Iran war spreads across the world as US warns: ‘We have only just begun’
Donald Trump and Israel’s war with Iran spread far beyond the Middle East on Wednesday, as NATO shot down a ballistic missile bound for Türkiye and the United States sank an Iranian frigate off the coast of Sri Lanka, killing dozens of sailors.
While Britain prepared to send a warship to defend Cyprus and repatriate thousands of citizens stranded in the Middle East, Iran rained missiles and drones on its neighbors, while Washington prepared to expand its attacks and boasted of virtually sinking Iran’s navy.
Sir Keir Starmer said two more government-chartered flights would depart from Oman “in the coming days”, while British Airways announced it would operate two more flights between Muscat and Heathrow on Friday and Saturday.
Unlike mega aviation hubs in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha, Muscat does not fall under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ travel warning; It can be reached from both Dubai and Abu Dhabi by road, a journey of approximately 300 kilometers.
But a large-scale evacuation of the 138,000 British nationals who have registered their presence in the Middle East is not expected and experts believe it could take weeks to clear the backlog of passengers.
Meanwhile, the warship prepared to protect Britain’s base in Cyprus is not planned to set sail until next week. HMS Dragon Ammunition is being loaded in Portsmouth before departing for the Mediterranean after RAF Akrotiri was hit by a drone on Monday.
Royal Navy Wildcat helicopters armed with Martlet drone destruction missiles are being deployed ahead of the warship, whose journey is expected to take several days.
In a bombastic briefing in Washington, US defense secretary Pete Hegseth warned that Operation Epic Rage was “just getting started”, announcing that a US Navy submarine had destroyed IRIS. DanaAn Iranian frigate off the coast of Sri Lanka.
“An American submarine sank an Iranian warship that thought it was safe in international waters. Instead, it was sunk by a torpedo. Quiet death,” Mr. Hegseth said at a briefing. He added that the United States is prepared to continue a long war with Iran as more U.S. bombers and fighters arrive in the region.
“This was never intended to be a fair fight, and it is not a fair fight,” he said. “We hit them while they are on the ground. Our and our allies’ air defenses have too many runways. We can easily continue this fight for as long as we need.”
Sri Lankan officials said that 87 people died in the torpedo attack and photographs emerged showing that the survivors were hospitalized.
NATO was forced to separately shoot down an Iranian ballistic missile aimed at Türkiye; It was the closest Tehran has come to a direct attack on a NATO country, and that could draw Türkiye and its allies into a collective response.
A Turkish official said the missile was aimed at an unspecified military base in Cyprus but “went off course”. The weapon had already passed over Iraq and Syria when it was shot down by NATO air and missile defense systems in the Eastern Mediterranean.
NATO said it “stands firmly with all its allies, including Türkiye, as Iran continues its indiscriminate attacks across the region.” Türkiye called for moderation to prevent further escalation of tensions.
Mr Hegseth played down suggestions that attacks on Türkiye would trigger NATO’s collective defense clause; instead, he boasted that the United States had “just begun to disintegrate, demoralize, destroy and defeat” Iran’s capabilities. He also vowed to “avenge” six US service personnel killed in the region since Saturday.
Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, added that the United States would now “begin to expand from within by attacking deeper and deeper into Iranian territory” and claimed that Iran’s capabilities appeared to have diminished, claiming that it was now firing far fewer missiles than at the beginning of the conflict.
Adm. Brad Cooper, head of U.S. Central Command, said U.S. forces have struck more than 2,000 targets across Iran since Saturday. The first 24 hours of the conflict saw almost twice as many attacks as the first day of the war in Iraq in 2003.
As the administration increasingly threatened a war that could last weeks, the U.S. Senate was preparing for a key vote on a war powers resolution that could require congressional approval for future strikes.
Iran launched retaliatory strikes with hundreds of drones targeting Kuwait, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Wednesday. He insisted that his attacks were aimed directly at US interests and not at regional neighbors.
The EU’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, said the Iranian government had created a strong justification for its own demise by attacking its neighbors indiscriminately. “Iran’s strategy is to sow chaos and set the region on fire,” he said.
Meanwhile, Israel announced that its forces hit targets across Iran for the fifth day. An Israeli F-35 fighter jet shot down an Iranian Yak-130 over Tehran; This is believed to be the first time the next-generation F-35 has shot down a manned aircraft in combat. The Israeli air force said it had dropped 5,000 munitions on Iran since Saturday.
The Martyrs and Veterans Affairs Foundation, a state institution of Iran, claimed that the death toll in Iran exceeded 1,000. The UN also said it was “deeply troubled” by the deaths of children, estimating that 160 people were killed when bombs hit a girls’ primary school in the southern city of Minab on Saturday. Hegseth said the Pentagon is still investigating allegations related to this attack.
