Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) claimed Sunday that President Trump likes to conduct daily strikes on Iran as he called for the US to ramp up pressure rather than pause them to allow negotiations to continue.
Kennedy said the US should act quickly to accomplish its war goals as the conflict approaches its sixth month, warning the president that previous daily attacks on Iranare just not working.
“The president likes the daily attacks. He believes that sometimes you have to kill a few chickens to scare the monkeys,” Kennedy told CBS News’ “Meet the Press,” referencing the old Chinese idiom.
“I don’t think that’s going to work with the Iranian leadership,” he added. “These people are more than mildly insane. It’s like dealing with son of Sam or Charles Manson.”
The US had been bombing Iran for nearly two weeks straight after the memorandum of understanding broke down earlier this month over Tehran’s attacks in the Strait of Hormuz.
The strikes mainly targeted Iranian military sites that threatened the strait, with Iran retaliating with its own attacks on US military bases in the region that resulted in the death of four more American soldiers.
Trump has since paused the airstrikes in favor of diplomacy, but the president has threatened all-out war if Iran does not submit to his demands.
Kennedy, however, insisted that diplomacy should not be the priority while Iran maintains its terror infrastructure.
“I think we ought to tighten the sanctions on the sale of Iranian oil. I think we ought to continue the blockade and starve them out. I think we ought to bomb Pickaxe Mountain and try to reach what’s underneath it,” he said.
“I don’t think we ought to just cut and run,” Kennedy added. “If we can stand the pain of the rising cost of energy, we need to stay the course, at least for a few more months.”
Oil prices surged back to more than $100 per barrel last week after Iran’s repeated strikes in the Strait of Hormuz and its Houthi terror proxies threats in the Red Sea, both critical chokepoints that transport nearly a third of the world’s crude supply.
Prices fell below $97 per barrel after Trump ended the daily strikes on Friday and reports emerged that Pakistan was one again working to restart peace talks between Washington and Tehran.
The scope of the current talks remains unclear after Iran reportedly rejected a cease-fire offeron Thursday presented by Iraq’s prime minister on behalf of Trump.
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