Trump: "Bad Things" Will Happen to Iran If They Don't Agree to Stop Producing Uranium, Building Long-Range Missiles, and Funding Hamas;
Meanwhile, the USS Ford Closes In on Iran

Is Trump ready to strike Iran? I don't put a lot of stock in Lindsey Graham's insane, low-T ramblings, but he claims the decision to strike has already been made:

Insider Paper @TheInsiderPaper

BREAKING: Senator Lindsey Graham, in an interview with Sky News Arabia: "The US decision regarding Iran has already been made. The ships are not arriving in the area only because the weather is pleasant at this time of year"

Yeah I dunno. Trump's mind is very changeable. And he's often both ingratiating and noncommittal, meaning he'll speak to someone and make vague noises that sound like agreement but actually are not definite and don't commit him to anything.

There may be a roadblock, too: "Our great allies" in the Ummah Kingdom of Great Britain are forbidding us from using our base in Diego Garcia in any strikes on Iran:

Faytuks Network @FaytuksNetwork

The UK has blocked U.S. use of RAF Fairford and Diego Garcia for Iran strikes, citing international law, leading Trump to withdraw support for Starmer's £35B Chagos Islands handover deal with Mauritius. Senior UK officials privately called the situation 'bleak.' - The Times

On the other hand, we've moved one-third of our Navy and a huge number of jets into the area. "Experts," whatever that means now, say there's a 90% chance of hostilities.

A massive fleet of US warplanes is heading to Iran to lay the groundations to bomb the Islamic Republic.

Aircraft including combat jets and support plane like air-to-air refuellers are flying to the Middle East - just hours after Iran launched a series of wargames.

These manoeuvres, in conjunction with the approaching USS Gerald R Ford strike group and USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier, have led insiders to estimate that there is a 90 per cent chance of war.

Former Israeli intelligence chief Amos Yadlin said he believes a strike would happen in a "matter of days".

The fleet of planes includes more than 50 American fighter jets, which include F-35s and F-16s, and dozens of air-to-air refuelling tankers.

One source within the administration told Axios: "The boss is getting fed up. Some people around him warn him against going to war with Iran, but I think there is a 90 per cent chance we see kinetic action in the next few weeks."

The USS Ford will reportedly be poised to strike by next week.

Trump says "bad things" will happen if Iran does not agree to his demands.

Iran held annual military drills with Russia on Thursday as a second American aircraft carrier drew closer to the Middle East, with both the United States and Iran signaling they are prepared for war if talks on Tehran's nuclear program fizzle out.

President Donald Trump said he believes 10 to 15 days is "enough time" for Iran to reach a deal. But the talks have been deadlocked for years, and Iran has refused to discuss wider U.S. and Israeli demands that it scale back its missile program and sever ties to armed groups. Indirect talks held in recent weeks made little visible progress, and one or both sides could be buying time for final war preparations.

Iran insists that the only thing it will discuss is its nuclear program, and also, it will not make any concessions regarding its nuclear program.

Let's definitely keep talking to them!

Iran's theocracy is more vulnerable than ever following 12 days of Israeli and U.S. strikes on its nuclear sites and military last year, as well as mass protests in January that were violently suppressed. But it is still capable of striking Israel and U.S. bases in the region, and has warned that any attack would trigger a regional war.

The war will be fought in the region of Tehran.

Iran earlier this week launched a drill that involved live-fire in the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow opening of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of the world's traded oil passes.

Tensions are also rising inside Iran, as mourners hold ceremonies honoring slain protesters 40 days after their killing by security forces. Some gatherings have seen anti-government chants despite threats from authorities.

The movements of additional American warships and airplanes, with the USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier near the mouth of the Mediterranean Sea, don't guarantee a U.S. strike on Iran -- but it bolsters Trump's ability to carry out one should he choose to do so.

...

The official said top national security officials gathered Wednesday to discuss Iran, and were briefed that the "full forces" needed to carry out potential military action are expected to be in place by mid-March. The official did not provide a timeline for when Iran is expected to deliver its written response.

