Trump Warns: Without a Deal, Iran Will Be "Finished for Good"

U.S. President Donald Trump gave an interview today (Sunday) to NBC and said that "the U.S. will work with Iran to collect and destroy its enriched uranium." Trump added that the goal is to reach an agreement with Tehran to end the war. At the same time, he stressed that "in the absence of an agreement, we will strike the Iranian military even harder, to the point that American forces could safely collect the material on their own."

Trump added: "If we make a deal where we are friendly, we will all go together. It will be our equipment. We will take it out and destroy it, whether it is at the site or whether we take it off-site. We will go with them, or without them. But there will not be people shooting at us, okay?. Now, if we do not make a deal, then we will finish them for good, militarily, and with a very heavy hand."

The American president claimed in the interview that the U.S. can monitor activity at Iran’s nuclear sites because it has "cameras in space." In his words, "We have cameras on it, everywhere. If somebody goes there, you can read his first name on his lapel." Trump noted that he wants to keep U.S. forces deployed in the region.

He repeated what he said last week, that the two sides are "very close" to signing an agreement, but that he is pushing Iran to move forward in abandoning its nuclear ambitions. "We have a few points. They do not even look like big points. They admitted the fact that they will not have nuclear weapons. We had a clause there that they would not develop nuclear weapons. I want another clause to make sure Iran cannot work around the deal. I want to put in the words, 'if they buy or acquire. Then they do not have the right to develop or acquire."

Trump said he finds Iran’s new leadership "more rational, very smart" after attacks by Israel and the U.S. killed former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and many of his deputies. Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba Khamenei, has taken his father’s place and is "part" of the approval process for a deal, Trump said, adding that he is open to direct talks with the new supreme leader.

"He is younger. I think more rational. He is pretty badly wounded. So there is a certain amount of courage there. A lot of people, if they were wounded that badly, they would not be talking about, you know, 'how do we get along with the U.S. They would have other things on their mind. So there is a certain amount of courage there. But he is very badly wounded." Trump declined to say definitively whether he knows the Iranian leader’s exact location or whether that location is in Iran. Trump also added in the interview that "any new agreement with Iran will not immediately unfreeze any of its assets."