President Donald Trump said Thursday that the United States has no need to reach an agreement with Iran, arguing that economic pressure and a continued naval blockade are already driving the Iranian regime toward collapse.
“We don’t need a deal with Iran. Those days have long since passed,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “We’ve got their money, Hundreds of Billions of Dollars, and we’ve got their Strait!”
In the same post, Trump told Vice President JD Vance to focus on domestic priorities, after reports that Vance had been weighing direct talks with a senior Iranian security official. The Wall Street Journal reported Vance had considered meeting Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, though no such meeting was ever scheduled.
The White House said negotiations remain possible if Tehran puts forward acceptable terms. The New York Post reported Vance joined an Oval Office meeting on Iran Thursday morning with senior administration officials. “If he ever sees a smart deal worth looking at, he’ll send the VP to get it done,” a U.S. official told the outlet.
Iran continues to demand that Washington meet seven conditions before substantive talks, including lifting the American blockade, easing sanctions, releasing frozen assets and paying reparations. Secretary of State Marco Rubio rejected those demands Tuesday as “absurd,” saying it is Iran that owes reparations, not the United States.
Blockade Numbers
U.S. Central Command reported Wednesday that American forces have redirected nearly 150 vessels attempting to breach the blockade since July, disabled five ships, and blocked an estimated $30 billion in Iranian crude exports. CENTCOM said nearly 4,000 commercial vessels carrying roughly 1.7 billion barrels of crude oil have passed through the Strait of Hormuz under American protection.
“We control the Gulf in terms of the Hormuz Strait. We control it. Totally control it,” Trump said in an interview with Hugh Hewitt.
Asked whether he would keep the blockade in place even if it took another 26 months to topple Iran’s government, Trump said the regime is already near the end. “Well, the regime is collapsing,” he said, citing inflation exceeding 300 percent, the government’s inability to pay its soldiers, and heavy damage to Iran’s navy, air force and air defenses.
Rubio described the administration’s thinking this way: “The President has concluded that for the time being there is no need for major combat operations because we’re achieving the same objective by economic means.”
Gulf Allies Urge Patience
In a separate interview with Stephen A. Smith, Trump said Gulf allies — Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, the UAE and Bahrain — had asked him to hold off on expanding military operations and let the economic pressure keep working. “Saudi Arabia has asked me to please just let it be the way it is now for a while because they’re disintegrating,” Trump said of Iran.
Asked if he would already have widened military action without those requests, Trump said, “Yes, I would.” He said the U.S. has so far spared much of Iran’s energy infrastructure, bridges and manufacturing capacity, which he said could be destroyed within three days of a broader offensive.
At Wednesday’s Veterans Day address at Arlington National Cemetery, Trump said the U.S. has already won a decisive military victory over Iran but wants total victory before the conflict ends. “We want to make sure we have a total victory, not a 93% victory. It’s going to be total,” he said.
Asked by Hewitt whether he’d strike again if Iran threatened American allies or ships in the Strait of Hormuz, Trump said he would act immediately: “If I saw things going the other way, I would do that.” Asked about possible renewed strikes on Iran’s industrial sites and the Pickaxe Mountain nuclear facility, he said, “It could happen.”
Threats and Warnings
Senior Iranian officials have continued issuing threats against American and Israeli forces. Rezaei said Thursday the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Aerospace Force is prepared to deliver “new surprises on the battlefield.” Iran’s Assembly of Experts, which oversees Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, also called Thursday for reconsidering Iran’s membership in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and revising its defense doctrine, calling such changes an “inevitable necessity.”
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who has helped lead the economic pressure campaign, has reportedly relocated with his family to a military installation following threats linked to Tehran. Asked what would happen if Iran assassinated a senior American official, Trump warned: “They will not exist very long any longer.”
