- USS Abraham Lincoln leaves Asia-Pacific: US officials.
- Say more assets will arrive in ME in the coming days.
- Trump says Iran “can’t go nuclear.”
WASHINGTON: A U.S. military carrier strike group and other assets will arrive in the Middle East region in the coming days, two U.S. officials said Thursday, even as President Donald Trump expressed hope of avoiding further military action against Iran.
U.S. warships, including the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, several destroyers and fighter jets, began leaving the Asia-Pacific region last week as tensions between Iran and the United States soared following a harsh crackdown on protests across Iran in recent months.
One of the officials said additional air defense systems were also being considered for the Middle East. The United States often increases its troops in the region at times of heightened tension, which experts say can be entirely defensive in nature.
However, the U.S. military staged a major buildup last summer ahead of its June strikes against Iran’s nuclear program, and later boasted about how it kept its plans to strike secret.
Trump had repeatedly threatened to intervene against Iran following the recent killings of protesters, but the protests declined last week and Trump’s rhetoric on Iran has since softened. He shifted his attention to other geopolitical issues, notably his conquest of Greenland.
On Wednesday, Trump said he hoped there would be no further U.S. military action in Iran, but said the United States would act if Tehran resumed its nuclear program.
“They can’t go nuclear,” Trump said. CNBC in an interview in Davos, Switzerland, referring to major U.S. airstrikes against Iranian nuclear facilities in June 2025. “If they do it, it’s going to happen again. »
It has now been at least seven months since the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, last checked Iran’s stockpiles of highly enriched uranium. Its own guidelines state that these checks should be carried out monthly.
Iran must submit a report to the IAEA on what happened at the sites struck by the United States and what nuclear materials are believed to be there, including about 440.9 kg of uranium enriched to a purity of 60 percent, close to the weapons-grade level of about 90 percent. That’s enough material, if further enriched, to make 10 nuclear bombs, according to IAEA criteria.
It is not yet clear whether protests in Iran could resume. The demonstrations began on December 28 as small protests at Tehran’s Grand Bazaar against economic woes and quickly spread across the country.
