By Bo Erickson, Nandita Bose and Steve Holland
WASHINGTON, April 7 (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump’s warning to destroy Iran if it did not yield to his demands drew rebukes from around the globe and even unnerved some aides and supporters, though administration officials said the increasingly hostile rhetoric was merely a negotiating tactic to force Tehran to concede.
“A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will,” Trump wrote online early on Tuesday, ahead of the 8 pm ET (2400 GMT) deadline he set for Iran to strike a deal with the U.S.
At 6:32 pm ET, Trump announced he had agreed to a two-week ceasefire with Iran.
By then, Trump’s threat had drawn harsh criticism from around the globe. Democratic lawmakers in Congress called the president “completely unhinged,” and Iran’s U.N. ambassador called Trump’s threat “deeply irresponsible” and “profoundly alarming.” Pope Leo said threats against the population of Iran are “unacceptable.”
Some of Trump’s fellow Republicans, including former U.S. Representative and one-time staunch Trump ally Marjorie Taylor Greene, openly expressed concern as well, though many others defended his approach.
“It’s about time we had a President willing to defend Americans,” the Senate Republican Conference said in a social media post.
Inside the White House, two officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters said Trump’s incendiary rhetoric was generally seen as a negotiation tactic, not an indication that he plans to annihilate Iran or use nuclear weapons.
“He’s creating leverage through unpredictability,” one of the officials said. “He wants Tehran to blink.”
The official said several White House aides helped craft the Tuesday morning social media post, but the language about ending a civilization came from Trump himself.
TRUMP’S DEMANDS
Trump has demanded that Iran must reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a critical global shipping lane closed by Iran in response to U.S.-Israeli strikes, as well as end support for militant proxies throughout the Middle East. Unless Iran complies, Trump has warned U.S. forces would attack Iran’s bridges and power plants.
A second White House official noted some unease around the high-stakes deadline. Both officials said the president could follow through on his threats to hit Iranian bridges and power plants, which some international law experts and world leaders have criticized as potentially illegal attacks on what is mainly civilian infrastructure.
“As President Trump has said, Iran can never have a nuclear weapon, and the Iranian people welcome the sound of bombs because it means their oppressors are losing,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said. “Greater destruction can be avoided if the regime understands the seriousness of this moment and makes a deal with the United States.”
Trump in his post Tuesday evening said the ceasefire deal was subject to Iran’s agreement to pause its blockade of oil and gas supplies through the strait.
ESCALATING RHETORIC
U.S. Senate Democratic leaders said in a Tuesday statement it is “unconscionable” for the president to threaten the end of the Iranian civilization and that such a threat “makes Americans less safe, further destabilizes our nation and economy, and puts at greater risk U.S. service members.”
Trump initially described the war as a “short-term excursion” aimed at addressing U.S. concerns quickly, citing the need to prevent Iran from possessing a nuclear weapon as a chief goal. He more recently has vacillated between saying the war is “ahead of schedule” to “we won” while also vowing that he will not stop until Iran is “decisively defeated.”
His language also has grown increasingly aggressive, a reflection of what aides said was his desire to get the unpopular war over with and the Strait of Hormuz opened at a time of rising gasoline prices, U.S. economic jeopardy and concern about whether Republicans can hold onto control of Congress in November elections.
Another person close to the White House said there was “a lot of support” within the West Wing for the president’s messaging.
“Staffers are definitely cheering him on,” the person said.
REPUBLICAN PUSHBACK
Trump’s threat against Iranian civilization has sparked pockets of pushback from within his own party.
U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, a frequent Trump critic despite being a Republican, said in a social media post that Trump and Iran “must de-escalate their unprecedented saber-rattling before it is too late.”
Some of the loudest media voices with influence in the president’s base, including right-wing commentator Tucker Carlson, have spoken out against Trump’s rhetoric.
Carlson on Monday called the president’s rhetoric toward Iran, including an expletive-filled threat on Easter, “vile” on “every level.”
Greene, a Georgia Republican who once was one of Trump’s most vocal defenders, suggested potentially invoking the 25th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. That amendment allows the vice president and members of the Cabinet to try to declare that a president is unable to discharge the duties of his office.
That part of the amendment has never been invoked and would require majorities of support in Congress, an unlikely scenario with Republicans holding control of both chambers.
“Not a single bomb has dropped on America. We cannot kill an entire civilization,” Greene said in a social media post, adding, “This is evil and madness.”
(Reporting by Bo Erickson, Nandita Bose and Steve Holland; additional David Morgan; Editing by Colleen Jenkins, Bill Berkrot and Christopher Cushing)
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