U.S.

March 4 (UPI) — The House Oversight Committee voted Wednesday to subpoena U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to testify on the Justice Department’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files.

Five Republicans joined the Democrats on the committee voting in favor of the subpoena by a 24-19 count.

The vote was forced by Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., during a full committee business meeting that was not related to the Epstein investigation. Republicans joining Mace in voting for the subpoena were Reps. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., Scott Perry, R-Pa., and Michael Cloud, R-Texas.

“AG Bondi claims the DOJ has released all of the Epstein Files,” Mace posted on social media. “The record is clear: they have not.”

Potential dates for Bondi’s testimony have not been announced.

While some Republicans joined Democrats in voting for a subpoena of Bondi, they did not do the same on a subpoena for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. A motion to subpoena Noem for her handling of immigration enforcement failed.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick agreed on Tuesday to testify before the House Oversight Committee about his relationship with Epstein. Lutnick’s relationship with the sexual abuser and trafficker came under further scrutiny after a photo of him with Epstein was posted on the Justice Department’s Epstein files database.

Lutnick previously downplayed his ties to Epstein.

The U.S. war effort against Iran was “accelerating” as American and Israeli forces fought for control of Iranian airspace and pressed farther inland to seek and destroy Iranian missile capabilities, top U.S. officials said Wednesday.

“Four days in, we have only just begun to fight,” said U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.

“The throttle is coming up,” said Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

However, a reported Iranian missile strike at NATO member Turkey — intercepted by NATO defense systems — was not expected to immediately broaden the war theater by triggering a NATO clause requiring other member nations to get involved, Hegseth said.

Hegseth, striking an unapologetic tone, said Iran’s surviving leadership “don’t know what plays to call” after exhausting initial retaliatory strategies devised prior to the U.S. assault, while the U.S. is firing on all fronts and stacking up wins — including an American submarine recently sinking an Iranian warship with a torpedo in international waters, which Hegseth called the first such sinking since World War II.

“We are just getting started. We are accelerating, not decelerating,” he said. “We can sustain this fight easily for as long as we need to.”

Caine, striking a far more measured tone at the Pentagon briefing, spoke of the “sacrifice” of the six U.S. service members who have been killed in the conflict to date and the “clear military objectives” of the operation, which include dismantling “Iran’s ability to project power outside of its borders, both today and into the future.”

And he said the U.S. has made “steady progress” toward those goals in recent hours. He said Iran’s “ballistic missile shots” were down 86% from the first day of fighting, and down 23% “just in the last 24 hours.” He said their “one-way attack drone shots” are down 73% from the “opening days” of the war.

That has allowed the U.S. to establish “localized air superiority across the southern flank of the Iranian coast and penetrate their defenses with overwhelming precision and firepower,” Caine said. “We will now begin to expand inland, striking progressively deeper into Iranian territory and creating additional freedom of maneuver for U.S. forces.”

Hegseth and Caine spoke against a backdrop of escalating destruction across the Persian Gulf region, as Iran — which Hegseth acknowledged is a “formidable” enemy — continued to unleash a wave of retaliatory strikes and Israel pushed into Lebanon and against Iran-allied Hezbollah fighters there.

Their message of U.S. control in the region belied chaos in many parts of it — as sirens blared in Bahrain, U.S. and other foreign citizens scrambled to flee the area, global air traffic was in disarray and tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a key artery for the flow of global energy, was down by about 90%, according to the Associated Press.

Turkey’s defense ministry announced Wednesday that NATO air defenses had shot down a ballistic missile fired toward Turkish airspace from Iran, which raised additional questions about a rapidly expanding footprint of the war given that Turkey is a NATO member and protected by a treaty clause — Article 5 — stating that an attack on one member is an attack on all.

Hegseth said the U.S. was aware of the strike, but that he did not believe it would trigger Article 5 or force all of NATO into the conflict — which has already drawn in nations throughout the Gulf region as Iran has targeted U.S. allies and military facilities.

Hegseth jettisoned any pretense of constraint or measured force by the U.S., instead casting its operations as an all-out assault on “radical Islamist Iranian adversaries” that he suggested both Democrats and the U.S. media were badly misrepresenting to make President Trump look bad.

He suggested the U.S. media was overly focused on losses, such as the deaths of U.S. military personnel, and not nearly focused enough on the progress the U.S. has made toward destroying Iran’s military capabilities in a matter of days.

“They are toast, and they know it — or at least soon enough they will know it,” he said of Iran. “And we’ve only just begun to hunt, dismantle, demoralize, destroy and defeat their capabilities, just four days in.”

He said that the U.S. and Israel in “under a week” will “have complete control of Iranian skies — uncontested air space,” which he said will mean that “we will fly all day, all night, day and night, finding, fixing and finishing the missiles and defense industrial base of the Iranian military, finding and fixing their leaders and their military leaders.”

“Death and destruction from the sky, all day long,” he said. “We’re playing for keeps.”

It was unclear what exactly Hegseth meant by that, given the Trump administration’s constant messaging that the war on Iran will not be another “endless” engagement for the U.S. in the Middle East.

The U.S. was using rules of engagement that are “bold, precise and designed to unleash American power, not shackle it,” Hegseth said. “This was never meant to be a fair fight, and it is not a fair fight. We are punching them while they’re down, which is exactly how it should be.”

