Acting US Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan said on Tuesday
that while threats from Iran in the Middle East remained high, deterrence
measures taken by the Pentagon had “put on hold” the potential for attacks on
Americans, Reuters reported.
It was unclear exactly what Shanahan meant and Pentagon
officials could not immediately clarify whether the threat from Iran had been
diminished.
“There haven’t been any attacks on Americans. I would
consider that a hold,” Shanahan told reporters.
“That doesn’t mean that the threats that we’ve previously
identified have gone away. Our prudent response, I think, has given the
Iranians time to recalculate,” Shanahan said.
Later on Tuesday, Shanahan along with Secretary of State
Mike Pompeo and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Joseph Dunford
will brief lawmakers on Iran.
The US military deployed a carrier strike group, bombers and
Patriot missiles to the Middle East earlier this month in response to what
Washington said were troubling indications of possible preparations for an
attack by Iran.
Rhetoric between Tehran and Washington has escalated in
recent weeks as the United States tightened sanctions with what it said was the
goal of pushing Iran to make concessions beyond the terms of a 2015
multinational deal to curb Iran’s nuclear program. President Donald Trump
pulled the United States out of the deal in 2018.
Trump warned on Monday that Iran would be met with “great
force” if it attacked US interests in the Middle East. US government sources
said Washington strongly suspected Shiite militias with ties to Tehran were
behind a rocket attack in Baghdad’s Green Zone.
“I just hope Iran is listening. We’re in the region to
address many things, but it is not to go to war with Iran,” Shanahan said
earlier on Tuesday.
He added that it was a period where the threat remained high
and the focus was on making sure there was “no miscalculations by the
Iranians.”
US government sources told Reuters last week they believe
Iran encouraged Houthi militants or Iraq-based Shiite militias to carry out
attacks on tankers off the United Arab Emirates.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a radio interview
that the United States had yet to reach a definitive conclusion he could speak
publicly about.
“But given all the regional conflicts that we have seen over
the past decade and the shape of these attacks, it seems like it’s quite
possible that Iran was behind these,” he told the Hugh Hewitt show.
The State Department said Pompeo spoke with his Norwegian
counterpart on Tuesday and discussed an attack on a Norwegian-flagged vessel
off Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates.
