Hegseth claims US is winning against Iran
Says can fight as long as needed
WASHINGTON: United States DefenceSecretary PeteHegseth said on Wednesday the US was winning in the war against Iran and that the US military could fight as long as needed.
“Our air defences and that of our allies have plenty of runway. We can sustain this fight easily for as long as we need to,” he told a press conference at the Pentagon.
He dismissed China and Russia as non-factors in Washington’s decision making when it comes to the war against Iran.
“I don’t have a message for them, and they’re not really a factor here, and our issue is not with them,” Hegseth said, adding that the US focus was purely on ending what he called “the nuclear ambitions of Iran.”
Russia and China have longstanding diplomatic and trade ties with Iran, while Russia has close military links to the country. Both Moscow and Beijing have criticised the US-Israeli war to topple the Iranian government and destroy its military.
US submarine torpedoed Iranian warship in Indian Ocean: Pentagon: A US submarine sank an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean, Hegseth said, touting the strike as evidence of America’s global reach in its war on Iran. “An American submarine sunk an Iranian warship that thought it was safe in international waters. Instead, it was sunk by a torpedo,” Hegseth told reporters.
Sri Lankan authorities said they had rescued 32 crew members from the frigate IRIS Dena but that 148 other sailors were missing, with hopes low that any more would be found.
Hegseth called the attack “quiet death” and the first US sinking of an enemy ship by torpedo since World War II. “Like in that war,” he said, “we are fighting to win.”
The Pentagon says one of the main aims of the US-Israeli war against Iran, launched Saturday, is to wipe out the country’s navy.
Sri Lanka’s foreign minister, VijithaHerath, told parliament that the rescued Iranians were rushed to the main hospital in the island’s south while two navy craft and a plane were deployed to search for others.
The frigate issued a distress call at dawn on Wednesday and within less than an hour a rescue vessel reached the area about 40 kilometres (25 miles) south of the southern port of Galle, the minister said. The frigate had completely sunk and only an oil patch remained when the navy rescue boats approached. “We are keeping up a search, but we don’t know yet what happened to the rest of the crew,” a Sri Lankan defence official told AFP. Sri Lankan navy spokesman BuddhikaSampath said their operation was in line with Sri Lanka’s maritime obligations. “We responded to the distress call under our international obligations, as this is within our search and rescue area in the Indian Ocean,” Sampath told AFP. “We have found a few bodies from the area where the ship had gone down,” Sampath. Web Desk