Disruptions to tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, and their potential effect on global and U.S. gas prices, were clearly on Trump’s mind. On Tuesday, he posted to his Truth Social platform that the U.S. would be providing wartime insurance for “ALL Maritime Trade” through Gulf shipping lanes — as other insurers began canceling coverage — and that the U.S. Navy would begin escorting tankers if necessary.

“No matter what, the United States will ensure the FREE FLOW of ENERGY to the WORLD,” he wrote.

The message drew immediate concern from some of Trump’s political opponents, who questioned the cost to the U.S. of securing energy shipments for the entire world, including rivals such as China, one of the largest purchasers of crude oil from the region.

“Very few, if any, of these tankers are coming to the United States,” Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) wrote on X. “This certainly looks like the United States will be subsidizing and protecting oil shipments to China.”

The ruling Democratic Party (DP) and the main opposition People Power Party (PPP) agreed Wednesday to pass a special U.S. investment bill without delay in consideration of the national interest, with a parliamentary vote expected on March 12.

The two sides reached the consensus during their talks at the National Assembly, agreeing to cooperate in passing the special bill to carry out Seoul’s investment pledges to Washington as part of a trade deal reached by the two countries last year, following tariff actions by U.S. President Donald Trump.

“We heard from the PPP side that they will complete the review of the special U.S. investment bill by March 9 as planned,” DP Rep. Cheon Jun-ho told reporters. “If things proceed as planned, the bill will be submitted and put to a vote during a parliamentary plenary session on March 12 at the latest.”

PPP Rep. Yoo Sang-beom said the agreement was reached under the understanding that the U.S. would expect the bill to be passed as scheduled given the “turbulent international situation stemming from the war between the U.S. and Iran.”

“The U.S. could take very strong retaliatory measures if the legislative process is delayed,” Yoo said. “We decided to process the bill after comprehensive consideration of the national interest.”

In January, Trump threatened to raise reciprocal tariffs on South Korean goods back to 25 percent from 15 percent, citing a delay in Seoul’s legislative process needed to move the trade deal forward.

Meanwhile, the rival parties failed to narrow differences at Wednesday’s meeting over proposed mergers between the central city of Daejeon and South Chungcheong Province, and another between Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province.

Copyright (c) Yonhap News Agency prohibits its content from being redistributed or reprinted without consent, and forbids the content from being learned and used by artificial intelligence systems.

U.S. Navy could soon be escorting commercial ships through the Strait of Hormuz, where maritime traffic has effectively stopped due to the current conflict with Iran, according to President Donald Trump. Doing so would demand that American naval vessels transit through the Strait, shifting them away from other duties. More importantly, it would also mean putting them right in a super weapons engagement zone full of Iranian threats that could include cruise and ballistic missiles, one-way-attack drones, explosive-laden kamikaze boats, and naval mines.

“If necessary, the United States Navy will begin escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, as soon as possible,” President Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social social media network.

“Effective IMMEDIATELY, I have ordered the United States Development Finance Corporation (DFC) to provide, at a very reasonable price, political risk insurance and guarantees for the Financial Security of ALL Maritime Trade, especially Energy, traveling through the Gulf,” he also wrote. “This will be available to all Shipping Lines.”

“No matter what, the United States will ensure the FREE FLOW of ENERGY to the WORLD. The United States’ ECONOMIC and MILITARY MIGHT is the GREATEST ON EARTH,” he added. “More actions to come.”

U.S. Central Command declined to comment when reached for more details. TWZ has also reached out to the White House.

The Strait of Hormuz, which links the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, is just 20 nautical miles across at its narrowest point. A significant portion of the waterway falls within Iran’s national waters, which also overlap with those of Oman to the south. Under normal conditions, maritime traffic flows in and out through a pair of established two-mile-wide shipping lanes. Each year, roughly one-fifth of all global oil shipments, and an even higher percentage of seaborne shipments, pass through this one waterway. It is also a major conduit for liquid natural gas exports. Some 3,000 ships, including tankers and container ships, pass through each month.

Politico had earlier reported that President Trump’s administration was considering both of these courses of action, citing unnamed sources.

“It’s becoming a growing concern that the energy markets could face pressures in the coming days as the military campaign intensifies and expands in geographic scope,” one individual said to be familiar with the discussions told that outlet. “Access to the Straits [sic] of Hormuz is obviously vital for both natural gas and crude oil shipments, especially from Qatar and Saudi [Arabia].”

Lloyd’s List has also reported that Trump’s announcement came “less than 24 hours after Navy officials told shipping industry representatives that there was ‘no chance’ of escorts happening any time soon.”

Several civilian vessels have already suffered attacks in and around the Strait since the United States and Israel launched their joint operation against Iran this past weekend. Though American officials insist that Iranian forces have been unable to seal off the highly strategic waterway, maritime traffic through it has now come to a near halt amid the ongoing fighting. Some ships appear to be making the transit with the transporters turned off to reduce the chance of being targeted. The real danger of attack has been compounded by insurers cancelling war risk policies ahead of what are expected to be major rate hikes.

Iranian retaliatory attacks have also been hitting port facilities, as well as energy infrastructure, in multiple Gulf Arab states. As noted, if this situation persists, the potential knock-on effects on global oil and natural gas markets could quickly become severe. Since Iranian authorities have repeatedly threatened to blockade the Strait of Hormuz in the event of a major crisis that threatens the regime, TWZ has explored all of this in detail in the past.

Iranian attack drones struck oil storage infrastructure in Fujairah, UAE, this morning, causing a large fire.

