The US military is planning two possible ground operations in Iran and is awaiting a green light from President Donald Trump, The Atlantic reports.
According to the report, the first operation would involve seizing Kharg Island, which is responsible for 90% of Iran's oil exports, while the second would focus on removing Iran's enriched uranium stockpile using special forces. Three sources familiar with the plans told the magazine that Trump has not yet decided whether to approve one of the operations, both of them, or neither.
According to the report, the Pentagon is considering sending the thousands of Marines who arrived in the Persian Gulf region over the weekend to Kharg Island, in the northern Gulf. Seizing the island could allow the US to take control of the regime's main source of revenue and use it as leverage in negotiations, but it would involve considerable risks: American forces would have to contend with drone attacks, missiles and naval mines.
Trump himself told the Financial Times over the weekend: "Maybe we'll take Kharg, maybe we won't. We have a lot of options. It also means we'd have to stay there for a while."
The second operation, described in the report as the more complex and dangerous of the two, would involve a special forces raid deep inside Iranian territory, likely via an airborne landing, aimed at extracting Iran's enriched uranium stockpile.
Such a move would allow the administration to declare that the immediate Iranian nuclear threat had been removed, but it carries obvious risks: the possibility of becoming entangled in Iranian resistance, engineering difficulties caused by tunnels blocked in previous US strikes, and the fact that the issue of the Strait of Hormuz would remain unresolved.
According to The Atlantic, Trump has yet to decide whether to approve one of the operations, both, or neither.
