Iran-U.S Conflict

Ryan Fredrick, Reporter

Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan presented a military plan at a meeting of top national security officials that would send as many as 120,000 US troops to the Middle East in the event  Iran strikes American forces in the region or speeds up its development of nuclear weapons, the New York Times reported.

“I don’t think it would be a good idea to send troops there. We need to just focus on ourselves and stay out of things,” junior Jay Clements said.

The latest frictions come after Iran suspended its commitments under the 2015 international nuclear deal, and threatened to resume production of enriched uranium which is used to make reactor fuel and nuclear weapons.

“Now would I do that? Absolutely. But we have not planned for that. Hopefully, we’re not going to have to plan for that, and if we did that, we’d send a hell of a lot more troops than that… If Iran wants to fight, that will be the official end of Iran. Never threaten the United States again!” President Trump tweeted.

A senior administration official confirmed that potential military plans to send additional U.S. troops to the region were reviewed during a meeting at the White House with the national security team, but did not say what the number of troops in the force would be, according to the BBC article “US president says war would be ‘end’ of Iran as tensions rise.”

“It would be so stupid to send troops now. Things have been getting better, and we need to just stay out of things. Trump is going to get us into something bigger than just a little war,” junior Ian Couch said.

The concerns over the movement of the missiles was one of multiple threads of intelligence from various sources that led the US to believe Iran had a capability and intention to launch strikes against US targets, according to CNN.

“That is a very dangerous thing to do. We should not be making anybody mad with the hot-headed president that we have,” sophomore Drake Mack said.

Tehran has allegedly placed missiles on boats in the Gulf, and US investigators reportedly believe the country damaged four tankers off the coast of the United Arab Emirates, claims Iran has denied, according to the BBC article.