Notably, Fujairah is the only major oil export terminal in the UAE that avoids the now-closed Strait of Hormuz. pic.twitter.com/DdAbVOyRoc

— OSINTtechnical (@Osinttechnical) March 3, 2026

This is not the first time that the United States has been faced with this predicament or decided to start escorting commercial vessels through the region as a result. The U.S. Navy did just this in the late 1980s during the Tanker War sideshow to the Iran-Iraq War. At the same time, that experience underscores the immense amount of resources such a campaign could require, as well as the risks.

At the peak of those operations, there were some 30 American warships escorting commercial vessels to and from the Persian Gulf. Aircraft, special operations forces, and other assets were also deployed in support. The risks to American service members, as well as the ships they were tasked to safeguard, were very real.

Shortly before the escort mission began in 1987, the Oliver Hazard Perry class frigate USS Stark was struck by two French-made Exocet anti-ship cruise missiles fired from an Iraqi aircraft as it sailed in the Persian Gulf. The government of Iraq, then led by Saddam Hussein, apologized, claiming they had mistaken the Americans for an Iranian tanker. In the end, 37 U.S. Navy personnel died, and 21 more were wounded.

In 1988, the USS Samuel B. Roberts, another Oliver Hazard Perry class frigate, was severely damaged after hitting an Iranian naval mine in the Persian Gulf while supporting the escort mission. 10 sailors were injured, but there were thankfully no fatalities.

In the course of the Tanker War, 450 commercial ships also came under attack, and many were damaged or even sunk by missiles, mines, and other threats.

More recently, the U.S. military, as well as the European Union, have established naval task forces to help ensure the free flow of maritime commerce through the Strait of Hormuz, as well as elsewhere in the Middle East. When it comes to Iran, those forces have primarily been called on to respond to attempts to seize ships or otherwise harass them. In the past decade or so, outright Iranian attacks on ships in and around the Persian Gulf have generally been covert and sporadic.

U.S. fires warning shots at Iranian fast boats.

The U.S. Navy released the video below in 2019 in relation to an Iranian covert limpet mine attack on a commercial ship in the Gulf of Oman.

Limpet Mine Attack in the Gulf of Oman: JUNE 13, 2019

Escorting commercial ships through the Strait of Hormuz now would involve U.S. Navy warships sailing right into an extremely high-threat zone in the midst of a conflict that has already taken on a regional character.

In general, the U.S. Navy, as well as commercial shipping companies, have loathed convoy operations despite the benefits they offer. As already noted, these missions can be very resource-intensive, as well as risky. Ships tasked with these missions are then also not available for other duties, including striking targets ashore or helping defend other assets. It can also be very time-consuming to assemble maritime convoys and then escort them to their destination. You can read more about all this in a past TWZ feature here.

For all the lessons the U.S. military learned during the Tanker War, Iran has also significantly expanded the scale and scope of anti-ship capabilities since then, as we regularly highlight. Iran’s missile, drone, and naval forces have been degraded just in the past few days of intensive U.S.-Israeli strikes. How much Iran was able to reconstitute missile and other capabilities in the aftermath of losses during the 12 Day War with Israel last year is also unclear.

Two days ago, the Iranian regime had 11 ships in the Gulf of Oman, today they have ZERO. The Iranian regime has harassed and attacked international shipping in the Gulf of Oman for decades. Those days are over. Freedom of maritime navigation has underpinned American and global… pic.twitter.com/nzdkMVMqZC

— U.S. Central Command (@CENTCOM) March 2, 2026

The Iranian regime’s killer drones have been a menace in the Middle East for years. These drones are no longer a tolerable risk. pic.twitter.com/76yhDKI6OW

— U.S. Central Command (@CENTCOM) March 3, 2026

At the same time, much of Iran’s shorter-range missile and drone arsenal is understood to be untouched, as well as dispersed, making interdiction now more challenging. Yesterday, U.S. Secretary of State and acting National Security Advisor Marco Rubio highlighted these threats and the dangers they pose.

SECRETARY RUBIO: The United States is conducting an operation to eliminate the threat of Iran’s short range ballistic missiles and the threat posed by their navy, particularly to naval assets.

That is what the U.S. is focused on right now and is doing quite successfully. pic.twitter.com/zWKBOLVstH

— Department of State (@StateDept) March 2, 2026

Iranian-backed Houthi militants in Yemen were able to cause massive disruptions in maritime traffic in and around the Red Sea between late 2023 and early 2025 using just a portion of what Iran itself could still potentially bring to bear. The U.S. response to Houthi attacks, which included naval deployments to help safeguard commercial shipping, did provide additional valuable lessons learned. It also underscored very real risks to naval assets in environments full of missile and drone threats, as well as to aircraft, including stealth types, flying overhead.

The narrowness of the Strait of Hormuz, as well as the insular nature of the Persian Gulf, creates additional challenges and risks compared to operations in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden because there is simply less space to maneuver. Iranian anti-ship cruise and ballistic missiles, as well as one-way-attack drones, can be fired from road-mobile launchers, including ones disguised as civilian trucks, making it even more difficult to find and fix threats in advance. Proximity in the littoral zone to these threats only further reduces the time available to react.