"It's proven to be, over the years, not easy to make a meaningful deal with Iran, and we have to make a meaningful deal. Otherwise bad things happen," Trump said Thursday.

...

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk urged his nation's citizens to immediately leave Iran as "within a few, a dozen, or even a few dozen hours, the possibility of evacuation will be out of the question." He did not elaborate, and the Polish Embassy in Tehran did not appear to be drawing down its staff.

The German military said that it had moved "a mid-two digit number of non-mission critical personnel" out of a base in northern Iraq because of the current situation in the region and in line with its partners' actions. It said that some troops remain to help keep the multinational camp running in Irbil, where they train Iraqi forces.
This image provided Thursday Feb. 19, 2026 by the Iranian military and dated

...

"This week, another 50 U.S. combat aircraft -- F-35s, F-22s, and F-16s -- were ordered to the region, supplementing the hundreds deployed to bases in the Arab Gulf states," the New York-based Soufan Center think tank wrote. "The deployments reinforce Trump's threat -- restated on a nearly daily basis -- to proceed with a major air and missile campaign on the regime if talks fail."

On the other hand, this genius warns us that Iran's missile system is mighty and will send the US fleet to the bottom of the sea.

Say how did Iran's drones, anti-ship missiles, and anti-aircraft missiles work in Venezuela? I heard not so good. What did you hear?

And now, as reported by the WSJ via Ed Morrissey, Trump is considering launching a "limited" strike against Iran to convince them he is serious and prod them to make actual concessions on nukes, missiles, and funding terrorist proxies.

I think that's kind of dumb. Nothing convinces an opponent you are not serious than your preference to deliver mere pinprick Attitude Adjustment strikes.

Talks continue between Iran, the US, and the various mediators hoping to avert military action as the weekend approaches. Thus far, Iran still thinks it can get a new JCPOA, while Donald Trump still thinks he can force them to deal rationally. Both sides appear ready to be disappointed, at the very least.

Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi insisted that the regime's nuclear program will survive both the strikes in June and the coming reckoning from the US armada assembling in the Persian Gulf. Araghchi did offer yet another deal in which Iran just postpones the inevitable...

In other words, Araghchi offers only a restoration of Barack Obama's 2015 Iran deal,

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If the Iranians remain locked in a JCPOA fantasy, Trump may be stuck in some misapprehensions of his own. The Wall Street Journal reports that the White House is now considering a limited opening strike, perhaps to push the Iranians into concessions on ballistic missiles and terror proxies. That strategy has its own problems:

President Trump is weighing an initial limited military strike on Iran to force it to meet his demands for a nuclear deal, a first step that would be designed to pressure Tehran into an agreement but fall short of a full-scale attack that could inspire a major retaliation.

The opening assault, which if authorized could come within days, would target a few military or government sites, people familiar with the matter said. If Iran still refused to comply with Trump's directive to end its nuclear enrichment, the U.S. would respond with a broad campaign against regime facilities--potentially aimed at toppling the Tehran regime.

The first limited-strike option, which hasn't been previously reported, signals Trump might be open to using military force not only as a reprimand for Iran's failure to make a deal, but also to pave the way for a U.S.-friendly accord. One of the people said Trump could ratchet up his attacks, starting small before ordering larger strikes until the Iranian regime either dismantles its nuclear work or falls.

There are many lessons of Vietnam, but one of the biggest ones is that slow escalation is a terrible strategy. An enemy can absorb small attacks and disruptions and adapt to them.

The right strategy is the same optimal strategy for picking up a girl at a bar: Go Ugly Early.

Meanwhile, the USS Ford Closes In on Iran&bodytext=Is Trump ready to strike Iran? I don't put a lot of stock in Lindsey Graham's insane, low-T ramblings, but he claims the decision to strike has already been made: Insider Paper @TheInsiderPaper BREAKING: Senator Lindsey Graham, in an interview...&topic=world_news"> posted by Disinformation Expert Ace at 01:20 PM

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