WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the US attacked Iran because they knew Israel was going to launch a military strike, and the Trump administration worried about retaliation from Tehran.
“We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action,” he told reporters on Capitol Hill before briefing lawmakers. “We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces.”
He described Iran as an “imminent threat.”
Follow The Post’s live coverage of the United States’ airstrikes on Iran
“We knew that Iran was attacked, and we believed they would be attacked, that they would immediately come after us, and we were not going to sit there and absorb a blow,” he said, adding: “Had we not done so, they would have been hearings on Capitol Hill about how we knew that this was going to happen.”
Rubio also said the objective was not regime change, but ending Iran’s missile program.
“The objectives of this operation are to destroy their ballistic missile capability and make sure they can’t rebuild, and make sure that they can’t hide behind that to have a nuclear program,” he said.
But he said there was no issue with the Ayatollah being killed.
“We would love for there to be an Iran that’s not governed by radical Shia clerics,” he said.
Follow The Post’s coverage of the United States’ airstrikes on Iran:
- Trump won’t rule out sending US troops into Iran ‘if necessary’— tells The Post war is progressing ‘way ahead of schedule’
- Fourth US service member dies from Iran attacks
- Kuwait ‘mistakenly’ shot down three $31M US fighter jets, all crew safely ejected: military
- Iran led by 3-man council with varying views after mass assassination leaves huge power vacuum
“While we would love to see a new regime,” he added. “The bottom line is, no matter who governs that country a year from now, they’re not going to have these ballistic missiles.”
Rubio said the attack was launched “proactively in a defensive way” due to the imminent Israeli strike on Iran just hours after Trump told The Post Monday morning that he made up his mind after US-Iran talks ended without a deal Thursday in Geneva.
Trump did not attribute his decision to imminent Israeli action, saying Iran’s resistance to a deal made it impossible to trust the Islamic Republic and that US intelligence indicated that Iran had started work on a new nuclear facility to replace three sites ruined by his airstrikes last June.
The president later identified four objectives while speaking at the White House.
“Our objectives are clear. First, we’re destroying Iran’s missile capabilities… Second, we’re annihilating their Navy,” he said.
“Third, we’re ensuring that the world’s number one sponsor of terror can never obtain a nuclear weapon… And finally, we were ensuring that the Iranian regime cannot continue to arm, fund and direct terrorist armies outside of their borders.”