The Iranian regime is using mobile launchers to indiscriminately fire missiles in an attempt to inflict maximum harm across the region. U.S. forces are hunting these threats down and without apology or hesitation, we are taking them out. pic.twitter.com/gv1SfKCrk4

— U.S. Central Command (@CENTCOM) March 3, 2026

Escort operations mean that American warships would need to transit through the highest threat areas repeatedly, as well, which would only give Iranian forces more engagement opportunities. There is a reason why U.S. naval vessels are currently operating well away from the Persian Gulf in the Arabian Sea, as well as the Eastern Mediterranean.

U.S. naval facilities, as well as civilian ports, on the opposite side of the Persian Gulf have also come under Iranian attack in the past few days, and would not be guaranteed sanctuaries to shelter in. Iranian retaliatory attacks across the Middle East are already showing the limits of some of the most modern air defense capabilities on Earth, especially when faced with large volumes and/or complex mixtures of disparate incoming threats.

An Iranian one-way attack drone, likely a Shahed-136, filmed scoring a direct hit earlier Saturday on the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet Headquarters at Naval Support Activity Bahrain in Juffair, located in Manama, the capital of Bahrain. pic.twitter.com/O9AVD7DmzC

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) February 28, 2026

It is possible that U.S. allies and partners could help bolster an operation to protect regional shipping that is sufficiently separate from U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran. The United Kingdom and France are already conducting defense missions to intercept incoming Iranian threats around the Persian Gulf, as well as in the Eastern Mediterranean. Both of those countries, among others, are also sending more forces to bolster defenses around the region. As already made clear, a protracted upending of oil and natural gas exports from the Arabian Peninsula, as well as Iran itself, will reverberate globally.

TWZ has pointed to this reality in the past as raising key questions about whether the Iranian regime would have the political will, let alone the materiel capacity, to blockade the Strait of Hormuz. For now, though, as we wrote just this morning:

“Increased targeting of Gulf Arab States’ oil and natural gas production is part of a clear Iranian strategy to put pressure on those countries to, in turn, create complications for the United States. As the economic pressure builds, the idea is that these countries will seek to end the conflict, and/or that relations with the U.S. will sour. The prospect of major, long-term disruptions in energy exports from the region has global ramifications, as well, which could bring immense external pressure to end the conflict. There is also the aspect of drawing Arab countries into the conflict, which would complicate it politically and militarily. In addition, some energy targets are not as well defended as U.S. bases in the region, for instance, and scoring hits with the now finite weapons Iran has on hand becomes easier.”

How this will continue to play out, especially if more countries begin to take ostensibly defensive action against Iranian threats, is unknown. There is a very real potential for Iran’s strategy to backfire if the crisis begins to take a toll economically well beyond the Middle East.

U.S. Navy warships escorting commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz could help soften those impacts, but not without major risks, as well as the expenditure of significant resources. Risks would remain for shipping companies too, who could still be reluctant to make the transit, especially with uncertain insurance guarantees.

Overall, it remains to be seen how a U.S. mission to get oil and gas flowing again through the Strait of Hormuz might materialize.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

WASHINGTON — The United States plunged further into conflict with Iran on Tuesday as a new round of strikes heightened fears of an expanding war in the Middle East, sending markets reeling and oil prices soaring and drawing urgent calls from European leaders for a plan forward.

President Trump acknowledged during an Oval Office appearance that the public would feel some economic pain as fighting continues to threaten areas that are critical to the world’s oil and natural gas production.

“As soon as this ends, those prices are going to drop, I believe lower than ever before,” Trump said, though he did not provide a clear time frame for when the conflict might end.

As the war stretched into its fourth day on Tuesday, Israel struck Iranian missile launch facilities and weapon factories and Iran retaliated across the Persian Gulf region, including attacks on U.S. diplomatic sites in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Dubai.

The conflict simultaneously set off alarms in the global markets, prompting stocks in Europe and Asia to plunge and the S&P 500 to drop nearly 1% after falling as much as 2.5% in early trading.

European governments were also forced to contend with the fallout, with some countries increasing their military presence in the region as their actions are closely monitored by Trump, who publicly singled out countries that he thought had been helpful in his war efforts so far.

“Spain has been terrible,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office while threatening to “cut off all trade with Spain” after he said the country had denied American forces access to its military bases.

Trump said he was “not happy with the U.K. either” and complained about not being allowed to use a military base on Diego Garcia in the Chagos Islands. Without access to that military base, Trump said American planes were forced to fly “many extra hours.”

“We were very surprised. This is not Winston Churchill that we’re dealing with,” Trump said. Churchill served as Britain’s prime minister during World War II.

As Trump threatened European allies, he sat next to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, underscoring the fraught landscape that world leaders are navigating as American and Israeli forces work to destroy Iran’s missile capabilities and nuclear program and eye a potential change in government.

During their meeting, Trump said Germany has allowed the United States to use its air bases. Beyond that help, Trump said, “we’re not asking them to put boots on the ground or anything.”

When asked by reporters how Germany intended to help in the conflict, Merz said he wanted to focus on talking to Trump about what comes “the day after” the war ends.

“We are on the same page in terms of getting this terrible regime in Iran away and we will talk about the day after, what will happen then, if they are out,” Merz said.

Trump talks about regime change options

Trump did not have much to say yet on what will come next and was unclear on who will lead the Iranian government, saying that U.S. and Israeli military operations had killed the people who he thought could have filled the leadership vacuum.

“Most of the people we had in mind are dead,” Trump said. “Now, we have another group, but they may be dead also based on reports so I guess you have a third wave coming in and pretty soon we’re not going to know anybody.”

