Trump warns of ‘disproportionate’ strike amid fears of Iran retaliation
US President Donald Trump says the US would strike back at Iran “perhaps in a disproportionate manner,” defying pressure from Congress over his war powers amid spiraling tensions between Tehran and Washington.
The comment came in a tweet Sunday, days after he ordered the assassination of Iran’s General Qassem Soleimani in the Iraqi capital Baghdad.
“These Media Posts will serve as notification to the United States Congress that should Iran strike any US person or target, the United States will quickly & fully strike back, & perhaps in a disproportionate manner. Such legal notice is not required, but is given nevertheless," claimed the US president.
With Iran vowing to retaliate the cowardly attack in due time, there were concern in the United States about Trump’s irrational escalation of tensions in the region.
Senate democratic leader Charles Schumer told ABC earlier in the day that he “will do everything I can to assert our authority. We do not need this president either bumbling or impulsively getting us into a major war.”
“We need Congress to be a check on this president,” said the New York Democratic lawmaker.
Congressional Democrats also expressed skepticism towards the evidence the Trump administration has cited to justify the assassination claimed to have been aimed at averting "imminent attack."
"I think we learned the hard way, Chris, in Iraq, in the Iraq war, that administrations sometimes manipulate and cherry-pick intelligence to further their political goals. That's what got us into the Iraq war," Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen told Fox News.
This is while a military official told Politico that the Pentagon has deployed a task force of special operations troops that includes Army Rangers to the Middle East.
"I'm saying that they have an obligation to present the evidence," Van Hollen said, adding that while "everybody knows that Soleimani was a very bad, despicable guy," the administration has "not supported" its "claim of an imminent threat."
President @realDonaldTrump has been resolute. We will defend America. Iranian proxy forces in Iraq thought they could act with impunity. We’ve made clear to the Iranian regime that wouldn’t be the case. The American people should know we will always defend them. pic.twitter.com/jMJ9FLRPhr
— Department of State (@StateDept) January 5, 2020
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has defended Trump’s decision to launch the terrorist attack near the Baghdad airport.
"We would have been culpably negligent had we not taken this action," the former CIA chief told NBC "It's never one thing. ... It's never one moment. It's never one instance," he said. "It's a full situational awareness of risk and analysis."
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