President Trump on Monday disparaged American allies who have responded coolly to, or outright rebuffed, his call to send warships to escort merchant vessels in and out of the Persian Gulf, complaining that the United States had been defending other countries for decades.
“You mean for 40 years we’re protecting you, and you don’t want to get involved in something that’s very minor?” Mr. Trump said, speaking about the war at a White House event with the board of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
He went on to say, “We don’t need anybody; we’re the strongest nation in the world,” adding that his request for international help to reopen the Strait of Hormuz was really a loyalty test for U.S. allies.
“I’m almost doing it in some cases not because we need them, but because I want to find out how they react,” he said.
Before his comments, top officials of Germany, Japan, Italy and Australia had said on Monday that their countries would not participate in efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a conduit for around a fifth of the world’s oil shipments. Other nations, including France, Britain and South Korea, were noncommittal.
As Iran blockades most ship traffic through the strait, Mr. Trump’s appeal for an international naval escort, which he issued on Saturday, was the first time he sounded eager to build a broad coalition against Iran. But he was asking for backup from allies who had not been consulted ahead of the U.S.-Israeli decision to begin bombing Iran last month, and who have been mocked by Mr. Trump in the past.
The sharpest refusal came from Germany, whose defense minister, Boris Pistorius, said on Monday, “This is not our war; we did not start it.” He added, “We want diplomatic solutions and a swift end to the conflict, but sending more warships to the region will likely not help achieve that.”
Britain’s prime minister, Keir Starmer, said that his government was working with allies on a plan to reopen the strait. But he did not say if Britain would send warships to the Persian Gulf and vowed that it would not be “drawn into wider war.”
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi of Japan told Parliament on Monday that her country had no plans to send its navy to the Persian Gulf. And Catherine King, Australia’s transport minister, told her country’s national broadcast service, “We know how incredibly important that is, but that’s not something that we’ve been asked or that we’re contributing to.”
Despite those comments, Mr. Trump said that “numerous countries have told me that they’re on the way.” Asked to name them, he replied, “I’d rather not say yet, but we’ll be announcing them.”
The U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, now in its third week, has killed more than 2,000 people, mostly in Iran and Lebanon, and has drawn in much of the Middle East, as Iran has launched rockets and drones at neighboring countries and at ships in the Gulf. Global energy prices have skyrocketed with tanker traffic all but stopped through the Strait of Hormuz.
The United States appears to have been unprepared for the extent of Iran’s retaliation and the need to protect ships in the strait, which also carry fertilizer and other products that help fuel the global economy. Mr. Trump has been pressuring NATO to help, with a sharp warning.
“If there’s no response, or if it’s a negative response, I think it will be very bad for the future of NATO,” Mr. Trump told The Financial Times on Sunday. A NATO official said, “We are aware that individual allies are talking with the U.S. and others on what more they might do, including in the context of security in the Strait of Hormuz.”
Mr. Trump called on China to send naval escorts, too, but Beijing has little incentive to cooperate; Iran, which sells oil to China, is letting its ships pass safely. Mr. Trump said on Monday that he would ask to postpone for a month a summit with Xi Jinping, China’s leader, which was expected to start on March 31 in Beijing.
“Because of the war, I have to be here,” Mr. Trump said.
There are no signs that the conflict is easing.
Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin, the chief Israeli military spokesman, said on Monday that Israeli ground forces had expanded their presence in southern Lebanon to more than 15 different areas, adding to fears that Israel could launch a wider invasion as it fights Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militia, which has been firing rockets into Israel in solidarity with Tehran.
More than 800,000 people in Lebanon have fled their homes, particularly in the country’s south.
Some Lebanese living in border villages are worried that Israel could occupy southern Lebanon, much as it did from 1982 to 2000, when the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Barak, withdrew his country’s troops and declared, “This 18-year tragedy is over.”
“I feel like this is preparation for an occupation, and I’m afraid history will repeat itself,” said Iman Ibrahim, 30, who fled her Lebanese village, Blida, when the war between Hezbollah and Israel escalated this month. “Everything we used to hear from our grandparents about occupation, we’re living it now.”
The Israeli military has already issued sweeping evacuation orders for much of southern Lebanon, stretching as far as 25 miles from the Israeli border. On Monday, Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an Israeli military spokesman, said that the Israeli military was prepared for at least three more weeks of military operations and “even more if we need to.”
In a strongly worded joint statement on Monday, the leaders of Britain, Canada, France, Germany and Italy urged Israeli and Lebanese leaders to negotiate a political solution to the conflict with Hezbollah.
“A significant Israeli ground offensive would have devastating humanitarian consequences and could lead to a protracted conflict,” the statement said. “It must be averted. The humanitarian situation in Lebanon, including ongoing mass displacement, is already deeply alarming.”
Germany, one of Israel’s closest allies, also warned on Monday that an Israeli ground offensive in Lebanon could lead to worsening humanitarian conditions. Germany is urging its “Israeli friends not to go down this path, and we are in contact with them to convey this message,” Stefan Kornelius, a German government spokesman, said at a news conference in Berlin.
Israeli leaders have not ruled out negotiations but have signaled that the military must keep striking targets in Lebanon. “I believe the next step will be talks, but first we have to degrade the capabilities of Hezbollah,” Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, said on Monday.
The Israeli police reported on Monday that interceptor and missile fragments from a barrage of Iranian missiles had fallen in Jerusalem near the holy sites of Al Aqsa and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher as well as in the Jewish Quarter. At least one person had minor injuries, Magen David Adom, Israel’s rescue service, said.
In the United Arab Emirates, a drone crashed near Dubai International Airport on Monday, damaging a fuel tank, sparking a fire and forcing the airport to briefly suspend flights, officials said. In Iran, airstrikes knocked out power to parts of Tehran for several hours, according to Iranian media reports, Iran’s Red Crescent Society and several residents.
Mr. Trump, who has offered several goals for the war, on Monday returned to the topic of stopping Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon with some of his strongest language yet.
“You can’t let the most violent, vicious country in the last 50 years have a nuclear weapon, because the Middle East will be gone,” he said. “Israel will go first without question, and they’ll certainly take a shot at us before we get our act together.”
The comments were notable because Mr. Trump is considering a risky operation to send forces into Isfahan, a city of two million people in the center of Iran, to recover 970 pounds of near-bomb-grade uranium.
Reporting was contributed by Christina Goldbaum, Dayana Iwaza, Johnatan Reiss, Ravi Mattu, Nick Cumming-Bruce, Farnaz Fassihi and Michael Levenson.
Anton Troianovski writes about American foreign policy and national security for The Times from Washington. He was previously a foreign correspondent based in Moscow and Berlin.
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