Trump Announces Full Iran Naval Blockade, Says Other Nations to Help

(MENAFN) US President Donald Trump declared Sunday that Washington will move forward with a complete naval blockade of Iran, enlisting allied nations in the effort, after weekend negotiations in Islamabad ended without a breakthrough to halt weeks of war across the Middle East.

Speaking in a Fox News interview, Trump left little ambiguity about his intentions: "Well, we're going to be blockading. It'll take a little while, but it'll be effective pretty soon."

He expanded on the scope of the operation, stating: "We think that numerous countries are going to be helping us with this also, but we're putting on a complete blockade. We're not going to let Iran make money on selling oil to people that they like and not people that they don't like."

Trump indicated that Gulf states are already participating in the effort, though he declined to identify them by name. Britain and other allies, he claimed, are dispatching minesweepers to the Strait of Hormuz to neutralize mines laid by Iran — a claim London has since pushed back on.

"We have minesweepers there. Now we have highly sophisticated underwater minesweepers, which are the latest and the greatest, but we're also bringing in more traditional minesweepers. And so I understand ... the UK and a couple of other countries are sending mine sweepers," he said.

Trump framed Iran's mining of the strait as deliberate economic coercion, saying: "We'll drop one mine, two mines, 10 mines. And that will if you have a ship that cost a billion dollars, you say, Well, you know, I prefer not getting whacked by a mine, losing my ship or damaging it badly, at least," calling it an "extortion."

On NATO, Trump did not conceal his frustration, saying he was "very disappointed with NATO," before acknowledging the alliance's belated offer of support: "Now they want to come and they want to help with the strait and it won't take long to clean it up. Clean it out, so we're going to clean out the straits, and they'll be able to use the strait in not too long a distance."

Despite the breakdown, Trump described Saturday's Islamabad session in surprisingly warm terms, calling it "really a good meeting" in which both sides aligned on roughly 95% of issues. The sole — and decisive — sticking point, he said, was Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

"We had a very intensive negotiation, and towards the end, it got very friendly, and we got just about every point we needed, except for the fact that they refused to give up their nuclear ambition," he said.

He made Washington's red line explicit: "On the important issue, they want to have nuclear weapons. They're not going to have nuclear weapons."

Trump also signaled that military pressure on Iran has already been pushed to near its limits, stating: "We went out the whole country, essentially. The only thing left, really, is their water, which would be very devastating to it." He reiterated threats to strike critical infrastructure — including power plants, bridges, and desalination and water facilities — warning that "we still have other things" being considered as potential targets.

On the economic front, Trump threatened to impose sweeping tariffs on any country supplying weapons to Iran, warning China in particular: "But if we catch them doing that, they get a 50% tariff, which is a staggering – that's a staggering amount."

He urged Beijing to redirect its oil purchases toward the US and Venezuela, stating: "As far as China is concerned, China can send their ships to us. China can send their ships to Venezuela. We told them ... buy from Venezuela."

Trump also addressed the broader trade picture, noting: "I put 100% tariff on all Chinese cars coming in, and that's destroying Europe." He elaborated: "They're destroying Europe because they're taking away so much business from Mercedes and BMW, etc. And we don't have any Chinese cars in our country because they would have destroyed General Motors, Ford."

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