His remarks were a startling acknowledgment in part because minutes earlier he said the worst-case scenario in his mind was that the military operation would take place and “then somebody takes over who is as bad as the previous person.”

“That could happen,” Trump said.

Asked if Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, son of the former shah, is someone he would like to run the country, Trump said he is a “very nice person,” but did not say for sure whether he is his choice.

The president and his top aides have offered varying explanations when asked about regime change, drawing criticism from Democrats and some conservatives who are demanding to know why Americans are being dragged into a war with no clear end in sight.

On Saturday, when U.S. and Israeli forces first struck Iran, Trump said overthrowing Iran’s theocratic regime was part of his rationale. But on Monday, he emphasized that Iran’s missiles posed a threat to the United States, and therefore theattack was carried out to eradicate its missile capability and nuclear program.

After briefing lawmakers Monday afternoon, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters that the United States launched a “preemptive” attack on Iran because officials knew Israel was going to strike the country — a move that he said would have put U.S. forces at risk and led to even more U.S. casualties. As of Tuesday, six American troops have been killed in combat.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), after being briefed by Trump administration officials on Monday afternoon, said, “Israel was determined to act in their own defense, with or without American support.”

“If Israel fired upon Iran, and took action against Iran to take out the missiles, then they would have immediately retaliated against U.S. personnel and assets,” Johnson told reporters.

Trump disputed the suggestion that Israel’s plans to attack Iran prompted him to launch the strikes, saying it was the other way around.

“If anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand,” Trump said Tuesday. “But Israel was ready, and we were ready, and we’ve had a very, very powerful impact because virtually everything they have has been knocked out.”

But it was unclear how far along the U.S. military is in accomplishing its mission.

In a letter Monday, Trump told Congress that while the “United States desires a quick and enduring peace, it is not possible at this time to know the full scope and duration of military operations that may be necessary.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-New York) warned in a speech on the Senate floor that the administration’s murky strategy is not good for the country.

“History teaches us a simple lesson: Wars without a clear objective do not stay small. They get bigger, they get bloodier, they get longer, they get more expensive,” Schumer said. “This is not a defensive war. This is not a necessary war. This is a war of choice.”

The latest attacks on the region

Tuesday saw yet another expansion of the war when Israeli troops blitzed into Lebanon in a bid to dislodge the Iran-backed Shiite militant group Hezbollah.

The ground invasion comes one day after Hezbollah lobbed rockets and drones at an Israeli military position across the border; an attack, the group said, that was vengeance for the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and a response to Israel’s near-daily violations of a ceasefire brokered by the U.S. in November 2024.

The attack sparked a massive Israeli assault on dozens of villages and towns in southern Lebanon, as well as on the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, Beirut. The strikes killed 40 people, wounded 246 others and saw tens of thousands forced to leave their homes and scramble for shelter in Beirut and elsewhere, according to Lebanese authorities.

The Lebanese army said Tuesday that it was withdrawing from positions in southern Lebanon ahead of a ground incursion by Israeli troops. The Israeli military’s Arabic-language spokesman then issued a warning to residents of some 80 towns and villages in that region to “immediately evacuate your homes” and move northward.

Hezbollah, meanwhile, maintained a defiant stance and continued rocket and drone launches into Israel.

“The era of patience has ended, and we have no option but to return to resistance,” said Mahmoud Qatari, who chairs Hezbollah’s Political Council. “If Israel wants an open war, so be it.”

The invasion comes more than a year after Israel occupied parts of southern Lebanon in 2024. After the ceasefire came into effect, Israel withdrew from most parts of the country save for five positions near the border. Yet in the 15 months since the ceasefire was signed, it has proved to be more notional for Lebanon, with Israeli warplanes and troops conducting well over 10,000 truce violations, according to the U.N.

Israel says its actions are to stop Hezbollah from reconstituting itself near the border, but the result has meant residents of border towns and villages in southern Lebanon have been unable to return home.

Israel’s military spokesman, Brigadier Gen. Effie Defrin, said in a statement that troops were “creating a buffer” inside Lebanon between residents in northern Israel “and any threat.”

As the conflict has escalated, some 1,600 Americans stranded across the region have requested assistance and the Trump administration is trying to help evacuate them, Rubio said. But the effort has faced challenges because Iranian missiles have struck many Mideast airports.

“We know we are going to be able to help them,” Rubio said. “It is going to take a little time because we do not control the airspace closures.”

Ceballos reported from Washington, Bulos from Khartoum, Sudan.

March 3 (Asia Today) — South Korea’s exports are riding a semiconductor boom, but lawmakers risk undermining that momentum by delaying legislation tied to a major U.S. investment plan.

According to the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, exports in February reached $67.4 billion, the highest ever for the month, despite fewer working days due to the Lunar New Year holiday. Exports have set new monthly records for nine straight months since June.

Still, vulnerabilities are emerging. Automobile exports fell 20.8% from a year earlier in February, reflecting the impact of U.S. tariffs on specific items. Even after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down reciprocal tariffs, the administration of President Donald Trump has continued to pursue tariff measures. Lawmakers should move swiftly to pass the Special Act on Investment in the United States to remove potential grounds for further trade friction.

Semiconductors once again drove export growth. Chip exports surged 160% from a year earlier to $25.1 billion, marking the third consecutive month above the $20 billion mark. The gains reflect increased artificial intelligence investment by global technology firms and a sharp rise in memory chip prices. The price of DDR4 8Gb DRAM has climbed 863% over the past year, while 128Gb NAND prices have risen 452%.

