choose between curbing its fast-expanding program or losing it in a military attack.Speaking on Friday in the Oval Office, Mr. Trump suggested that Iran’s nuclear capabilities — which now include enough near-bomb-grade fuel to produce about six weapons — were reaching a critical point. “We’re down to final strokes with Iran,” he told reporters. “We can’t let them have a nuclear weapon.”Earlier on Friday on Fox Business, Mr. Trump said: “There are two ways Iran can be handled: militarily, or you make a deal. I would prefer to make a deal, because I’m not looking to hurt Iran. They’re great people.”He said the letter was sent Wednesday and addressed to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader. The White House did not provide the text or describe its contents with any specificity. It was unclear if it was sent through the Swiss — the traditional intermediary for communications between Washington and Tehran — or through Russia or another nation.Mr. Trump’s offer echoes a similar message to Iran during his first term, after he announced in 2018 that he was pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal that had been negotiated three years earlier by the Obama administration. But he never got talks started, and an effort by President Joseph R. Biden Jr. collapsed.Now, the strategic environment has changed radically. The Justice Department has accused Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps of seeking to assassinate Mr. Trump last year; it issued indictments before Mr. Biden left office. Iran’s nuclear facilities are now exposed to attack, after Israel destroyed almost all of the air defenses protecting them in October. And Iran’s regional proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas, are in no condition to threaten Israel with retaliation should the Iranian facilities come under attack.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Says He Wrote to Iran to Open Nuclear Talks

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      President Trump said he had sent a letter to the Iranian government seeking to negotiate a deal to prevent Tehran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.He said the letter was sent Wednesday and addressed to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader. The White House did not immediately respond to a request to provide the letter or further describe its contents.“There are two ways Iran can be handled: militarily, or you make a deal,” Mr. Trump told Maria Bartiromo in an interview aired Friday on Fox Business. “I would prefer to make a deal, because I’m not looking to hurt Iran. They’re great people.”The move is a sharp pivot for Mr. Trump, who in 2018 withdrew the United States from a nuclear deal with Iran, unraveling the signature foreign policy achievement of his predecessor, Barack Obama. Iran did not immediately provide a response.In the interview, Mr. Trump described the letter as saying, “I hope you’re going to negotiate because it’s going to be a lot better for Iran.”“If we have to go in militarily, it’s going to be a terrible thing for them,” he said, adding: “The other alternative is we have to do something because you can’t let them have a nuclear weapon.On Thursday, Mr. Trump talked more broadly about his desire to see the world’s countries eliminate their nuclear weapons. He said he hoped to negotiate denuclearization efforts with China and Russia as well.“It would great if everybody would get rid of their nuclear weapons,” he told reporters in the Oval Office. More

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      Measured Comments From Israel and Iran on New Round of Strikes

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      Israel’s prime minister said Israeli airstrikes on Iran had achieved their goals, and Iranian officials did not threaten retaliation.Iran’s leaders emphasized on Sunday that they had a right to respond to Israel’s airstrikes a day earlier but appeared to take a measured tone, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the assault had achieved its objectives.Their comments came as Israeli and American negotiators headed to Qatar in an effort to revive long-stalled talks aimed at brokering a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip. Earlier, Israel carried out more deadly attacks in northern Gaza and in southern Lebanon.In his first public comments since Israeli warplanes struck Iran on Saturday, Mr. Netanyahu said the strikes — carried out in retaliation for a missile barrage Iran fired at Israel on Oct. 1 — had severely damaged Iran’s defensive capabilities and its ability to produce missiles.Iranian and Israeli officials told The New York Times that the strikes had destroyed air-defense systems that protect important energy sites but did not hit the facilities themselves. The Biden administration had urged Israel not to attack Iran’s oil and nuclear sites.Iran must now decide whether to respond.On Sunday, in his first public comments about the strikes, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said the strikes “should neither be magnified nor downplayed,” the Iranian state news agency IRNA reported. He did not appear to be explicitly calling for retaliation.Although Iranian officials emphasized that their country has the right to respond, Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said late Saturday that the country would “answer any stupidity with wisdom and strategy.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Israel Struck Air Defenses Around Critical Iranian Energy Sites, Officials Say

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      Israel’s attacks on Iran early Saturday destroyed air-defense systems set up to protect several critical oil and petrochemical refineries, as well as systems guarding a large gas field and a major port in southern Iran, according to three Iranian officials and three senior Israeli defense officials.The sites targeted by Israel, according to the officials, included defenses at the sprawling Bandar Imam Khomeini petrochemical complex, in Khuzestan Province; at the major economic port Bandar Imam Khomeini, adjacent to it; and at the Abadan oil refinery. Air-defense systems were also struck in Ilam Province, at the refinery for the gas field, called Tange Bijar, said the officials, one of them with Iran’s oil ministry.The Iranian and Israeli officials familiar with the attacks spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence.Israel’s destruction of the air-defense systems has raised deep alarm in Iran, the three Iranian officials said, as critical energy and economic hubs are now vulnerable to future attacks if the cycle of retaliation between Iran and Israel continues.“Israel is sending a clear message to us,” said Hamid Hosseini, an expert on Iran’s oil and gas industry and a member of the Iran-Iraq Chamber of Commerce. “This can have very serious economic consequences for Iran, and now that we understand the stakes we need to act wise and not continue the tensions.”Iran’s military announced that four soldiers working with air defenses were killed in Israel’s attacks. The Iranian media said the casualty numbers would probably increase.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      In Deciding Whether to Retaliate, Iran Faces a Dilemma

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      Iran faces a dilemma after the Israeli strikes on Saturday.If it retaliates, it risks further escalation at a time when its economy is struggling, its allies are faltering, its military vulnerability is clear and its leadership succession is in play.If it does not, it risks looking weak to those same allies, as well as to more aggressive and powerful voices at home.Iran is already in the middle of a regional war. Since the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7, 2023, Israel has moved swiftly to damage the militant group in Gaza and other Iranian proxies, including Hezbollah, the Houthis and its allies in Syria and Iraq.These groups represent Iran’s “forward defense” against Israel, the heart of the nation’s deterrence. They have been badly weakened by the Israeli military’s tough response since Oct. 7, which weakens Iran, too, and makes it more vulnerable.Iranian officials have made it clear that they do not want a direct war with Israel. They want to preserve their allies, the so-called ring of fire around Israel.After Israel struck Iran, Tehran on Saturday publicly played down the effect of the attack and showed ordinary programming on television. It did not immediately vow a major retaliation, but simply restated its right to do so.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More