Washington, United States. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Friday that the United States is progressing toward controlling Iranian airspace and expects achievable objectives to be completed in four to six weeks.
Airspace and timeline
Speaking to reporters at the White House, Leavitt said Washington was “well on its way toward controlling Iranian airspace” and that the United States expects the achievable US objectives to be completed in four to six weeks.
Potential leadership candidates
Leavitt said Washington was looking at potential candidates to lead Iran, a day after President Donald Trump told Reuters that the United States must be involved in choosing Iran’s next leader. Leavitt said, “I know there’s a number of people that our intelligence agencies and the United States government are looking at, but I won’t get any further on that.”
Trump remarks on succession
In the Thursday interview, Trump said he thinks the next leader of Iran is unlikely to be the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s son, who has emerged as a frontrunner to succeed his father, who was killed in a military strike at the start of the war.
Unconditional surrender statement
Earlier on Friday, Trump said there would be no deal with Iran except “unconditional surrender.” Leavitt said that Trump meant that when he, as Commander in Chief of the US Armed Forces, determines that Iran no longer poses a threat to the United States and the goals of Operation Epic Fury have been fully realized, Iran would be “in a place of unconditional surrender, whether they say it themselves or not.”
What do you think the White House’s stated four-to-six-week timeline signals about its next steps toward Iran?