But heavy reliance on semiconductors has deepened disparities across industries. Of the country’s 15 key export categories, only five posted gains last month, including computers, wireless communication devices, ships and biohealth products. Exports of auto parts, petrochemicals and steel declined amid global oversupply and tariff pressures.

Geopolitical risks add further uncertainty. The recent U.S. airstrikes on Iran have heightened concerns about instability in the Middle East. According to the Korea International Trade Association, every 10% increase in global oil prices reduces South Korea’s export volume by 0.39%. A prolonged conflict could jeopardize the government’s goal of achieving $800 billion in annual exports this year.

Against this backdrop, the ruling Democratic Party and the opposition People Power Party remain locked in a dispute over passage of the Special Act on Investment in the United States, which would support a planned $350 billion investment in America.

On Sunday, Han Byung-do, floor leader of the Democratic Party, warned that his party would take “a major decision” if the opposition continued to block proceedings. The People Power Party has boycotted related committee activities in protest of separate judicial reform bills passed by the majority party.

While the ruling party bears responsibility for pushing through controversial judicial legislation, it is also unwise to hold a bill tied to national economic interests hostage to partisan conflict. The government has already conditionally approved Google’s request to export high-precision map data in an effort to avoid giving Washington grounds for additional tariffs.

Failure to pass the investment bill in the coming days could carry further costs. Both sides should exercise strategic flexibility to safeguard national interests amid mounting external risks.

— Reported by Asia Today; translated by UPI

© Asia Today. Unauthorized reproduction or redistribution prohibited.

Original Korean report: https://www.asiatoday.co.kr/kn/view.php?key=20260302010000303

NEW YORK — U.S. and Israeli officials are privately casting doubt on projections from the Trump administration that the war with Iran could end within a matter of weeks — instead warning that a months-long campaign may be required to destroy the country’s ballistic missile capabilities and install a pliant government, multiple sources told The Times.

The prospect of extended combat creates new political risks and uncertainties for President Trump, whose penchant for dramatic, short-term military operations has suddenly given way to a full-scale assault on the Islamic Republic, shocking a MAGA base that for years supported his calls to end forever wars in the Middle East.

One Israeli official told The Times — despite internal guidance among Israeli officials to adhere to the U.S. president’s stated time frame — that the war “definitely could be longer” than the four-week window that Trump repeatedly offered to reporters.

A U.S. official said that in private conversations, top administration officials presume the campaign will require a longer runway now that remnants of Iran’s government have chosen to resist rather than acquiesce to Washington.

Protracted war was always a possibility. Trump was presented with U.S. intelligence assessments gaming out the potential conflict that emphasized how highly unpredictable the results of an attack would be — an analysis the intelligence community believes has borne out on the ground in the chaotic early days of the conflict.

A longer conflict could create diplomatic space between Trump and Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who has advocated for the overthrow of the Islamic Republic for over 30 years.

The Israeli leader has succeeded in convincing Trump to take military actions in Iran that American presidents have rejected for decades, from bombing its nuclear facilities to assassinating its leadership, including Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in an opening strike over the weekend.

Goal of regime change fades

Yet, mere days into the war, White House officials have all but ceased references to a democratic spring that could sweep Iran’s government aside.

A set of four U.S. goals for the mission no longer calls for changing the regime itself. Still, Netanyahu’s government remains keen on replacing the government, and the nation’s longest-serving premier sees the current war as his best opportunity to do so, one official said.

Speaking with reporters Tuesday, Trump rejected reports that the Israelis had convinced him to launch the attack.

“No, I might have forced their hand,” Trump said. “Based on the way the negotiations were going, I think they were going to attack first, and I didn’t want that to happen. So if anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand, but Israel was ready, and we were ready, and we’ve had a very, very powerful impact because virtually everything they have had been knocked out.”

In a series of interviews this week, Trump said he had been given projections of a four- or five-week war, while noting he is prepared to go longer if necessary.

Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon official who is Iran expert at the American Enterprise Institute, said that projecting a deadline to the conflict at its start would be a strategic mistake for the Trump administration, as it would in effect give Iran’s remaining leadership an end date to wait out the fighting.

“Successive presidents have shown that America has strategic attention deficit disorder,” Rubin said. “If that was the case in Iraq and Afghanistan, it’s especially true under Trump. He imposed a ceasefire on Gaza that let Hamas survive to fight another day; they still haven’t disarmed.”

The duration of the war will depend, in part, on Iran’s ability to resist and defend its remaining capabilities — but also on the president’s willingness to accept an outcome that leaves the Islamic Republic in place.

That decision has not yet been made by Trump, who has vacillated between calls for a democratic uprising across Iran — and U.S. military options to support resistance groups inside the country — as opposed to a shorter campaign that cripples Iran’s political leadership and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

“I can go long and take over the whole thing, or end it in two or three days and tell the Iranians, ‘See you again in a few years if you start rebuilding,” Trump told Axios.

One of Israel’s primary goals is to effectively eliminate the country’s ballistic missile program, and progress on that score is ahead of schedule, another source familiar with the operation said. “Things are going very well at the moment,” the source added. “Great pace.”

An Israeli military source noted to The Times that the stated goal of the mission is to significantly degrade, but not necessarily destroy, Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities, a goal the source said could be accomplished within Trump’s preferred time frame.

