The Trump administration has justified the strikes on Iran by making the case that Tehran was an 'imminent threat' to the US. However, officials from the administration confirmed in a closed-door meeting that the there was no intelligence that suggested that Iran would attack the US first, Reuters reported, citing two sources.
After the first wave of attacks by Israel and the US on Tehran, Trump, in an eight-minute video, said that Iran had continued to develop long-range missiles that could threaten Europe and US troops. However, American intelligence had assessed that it would take years before the country could develop any, if Tehran were in pursuit of such weapons.
He also said the attacks were to "defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime." The US government has so far not clarified what the imminent threat by Iran was to the public or to the US Congress.
As a means to justify the attacks, a senior official told reporters that the American soldiers would have suffered far more casualties by waiting for an impending strike, 12 hours after the attacks on Tehran began.
In the briefing, two officials said that the president ordered the strikes after he determined that Iran would not agree to stop uranium enrichment.
However, two days before the attack, Oman’s Foreign Minister who was part of the mediations between the US and Iran, said that Tehran had agreed to never stockpile enriched uranium. The information was presented as a ‘breakthrough’.
Badr bin Hamad Al Busaidi also said on Friday that the issues between the countries could be resolved ‘amicably and comprehensively’ within a few months.
“Whatever imminent threat they’re posing was likely in reaction to our unprecedented military buildup in the region,” said Sen. Andy Kim to Politico. “This is an example of the president deciding what he wanted to do, and then making his administration go and find whatever argument they could make to justify it.”
The officials who attended the briefing by the Trump administration said that there was no clear evidence presented about an imminent Iranian attack.
They told reporters the day before that President Donald Trump decided to launch the attacks in part because of indicators that Iranians might strike U.S. forces in the Middle East "perhaps preemptively."
Trump, according to the officials, was not going to "sit back and allow American forces in the region to absorb attacks."
Senate Intelligence Vice Chair Mark Warner, who was among those briefed by senior officials last week, told CNN that he saw no intelligence “that Iran was on the verge of launching any kind of preemptive strike against the United States of America.”
He said that the president “started a war of choice.”
The Trump administration's lack of authorisation for the attacks has led to critisim from US lawmakers. They are also facing pressure from Congress who are asking for a justification for the operation.