Central Command has reportedly requested more intelligence officers to sustain the effort, with air defenses to be sent to the region
The US expects to wage war on Iran for at least another 100 days, or even through September, Politico has claimed.
In an article on Wednesday, the media outlet, citing a “notification” it had reportedly obtained, said the US Central Command (CENTCOM) has requested that the Pentagon send additional “military intelligence officers to its headquarters in Tampa, Florida, to support operations against Iran for at least 100 days but likely through September.”
The publication also quoted an anonymous US official as saying that the Department of War is scrambling to ship more air defense systems to its military installations across the Middle East. The focus is reportedly on relatively inexpensive anti-drone weapons, which are viewed as an alternative to the costly air defense missiles currently used to intercept incoming Iranian UAVs.
According to Politico, this could be a sign that the Pentagon “is already allocating funding for operations that may stretch long beyond” the four-week timeline previously outlined by US President Donald Trump.
Meanwhile, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said in an interview with Newsmax on Wednesday that while the military bloc “is not involved” in the US-Israeli campaign against Iran, “allies are basically, on a massive scale, supportive of what the [US] president is doing and are also enabling what the US is doing now in the region.”
The UK as well as Spain initially denied the use of its military bases to US forces engaged in the operation against Iran. London, however, made a U-turn following a rebuke from Trump.
Madrid, in turn, recently announced that it would deploy a navy frigate to Cyprus to protect a British Royal Air Force base from Iranian strikes, in a joint effort also involving Italy, France, and the Netherlands.
Last Saturday, the US and Israeli militaries launched massive airstrikes on Iran, killing Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and a number of senior Iranian commanders, as well as hundreds of civilians, with the attacks continuing to date. Tehran has retaliated by firing barrages of drones and missiles at Israel, as well as US and UK military installations across the Middle East.
Russia has condemned the killing of Khamenei, with President Vladimir Putin describing it as a “cynical violation of all norms of human morality and international law.”