“Israel was quite unhappy Trump ordered the [June 2025] 12-day war ended when it did,” said Patrick Clawson, director of the Iran program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. He said he expected the current war would “take time” to comprehensively set back Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities, after a series of Israeli missions in 2024 against the missile program failed to set them back by more than a matter of months.

“Some Israelis think before the recent strikes, Iranian production was fully restored,” Clawson said. “So a really comprehensive attack on Iranian missiles is an important Israeli objective.”

The Maduro model

But no one inside the Islamic Republic system has emerged so far to serve in a supplicant role to Trump in the way that Delcy Rodríguez has stepped in as acting president of Venezuela, after U.S. forces captured that country’s strongman president, Nicolás Maduro, in an audacious overnight raid in January.

Since then, the Stars and Stripes have flown alongside the Venezuelan tricolor at government buildings in Caracas, where senior Trump administration officials have been welcomed to discuss lucrative opportunities in Venezuela’s oil industry.

Trump is now looking for an Iranian counterpart to Rodríguez, he said Tuesday, suggesting he is willing to keep the Islamic Republic in place despite encouraging its citizens to rise up against their government.

“Most of the people we had in mind are dead,” Trump said in the Oval Office. “We had some in mind from that group that is dead. And now we have another group. They may be dead also. Pretty soon we’re not gonna know anybody.”

“I mean, Venezuela was so incredible because we did the attack and we kept the government totally intact,” he added.

Dennis Ross, a veteran diplomat on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict who served in the George H.W. Bush, Clinton and Obama administrations, expressed doubt that Trump would be willing to proceed with a months-long campaign, regardless of Israel’s aspirational objectives.

“I believe President Trump doesn’t define clear objectives so he can decide to end the war at a time of his choosing, and declare the objective at that point, announcing we have achieved what we sought to do,” said Ross, noting that finding a figurehead in Iran as he did in Venezuela was always “a long shot.”

“Unilaterally, he could declare we made the regime pay a price for killing its citizens, and we have weakened Iran to the point that it is not any longer a threat to its neighbors,” Ross added. “He could then say, if Iran continues the war, we will hit them even harder.”

Four days into Operation Epic Fury, the joint American-Israeli attack on Iran, the U.S. is moving more tactical jets to the Middle East. On Tuesday, additional F-35A Lightning II stealth fighters and F-15E Strike Eagle multirole fighters took off from Lakenheath Air Base in the U.K, according to flight trackers and spotters. The jets are joining the large number of fighters already engaged in the war effort. The aircraft will be a welcome sight for CENTCOM, which just lost three F-15E Strike Eagles to friendly fire.

You can catch up with our latest coverage of Epic Fury here.

These movements come in the wake of statements made by Air Force Gen. Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that the U.S. is plussing up its Middle East aviation force.

In his opening remarks during a Monday morning press conference at the Pentagon, Caine said that the commander of U.S. Central Command, Adm. Brad Cooper, “will receive additional forces.”

“Even today, this rapid buildup of forces demonstrated the joint forces’ ability to adapt and project power at the time and place of our nation’s choosing,” Caine said, declining to provide many additional details.

“I don’t want to talk specifics, because that would tip the enemy off,” Caine explained. “We have more tactical aviation flowing into theater just based on the time it took to get it out there. I think we’re just about where we want to be in terms of total combat capacity and total combat power.”

That could change depending on what happens in the fight against Iran.

“For Admiral Cooper…he’ll consistently assess the trajectory of the campaign is the ON or OFF trajectory, and then make an ask of the joint force, which will then develop options for consideration by the secretary and the president to either increase or, in some cases, decrease the amount of combat capabilities that we have over there.”

The open-source intelligence (OSINT) @DefenceGeek X account tracked a dozen F-35As, originally from Hill Air Force Base in Utah, heading to the Middle East.

Hill AFB F-35As on the move from Lakenheath #FreeIran‌
— Operation EPIC FURY —

The F-35As from Hill AFB that arrived at RAF Lakenheath (EGUL) the other week are now heading forward! Aircraft on the move are:

KC-135R “BOBBY01” 61-0324 #AE0263
KC-135R “BOBBY02” 62-3559… pic.twitter.com/W6SlbgrI6F

— DefenceGeek 🇬🇧 (@DefenceGeek) March 3, 2026

Aviation photographer Eugenia Golding, who lives under the RAF Lakenheath’s airbase flight path, shared some photos with us of F-35As after taking off from Lakenheath.

She also provided photos of the F-35As accompanied by a KC-135 Stratotanker aerial refueling jet.

Aviation photographer Paul Field, who lives near RAF Lakenheath, also shared images of F-35As.

The @ArmchairAdml X account tracked additional F-15Es heading to the Middle East.

Golding also shared a photo of three F-15Es heading out of Lakenheath accompanied by a KC-135 Stratotanker aerial refueling jet.

The fighters leaving Lakenheath today join a wide array of fighters, electronic warfare aircraft, surveillance aircraft, communications planes, maritime patrol jets and tankers deployed to the region.

In addition, CENTCOM confirms that in addition to B-2 Spirit stealth bombers, B-1 Lancer and B-52 Stratofortress bombers have also taken part in Epic Fury, flying from the U.S. to strike targets in Iran. There have also been scores of transport jets hauling air defense systems and other war materiel transiting to the region on a daily basis.

