Trump approves, then cancels, Iran strikes after drone shot down: Report
US President Donald Trump
United States President Donald Trump reportedly approved military strikes on "a handful of Iranian targets, like radar and missile batteries" in retaliation for downing an American surveillance drone, but pulled back on Thursday night after a day of escalating tensions, reported New York Times citing senior administration officials, but the plan was suddenly aborted in its early stages.
Military and diplomatic officials were expecting a strike as late as 7pm on Thursday, after intense discussions and debate at the White House among the president’s top national security officials and congressional leaders, the NYT report said quoting multiple senior administration officials involved in or briefed on the deliberations.
The report quoting officials said the president had initially approved attacks on a handful of Iranian targets, like radar and missile batteries.
But the action was then abruptly called off for the evening, putting a halt to what would have been the president’s third military action against targets in the Middle East. Trump had struck twice at targets in Syria, in 2017 and 2018.
White House and Pentagon officials declined to comment, the Times said, and it was unclear whether there were plans for such strikes in the future.
The retaliation plan was intended as a response to the shooting down of the unmanned, $130 million surveillance drone, which was struck Thursday morning by an Iranian surface-to-air missile, according to a senior administration official who was briefed on the military planning and spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss confidential plans.
The strike was set to take place just before dawn Friday in Iran to minimize risk to the Iranian military or to civilians.
But military officials received word a short time later that the strike was off, at least temporarily.