The Pentagon chief claims Tehran ‘cannot outlast’ US as strikes intensify and civilian toll climbs
The US will have complete, uncontested control of Iranian airspace within days, the Pentagon chief, Pete Hegseth, declared Wednesday, saying Iran “cannot outlast” American military power and that its capabilities were “evaporating by the hour”.
The joint US-Israeli operation to attack Iran, which began on Saturday, had already delivered “twice the air power of shock and awe of Iraq in 2003” and “seven times the intensity of Israel’s previous operations against Iran during the 12-day war”, Hegseth claimed at a press conference alongside Dan Caine, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.
“We are just getting started,” Hegseth said. “We are accelerating, not decelerating.” He said the Iranian regime “are toast, and they know it, or at least soon enough, they will know it.”
Caine added that Iran’s ballistic missile capability had been reduced by 86% since the opening day of hostilities, its navy largely destroyed and its senior leadership killed or in hiding. He said the progress had allowed the US to establish air superiority along Iran’s southern coast, and that forces would now “begin to expand inland, striking progressively deeper into Iranian territory”.
