Vice President JD Vance — a Marine veteran of the Iraq War who has long been skeptical of American military interventions abroad — insisted Monday that the war with Iran is different because President Donald Trump “has clearly defined what he wants to accomplish.”
“There’s just no way that Donald Trump is going to allow this country to get into a multiyear conflict with no clear end in sight and no clear objective,” Vance said in a primetime interview with Fox News. His remarks were his first in public since the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran began Saturday.
“The president wants to make it clear to the Iranians and to the world that he is not going to rest until he accomplishes that all-important objective of ensuring that Iran can’t have a nuclear weapon,” the vice president added.
Trump on Monday outlined the administration’s four key objectives for its operations: destroying Iran’s missile capabilities, “annihilating” its navy, preventing Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and ensuring the “Iranian regime” cannot continue to “arm, fund and direct” its proxy groups in the Middle East.
The vice president was in the White House Situation Room with Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Energy Secretary Chris Wright as Trump launched Operation Epic Fury from his Mar-a-Lago war room in Palm Beach, Florida.
It’s quite a shift from Vance’s previous stance. In 2023, while serving as a U.S. senator representing Ohio, Vance endorsed Trump in a Wall Street Journal op-ed headlined: “Trump’s best foreign policy? Not starting any wars.”
“He has my support in 2024 because I know he won’t recklessly send Americans to fight wars overseas,” Trump’s future vice president wrote. “In Mr. Trump’s four years in office, he started no wars despite enormous pressure from his own party and even members of his own administration.
“Not starting wars is perhaps a low bar, but that’s a reflection of the hawkishness of Mr. Trump’s predecessors and the foreign-policy establishment they slavishly followed,” he asserted.
Trump, in the first year of his second term, has ordered more airstrikes than his predecessor, President Joe Biden, did in his full four years.
Vance’s comments Monday come as the American death toll from the operation mounts. Six service members have been killed in action since the first wave of strikes began Saturday morning Eastern time, according to U.S. Central Command. Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth have conceded that additional casualties are likely.
The U.S. has also signaled it plans to escalate its military offensive against Iran, as it urges Americans in more than a dozen countries in the Middle East to “depart now” due to serious safety risks.
“The hardest hits are yet to come,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Capitol Hill on Monday, warning, “The next phase will be even more punishing on Iran than it is right now.”
Tanya Noury is a reporter for Military Times and Defense News, with coverage focusing on the White House and Pentagon.