Evan Vucci/AP
President Donald Trump delivers remarks on Iran, at his Mar-a-Lago property, Friday, Jan. 3, 2020, in Palm Beach, Fla
- President Donald Trump said on Friday that the US airstrike that killed Iran's top general Qassem Soleimani was meant to "stop a war" despite Iranian officials immediately vowing revenge.
- "We take comfort in knowing that his reign of terror is over," Trump said of Soleimani. "We took action last night to stop a war, we did not take action to start a war."
- Trump added that he has "great respect" for the Iranian people, saying that while the US does not seek "regime change," the "aggression and use of proxy fighters to destabilize its neighbors must end now."
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President Donald Trump said on Friday that the US airstrike that killed Iran's top general Qassem Soleimani was meant to "stop a war" despite Iranian officials vowing revenge against the US.
On Thursday evening, the Pentagon confirmed that, at Trump's direction, US forces killed Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani in an airstrike near Baghdad's airport, drastically inflaming tensions between the US and Iran.
As the leader of the elite and secretive Quds Force of Iran's Revolutionary Guard, which carries out foreign intelligence operations outside of Iran, Soleimani abetted terrorism and violence throughout the region for decades. The Pentagon has said that he's responsible for the deaths of hundreds of US service members in Iraq and beyond.
"We take comfort in knowing that his reign of terror is over," Trump said of Soleimani. "We took action last night to stop a war, we did not take action to start a war."
Trump added that he has "great respect" for the Iranian people, saying that while the US does not seek "regime change," the "regime's aggression and use of proxy fighters to destabilize its neighbors must end now."
The strike on Soleimani came after a rocket strike on US coalition forces in Iraq, which killed a US contractor on December 27, and attacks on the US Embassy in Baghdad, for which the Pentagon blamed Tehran and the Qods force.
The US has yet to provide any evidence supporting the administration's claims that they have intelligence that Soleimani was planning more attacks on Americans, another major justification for the strike.
Despite Trump's claim that the strike was not intended to start a war, the US killing one of the most important officials in the Iranian military and intelligence community likely to provoke a strong response from Iran, potentially putting US troops and allied forces in the region in danger.
In the immediate aftermath of the strike on Soleimani, Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said that "harsh retaliation" would be waiting for the US, while a former military official, Mohsen Rezaee, vowed to "take vigorous revenge on America."
Read more:
Iran's 'forceful revenge' against the US is likely to include cyberwarfare, and experts warn that the attacks could be devastating
Trump has no clear strategy if Iran makes good on its vow to avenge the killing of a top general, experts say
This map shows where US-Iran tensions have flared in Iraq, which culminated in the strike killing Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani
How the Trump administration got into a showdown with Iran that could lead to war
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