A defense adviser to Leader of the Islamic Revolution in Iran warned that any US attack on the Islamic Republic could set off a “full-fledged war” in the region.
“We don’t welcome a crisis. We don’t welcome war. We are not after starting a war,” Brigadier General Hossein Dehqan, the military adviser of Imam Sayyed Ali Khamenei, told the Associated Press in a recent interview.
He, however, warned against any US military escalation in final weeks of US President Donald Trump in office.
“A limited, tactical conflict can turn into a full-fledged war,” he said. “Definitely, the United States, the region and the world cannot stand such a comprehensive crisis.”
The remarks came in reaction to a recent report in which the New York Times, citing four current and former US officials on Monday, said that Trump asked senior advisers in an Oval Office meeting on Thursday whether he had options to take action against Iran’s main nuclear site in the coming weeks.
A range of senior advisers dissuaded Trump from moving ahead with a military strike, said The New York Times, adding that the advisers — including Vice President Mike Pence; Secretary of State Mike Pompeo; Christopher C. Miller, the acting defense secretary; and Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff — warned that a strike against Iran’s facilities could easily escalate into a broader conflict in the last weeks of Trump’s presidency.
Further, Dehqan reiterated the country’s principled stance that its missile power is non-negotiable due to its forming part of Iran’s “deterrent” might.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran will not negotiate its defensive power … with anybody under any circumstances,” he added. “Missiles are a symbol of the massive potential that is in our experts, young people and industrial centers.”
The official also described as ‘strategic mistake’, the Zionist entity’s regional expansionist ambitions that saw the regime normalizing its relations with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Sudan earlier in the year.
“It is opening an extensive front,” he said. “Just imagine every Israeli in any military base can be a target for groups who are opposed to Israel.”
Source: Iranian media
