President Donald Trump has expressed no regrets over the Iran war, saying he would make the same decision again even knowing the political cost, as Washington intensifies an economic pressure campaign that now targets foreign banks and, soon, every Iranian airline operating worldwide.
The Trump Iran war no regrets comments came during an interview with Fox News presenter Laura Ingraham on Thursday. Ingraham suggested the conflict had damaged Republican prospects, telling Trump: ‘If we hadn’t done Iran, you would be cruising to midterms victory right now.’ Trump pushed back firmly. ‘Supposing we were cruising, and all of a sudden Iran has a nuclear weapon,’ he replied. ‘They would use it.’ He went further, arguing that a nuclear-armed Iran would ‘wipe out’ Israel and the Middle East and begin striking US cities.
Trump signals war will end after elections
In a separate interview with NewsNation on Thursday, Trump was pressed on how long the conflict could continue. ‘I don’t know that they’re gonna be able to hold out,’ he said of Iran. ‘But it’ll get settled after the elections. Or maybe sooner. But it’ll get settled right after the election.’ Those remarks sit alongside a Wall Street Journal report that top White House advisers have discussed with Trump the possibility that the war could drag on beyond his current term, rattling markets that had hoped for a quicker resolution.
Trump also denied Iranian claims of damage to US military assets. Iran said it had struck multiple US fighter aircraft at a base in Jordan. ‘No damage. No nothing,’ Trump told NewsNation.
Sanctions widen to banks, airlines and Russia
While the military picture remains contested, the economic pressure is accelerating fast. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, speaking on Thursday, announced that sanctions on ‘a large bank’ would follow on Monday, timed deliberately. ‘We’re going to do it on Monday because we want to honor the memory of our fallen citizens on 9/11,’ Bessent said.
Bessent confirmed that the administration has already sanctioned and closed the Dubai branches of the second-largest bank in Egypt, which he claimed had transferred $1.8 billion to Iran. He also flagged that the 30th-largest Turkish bank that had been channelling funds to Iran would be closed, according to CNBC, though he did not name either institution in his public remarks.
The pressure goes beyond those two cases. According to Reuters, the Trump administration escalated its campaign last month with what Bessent called ‘Operation Economic Outcast,’ imposing sanctions on nearly 60 entities, individuals and vessels in a single action. The operation signals that Washington is moving well beyond symbolic gestures, targeting the financial plumbing that keeps Iranian trade connected to the global economy.
Russia’s banking sector is also now in scope. The Wall Street Journal reported that the Treasury Department identified VTB Bank, Russia’s second-largest financial institution, as a key financial node for Iran’s Islamic Republic, and imposed further sanctions on the bank. The move marks a broadening of the campaign beyond Iran’s immediate circle of trading partners.
Perhaps most sweeping of all is what comes next in the aviation sector. According to Truthout, Bessent announced that on 23 September all Iranian airlines will be shut down around the world. If carried out, the measure would sever Iran’s commercial air links globally, adding a new layer of isolation on top of the financial squeeze already under way.
The Trump Iran war no regrets stance, combined with the expanding sanctions architecture, suggests the administration is preparing for a prolonged campaign rather than a swift conclusion, whatever the president’s public insistence that a settlement will follow the midterms. Bessent’s own words on the airline shutdown offer the clearest dated marker of what comes next: 23 September.