In the first three days of the operation, CENTCOM has hit more than 1,700 targets, including command and control centers, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps facilities, air defense systems, ballistic and anti-ship missile sites and naval bases. In addition to attacks from manned aircraft, these strikes have come from drones, ground base rocket artillery systems as well as from the sea with Tomahawk Land Attack Cruise missiles launched from Arleigh Burke class guided missile destroyers.

As we have noted in the past, a large number of these aircraft have flown to Muwaffaq Salti, in central Jordan, which has become a central hub for U.S. tactical jets and other aircraft.

The war, as we noted earlier in this story, has already taken a toll on U.S. fighters. As we previously reported, three Strike Eagles were mistakenly shot down by Kuwaiti air defenses on March 1. All six crew members survived, but the incident showed that the battlespace is extremely complex. Given how many missiles and drones Iran is firing and all the tactical aircraft coming and going, the threat of friendly fire incidents like this is very real.

The U.S. is not alone in providing airpower. Israel has the largest and most advanced Air Force in the Middle East and has been hitting hundreds of targets, including a major new wave of Israeli strikes going after leadership targets in Tehran today.

🎯STRUCK: The Iranian Regime’s Leadership Compound — the central headquarters have been dismantled

This command headquarters was one of the most heavily secured assets in Iran. The compound that housed the regime’s most senior forum was struck by the IAF overnight using precise… pic.twitter.com/4iW2xd71bC

— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) March 3, 2026

Meanwhile, aircraft from the U.K. and France have been deployed to the Middle East as well, while Greek fighters have been sent to Cyprus to protect facilities on the island.

On Tuesday, the British Defense Ministry (MoD) confirmed that one of its F-35Bs downed an Iranian drone over Jordan.

The UK’s F-35 fleet has scored its first kill, shooting down an Iranian attack drone over Jordan.

British fighters are now conducting combat air patrols over Jordan, Qatar, and the Eastern Mediterranean. pic.twitter.com/EDxQbONjTZ

— OSINTtechnical (@Osinttechnical) March 3, 2026

France deployed Rafale fighters to the United Arab Emirates for protection of “its naval and air bases against Iranian attacks, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said on Tuesday,” according to Le Monde. “France has hundreds of navy, air force and army personnel based in the United Arab Emirates. Its Rafale aircraft are stationed at the Dhafra base near Abu Dhabi.”

It remains unknown how long Epic Fury will last. U.S. President Donald Trump has offered various timelines, the most recent being an operation that could last “four to five weeks.”

As we have reported in the past, though a large number of aircraft have been pushed to the Middle East, that still might not be enough for a sustained campaign lasting more than a month. As the war drags on, we will very likely see more allied aviation assets pouring into the region, something we will continue to monitor.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

March 3 (UPI) — Suspected Iranian drones have struck the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Defense said early Tuesday, as the United States orders all non-emergency personnel to evacuate Bahrain and Kuwait amid Tehran’s continued retaliation strikes targeting U.S. assets and Israel.

Two drones struck the embassy, igniting “a limited fire” and causing “minor material damage” to the building, the ministry said in a statement.

The embassy confirmed in a statement that it had been attacked, urging people to avoid the facility. It said the mission was closed on Tuesday, and urged U.S. citizens throughout Saudi Arabia, but especially in the cities of Jeddah, Riyadh and Dhahran, to shelter in place.

The Saudi Defense Ministry later said it had intercepted and destroyed eight drones near Riyadh and Al-Kharj.

Asked what the U.S. response to the attack would be, President Donald Trump told NewsNation, “You’ll find out soon.”

Saudi Arabia is a U.S. ally and home to several American assets, including the U.S. Embassy and Prince Sultan Air Base, as well as other U.S. military facilities.

Since the United States and Israel began attacking Iran early Saturday, the Islamic regime has launched a barrage of missiles and drones targeting Israel as well as U.S. assets throughout the region.

Along with Saudi Arabia, Iran has attacked Kuwait, Jordan, Bahrain, Oman and the United Arab Emirates. At least six U.S. service members have been killed so far, all in Kuwait, where three U.S. fighter planes were also downed by Kuwait’s aerial defense weapons system in what is being called friendly fire.

The State Department on Tuesday ordered non-emergency U.S. government personnel and their families to leave Bahrain and Kuwait, according to statements published by their respective embassies.

On Tuesday, the State Department urged Americans throughout the Middle East to leave.

In a 4 p.m. EST statement from Assistant Secretary Mora Namdar, Americans in 14 Middle Eastern countries were told to “DEPART NOW.”

March 2 (UPI) — A United Airlines flight made an emergency landing at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday after a possible engine fire was reported, authorities and the airline said.

United flight 2127 from Los Angeles to Newark, N.J., departed LAX at 10:43 a.m. PST, but was diverted back to the airport about 40 minutes into the flight, according to flight traffic tracker FlightRadar24.

It landed at 11:20 a.m., the Federal Aviation Administration told UPI.

After the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner landed, slides deployed from its fuselage, which some passengers used to deplane. Uncorroborated video posted online shows passengers going down the slide, where firefighters met them on the tarmac before they ran from the plane.

United Airlines confirmed to UPI in a statement that the flight “safely returned to Los Angeles” and that the issue was “a possible engine fire.”

“Customers deplaned via slides and airstairs and were bused to the terminal,” the company said.

No serious injuries were reported among the 265 passengers and 12 crew, United Airlines said, adding that a second aircraft was arranged to take them to Newark.

According to a statement from the Los Angeles Fire Department, no passengers required transport to the hospital.

The FAA told UPI that it was investigating.