US moving more assets to West Asia to enhance deterrence ahead of Iran retaliation

“We are moving additional assets to the region to bolster regional deterrence efforts and increase force protection for US forces. We have no other information to add at this time,” the official stated when asked about reports the USS Dwight Eisenhower aircraft carrier is sailing north through the Red Sea in a show of deterrence.

Israeli media reported that the US aircraft carrier’s movement toward Israel is meant to be a show of deterrence against Iran.

According to an earlier Axios report, Tehran warned Washington that it will attack US forces in the Middle East if the US gets involved in a military confrontation between Iran and Israel.

However, a US official told Axios that it’s unclear if Iran is threatening to attack US forces in the region if they help Israel intercept Iranian missiles or only if they participate in an Israeli counteroffensive.

Last week, Israeli warplanes bombed the Iranian consulate in Damascus, located next to the embassy building in Damascus’s Mezzeh district. The attack killed two senior Iranian military personnel who were on an advisory mission to Syria as well as five of their accompanying officers.

The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps announced Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a commander of the IRGC’s Quds Force, and his deputy General Mohammad Hadi Haji Rahimi were among the seven martyrs of the terrorist attack.

Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei has vowed that Iran will “punish” Israel and make the evil regime “regret” its crime of assassinating the country’s military advisors in Syria.

Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi has also stated Israel had resorted to indiscriminate assassinations after back-to-back failures in the face of the resistance, warning that the regime’s latest crime against Iranian military advisers in Syria “will not go unanswered”.