Trump warns Iran of 'very tough times' as Pentagon readies $29B escalation plan
US President Donald Trump told French network BFMTV that Iran faces "very tough times, very tough times" if Pakistan-mediated talks on a 14-point Hormuz-and-uranium deal collapse, as the Pentagon prepared to reactivate a joint US-Israeli air campaign within a week. The Pentagon now puts the US war bill at $29 billion — up $4 billion from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's $25 billion congressional estimate two weeks ago — while classified intelligence shows Iran has restored 30 of 33 missile launchpads along the Strait of Hormuz and retains 70% of its ballistic inventory. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington is pushing for a diplomatic exit because US military resources are finite.
US President Donald Trump warned in an interview broadcast on French network BFMTV that Iran faces "very tough times, very tough times" if Pakistan-mediated talks on a permanent peace treaty fail. "I have no idea if they're going to do it. If not, they're going to have very tough times, very tough times. They'd better make a deal," Trump said, marking a sharp hardening of the US position toward Tehran.
The deadlocked negotiations centre on a 14-point memorandum of understanding being brokered in Islamabad. The current draft asks Iran to relax its military stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz and relocate its highly enriched uranium stocks abroad in exchange for a 30-day easing of the US naval blockade. Tehran's hesitation has hardened in recent days after the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps threatened large-scale missile strikes on US regional bases in response to the US Navy's interception of two blockaded Iranian oil tankers.
The financial bill of the war is now central to White House calculations. The Pentagon's latest budgetary assessment puts the conflict's cost to the US at $29 billion, a $4 billion jump from the $25 billion figure Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave congressional appropriators just two weeks ago. The increase reflects the operational costs of sustaining massive naval and aerial deployments in the Persian Gulf.
If talks collapse, the Pentagon has finalised a multi-tiered "escalation plan" that could be activated as early as next week. The suspended joint US-Israeli air campaign would be reactivated under a revamped operational mandate utilising hundreds of combat aircraft and two active Carrier Strike Groups already staged in the region. Advanced contingency scripts include a high-risk special forces raid to physically seize nuclear materials at the hardened Isfahan facility, alongside an amphibious assault by US Marines to capture Kharg Island, the main bottleneck for Iran's maritime oil exports.
Planners are working from intelligence that contradicts earlier White House claims that Iran's military had been decimated. Classified assessments reveal Iran has successfully restored 30 of 33 missile launchpad positions along the Strait of Hormuz and retains roughly 70 percent of its ballistic inventory.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington is "aggressively pushing for a clear diplomatic solution because American military resources are finite and must be balanced with critical parallel security priorities". Trump's ultimatum comes a week after he publicly rejected Iran's counterproposal as "totally unacceptable", with the cease-fire described in subsequent days as on "life support" amid mutual accusations of violations.