The U.S. launched “large and powerful” strikes on Iranian targets near the Strait of Hormuz, President Donald Trump said Tuesday on Truth Social.
Trump said that the attack was “retaliation for the Iranians’ failed attempt at adding sea mines to the Strait,” adding that the mines had been “removed or detonated.” It was also in response to an Iranian missile launch at an American military base in Jordan, he said.
If the Islamic Republic retaliates, Trump said, “they will be hit again at a much harder and higher level, but it will not be the biggest attack of them all, that is waiting in the wings.” When that is over, he added, “there will be very little left” of the country.
Trump later wrote in a post on Truth Social that he was not interested in negotiating with Iran.
“I’m not trying to force Iran to the bargaining table, as ABC Fake News reported. I couldn’t care less if they sign a worthless, to them, agreement. I like our position now much better, with almost total control of the Hormuz Strait, and their economy totally collapsing. They are just playing out the inevitable. When are the Iranian people going to rise up and fight?,” he wrote.
U.S. Central Command said on X at 12:34 p.m. ET that it had targeted “Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) targets in Iran.”
CENTCOM said that it had concluded strikes in a post on X at 6:33 p.m. ET.
“U.S. forces struck Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) targets including air defense sites, radar systems, maritime assets and facilities, mine laying capabilities, and communications sites,” CENTCOM said. “The strikes follow recent attempted attacks by the IRGC against commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and against American service members.”
In response, Iran’s armed forces general staff said in a statement on Telegram that it would “impose a heavy cost on the American enemy.”
The more the “U.S. military insists on its hostile actions in the region, the greater and heavier the losses it will have to bear,” it added.
A U.S. strike hit a wedding ceremony in Kuhestak in southern Iran, killing four people, including a child, and wounding more than 50 others, according to the semiofficial Fars news agency, which cited the Red Crescent of Hormozgan province.
Video of the aftermath of the attack posted on social media and verified by NBC News showed a group of people moving what appeared to be a fire hose over debris at the entrance of a damaged building filled with smoke.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei condemned the attack on X.
“The United States’ catalogue of atrocities against the nation of Iran is now complete: a residential home in Kuhestak, #Sirik, was brutally attacked tonight while families were celebrating a wedding. More than 50 innocent men, women and children were martyred or wounded,” he wrote. “This cruelty cannot be separated from the chain of atrocities that preceded it in #Minab, #Lamerd, Qeshm and elsewhere nor from the strikes on military targets that were dressed in deceptive justifications.”
Iranian state TV said the U.S. also struck a fishmeal factory on Qeshm Island in the strait as well as several civilian targets in Hormozgan province. It said a fishing pier and a Ports and Maritime Organization tower in Sirik were among the sites hit.
Cmdr. Tim Hawkins, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command, responded to the reports about civilian casualties: “We’re aware of the reports, which originated from Iranian state media. The U.S. military never targets civilians, unlike the IRGC.”
The country’s semiofficial Tasnim news agency also reported that Iran had responded with missiles and drones launched on “American bases and interests in the region.” It did not say which countries had been targeted.
The Kuwaiti army later said on X that it was defending against an Iranian drone attack.
“Kuwaiti air defenses are currently engaging hostile drone attacks following the Iranian aggression,” it said.
Trump’s post came two days after Washington and Tehran exchanged fire for the first time in a month.
Despite the recent attacks, Energy Secretary Chris Wright told reporters in Caracas, Venezuela that 17 million barrels of oil passed through the Strait of Hormuz on Monday, the largest amount since the conflict began.
Wright also said that the average amount of oil passing through the strait is now 8 million barrels a day.
On Sunday, U.S. forces targeted two rocket launchers on Larak Island, home to a key port in the Strait of Hormuz. The U.S. strikes were the first known attack by American forces since late July, and Iran’s Revolutionary Guard said several of its “fighters and compatriots” had been killed and injured.
U.S. Central Command said Monday on X that it took “limited, precise action” to prevent the Revolutionary Guard from laying mines in the crucial waterway, which 20% of the world’s oil passed through before the war began.
“In essence, Iran created the threat and the U.S. military eliminated it to protect civilian mariners, commercial shipping, and the free flow of global commerce,” CENTCOM added.
It was the first major military escalation in weeks in the war, which began when American and Israeli forces launched an assault on Iran in late February, killing its supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
After vowing “punishment” in response to Sunday’s U.S. strikes, the Revolutionary Guard announced later that day that it had launched attacks against U.S. military bases in Jordan.
Jordan’s military said it intercepted at least eight missiles Monday. The same day, the United Arab Emirates Defense Ministry said its air force “engaged” at least one drone over its territorial waters after Iran launched drones at an air base in the country.
