Iran threatens to destroy 35 US military bases if attacked
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Iran’s media has reported that Tehran could destroy around 35 nearby U.S. military bases and hit Israel should the Islamic Republic be attacked. According to Iranian semi-government news agency Fars, the action could be very swift and the U.S. troops’ bases in the region could be obliterated within minutes as a retaliatory action.
The Iranian media quoted Brig. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Aerospace Force, as saying that the United States has thirty five military bases in the region and all fall under the range of Tehran’s missiles and could be destroyed within minutes of attack on Iran.
Hajizadeh, who referred to the U.S. bases and Israel as occupied territories, also said that the U.S. military presence around Iran is not a threat, but an opportunity for Iranian forces.
"We have thought of measures to set up bases and deploy missiles to destroy all these bases in the early minutes after an attack," said Hajizadeh, according to Fars News. "All these bases are within the reach of our missiles. Meantime, the occupied (Palestinian) lands (Israel) are good targets for us as well."
It is pertinent to mention here that the statement from Hajizadeh comes as the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps carries out a key military exercise. Reports suggest that during the military exercise the IRGC fired a salvo of missiles, targeting dummy enemy military bases that were set up in the deserts.
Besides, the threat from Hajizadeh should be taken seriously because the U.S. has several dozens of military bases in the region. The base of the U.S. Navy's 5th flotilla in Bahrain is only around 120 miles from Iran's southern border.
According to Brig. Gen. Hossein Salami, who talked to the media on Tuesday, the goal of the military exercise was to display Tehran’s power to defend its borders, imperative values, political determination and national significance and interests.
The military exercise is a "firm response to those who threaten Iran with the option of military action," Salami said, according to ABC News.
Tehran has time and again warned that it will destroy all U.S. military bases in the Middle East and the Strait f Hormuz, the passageway for around forty percent of the world’s oil supply, in case of any attack on the Islamic Republic.