U.S. President Donald Trump promised that ‘bad things’ would happen to Iran if it won't engage in nuclear talks. (REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein)
A video released this week by state media shows two Iranian military leaders, Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Hossein Bagheri and IRGC Aerospace Force Commander Amir Ali Hajizadeh, riding in a vehicle through long, weapons-packed tunnels that Tehran has dubbed "Missile City."
The 85-second clip, which has not been independently verified, is set to menacing music and suggests that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps stands ready to respond to threats of an attack from the U.S. and Israel.
"Iran’s ballistic missile force remains the largest in the Middle East," said Behnam Taleblu, fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. "This is all part of the regime’s deterrent strategy to cement the idea of any conflict with Tehran being a costly and protracted one."
The U.S. also recently deployed two B-2 stealth bombers to the Diego Garcia base in the Indian Ocean, a warning to Iran and Yemen's Houthi militia. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
"The Islamic Republic has not closed all the doors and is willing to begin indirect negotiations with the United States."
"Our policy is to not negotiate directly while there is maximum pressure policy and threats of military strikes," foreign minister Abbas Aragchi explained. "But indirect negotiations can take place as they have in the past."
If talks falter, the U.S. and Israel have floated the possibility of targeted strikes on underground nuclear facilities.
In recent weeks, the Trump administration launched a series of offensive attacks on the Houthis in Yemen to send a message to Tehran, which supports them.
"Let nobody be fooled! The hundreds of attacks being made by Houthi, the sinister mobsters and thugs based in Yemen, who are hated by the Yemeni people, all emanate from, and are created by, IRAN," Trump wrote on Truth Social at the time.
"Iran has played 'the innocent victim' of rogue terrorists from which they’ve lost control, but they haven’t lost control," he continued. "They’re dictating every move, giving them the weapons, supplying them with money and highly sophisticated Military equipment, and even, so-called, "Intelligence.'"
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-bad-things-iran-missile-city-bombs-us