July 25 (UPI) — President Donald Trump said Friday that he’s ready to continue talks with Iran or escalate fighting, but an Iranian general said it’s ready to fight.
Trump met with top advisors and cabinet members on Friday to make a decision on whether to escalate attacks on Iran, The New York Times reported. Friday night, no attacks on Iran from the United States or on U.S. military sites were reported after 13 straight nights of fighting.
The White House hasn’t said if the president decided what to do, but Trump said the military is ready for a heavier attack if Iran doesn’t want to resume talks.”Look, we’re locked and loaded,” Trump told reporters on Friday. “We’re ready to go, but we’re talking to them, so maybe there will be, maybe there won’t be a tipping point. Maybe they will cry uncle, or maybe they’ll just give up, or maybe they’ll just go into a cave and hide.”
He told reporters that Iran is getting more serious about talks to end the fighting.
“We are talking to them. I think they’re getting more and more serious as the days go by, for maybe the obvious reason, but we are talking to them right now,” Trump said Friday.
He said that Iran would “love to make a deal” but he didn’t “think they’re ready to.”
But an Iranian general pushed back Saturday, even suggesting that Tehran welcomed a ground invasion by American troops.
“Our war with the enemy is a war of attrition, one that will not end,” the official whom Iranian media named General Asadi said Saturday, CNN reported. “We ask God that the ground forces of the aggressor American army find themselves in a position where we can engage them on the ground.”
In an interview with Axios on Thursday, Trump said he was considering a “massive attack” on Iran.
“Bigger than ever before. I am close to making a decision. We are all set for it,” he said. But he said that decision would have consequences, and he hadn’t decided on it yet.
He told Axios that the Iranians “want to negotiate” but aren’t ready to make a deal.
“They haven’t received enough pain yet,” he said.
Two regional sources with knowledge of mediation efforts told Axios that Iranian leadership hasn’t accepted the latest proposal.
One of the sources said, “We are trying, but the Iranians are not being helpful.”
