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U.S. President Donald Trump announced Thursday that the United States would strike Iran "very hard tonight" and vowed to seize Kharg Island and other Iranian oil infrastructure "in the not too distant future."
He separately told Fox News he would "rather not" hit civilian infrastructure such as power plants and bridges, and admitted that he is unsure whether Americans had "the stomach" for the major ground operation a Kharg seizure would require.
Trump announced the planned attacks on his Truth Social platform, while repeating his claim that Iran’s military capabilities had largely been destroyed.
"The United States will be hitting Iran (Whose Navy, Air Force, Radar, Anti Aircraft, and all other forms of Defense, together with most of its offensive capability, are gone!), very hard tonight," Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Speaking on Fox & Friends, Trump said the strikes would surpass previous nights in scale. "There will be more bombing tonight. It will be bigger, bigger, more powerful," he said.
He said bombs worth $250 million had been dropped the previous night, and that Iran "has no defense. They can't do anything about it."
He added: "They're in submission, they just don't know it yet."
Trump did not provide details about the targets, timing, or scope of the planned strikes.
Trump tied his bombing announcement to a longer-term goal: "seizing Iran's primary oil export hub," as he also compared the proposed action to U.S. policy toward Venezuela, which he described as beneficial to both Venezuela and the United States.
"At some point in the not too distant future, we will be taking Kharg Island, and other oil infrastructure points, and assume total control of their Oil and Gas Markets, much like we have with Venezuela, which is working out brilliantly for both Venezuela and the United States of America," he wrote on Truth Social.
In his Fox News interview, however, Trump appeared to qualify the threat.
"My preference has always been, take Kharg Island ... my preference would be that. I don't know that America has the stomach for it," he said.
He added that he did not want American boots on the ground but suggested a small force could "take over the whole place" if deployed.
Kharg Island, a five-mile-long coral outcrop 16 miles off Iran's Gulf coast and roughly 300 miles north of the Strait of Hormuz, handles approximately 90% of Iran's crude oil exports.
U.S. officials cited by CNN have described it as "the nexus for all the Iranian oil supply."
Any seizure operation would almost certainly require ground troops, and U.S. military experts have warned of significant casualties.
He did not provide additional details about how or when the U.S. would attempt to take control of the island or the other infrastructure sites.
Mohsen Rezaei, a military adviser to Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, responded on X before Trump's Truth Social post.
"The unhinged U.S. president imagines that bombs can get him out of the quagmire he himself created. But Iranian missiles will sink him even deeper into it," Rezaei wrote.
"Washington must choose between accepting Iran's terms and losing the last shred of its credibility in the world," he concluded.
Trump told Fox News he preferred not to strike bridges, power plants or other civilian infrastructure. "I'd rather not do it, because once you do that, the people suffer," he said.
He also said he did not want to leave Iranians without drinkable water.
He said Iran was "dying to make a deal" and that he personally would "like to get a deal now, less than three or four weeks ago."
He said the U.S. and Iran were still talking, describing the Iranians as "proud," and mused that Iran could "wave the white flag of surrender" at any time, though he predicted the media would credit Iran rather than the U.S. if a deal were reached.
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