Trump Warns Iran: U.S. to Bomb ‘Back to Stone Ages’ in 2-3 Weeks

President Trump declared in a prime-time address that the U.S. would spend the next two to three weeks bombing Iran “back to the stone ages” if a war-ending deal cannot be reached, vowing to target the country’s power plants and oil fields in what he described as a “final blow” to close out the bombing campaign that began February 28. The threat sent oil prices ↑ and stock futures ↓ plummeting, as markets braced for potential devastation to Iran’s civilian infrastructure and prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a critical artery for global energy supplies. Trump’s stark warning betrayed frustration that Iranian leadership does not believe they are losing the war, with one confidant revealing the president has privately discussed “testing their pain tolerance” through intensified strikes. The massive bombing campaign would have catastrophic consequences for Tehran’s civilian population and the future of the country, while likely inciting retaliation against U.S. allies in the region. Despite claims that all U.S. military objectives were near completion, Trump’s suggestion that the war could end without resolving the strait’s closure raised fears of an indefinite global energy crisis. The president argued that previous administrations should have handled the Iranian threat, making the exaggerated claim that Israel and the entire Middle East would have been destroyed if he had not withdrawn from the 2015 nuclear deal. Trump also asserted that Iran had begun rebuilding its nuclear program after last June’s 12-day war, necessitating renewed U.S. action, though his claim of an “imminent threat” has been widely questioned given the country’s heavily damaged nuclear facilities and missile capabilities that cannot reach the U.S. homeland. As mediators continue seeking a ceasefire in exchange for reopening the strait, Trump’s mixed messages—at one point suggesting U.S. allies should “go into the straight and take it,” before claiming it would “just open up naturally” once the war ends—have perplexed his own team and left global markets on edge.

Reported by Vance Sterling (Crisis & Global Conflict Director).