Iran’s foreign minister on Wednesday delivered his bluntest warning yet to the United States, vowing a sweeping military response if Tehran comes under renewed attack, as U.S. forces visibly repositioned toward the Middle East amid mounting regional tension and a deepening crackdown at home.
In an opinion article published in The Wall Street Journal, Abbas Araghchi said Iran’s armed forces would respond “with everything we have” should hostilities resume, signaling a harder line as Washington moves an aircraft carrier strike group westward from Asia and deploys additional air and missile assets across the region.
The warning came as the USS Abraham Lincoln, accompanied by three destroyers, passed through the Strait of Malacca into the Indian Ocean, putting the carrier group days away from the Middle East, according to ship-tracking data and a U.S. Navy official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Recent U.S. military images also showed F-15E Strike Eagles arriving in the region and forces repositioning a HIMARS missile system, the same platform used extensively by Ukraine against Russia.
While U.S. defense officials stopped short of confirming the carrier’s final destination, its movement coincides with rising alarm among Gulf Arab states, whose diplomats have urged Washington to avoid a direct strike on Iran.
Tehran last week closed its airspace, a move widely seen as preparation for possible escalation.
Araghchi framed his warning as a reluctant but necessary message, referencing Iran’s restraint during the 12-day war launched by Israel in June 2025.
“This isn’t a threat, but a reality,” he wrote, adding that an all-out confrontation would be “ferocious,” prolonged and destabilizing far beyond the region, with global consequences.
His comments appeared to allude to Iran’s short- and medium-range missile arsenal.
During the war with Israel, Iran relied largely on ballistic missiles, leaving much of its shorter-range stockpile untouched, weapons that analysts say could target U.S. bases and interests across the Persian Gulf.
Already, U.S. officials have imposed limited travel restrictions on diplomats near American bases in Kuwait and Qatar.
The foreign minister’s message, however, was sharply at odds with evidence emerging from inside Iran following weeks of unrest.
Araghchi claimed the “violent phase” of the protests lasted less than 72 hours and blamed armed demonstrators for the bloodshed.
Yet videos smuggled out despite a near-total internet shutdown appear to show security forces firing live ammunition at unarmed protesters, allegations he did not address.
The unrest has been deadly.
At least 4,519 people have been killed, according to the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency, which has consistently tracked casualties through a network of sources inside Iran.
The Associated Press (AP) has been unable to independently verify the toll. The figure exceeds that of any protest wave in Iran in decades and evokes the turmoil surrounding the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei acknowledged on Saturday that “several thousand” people had been killed, blaming the United States, the first public confirmation by a senior Iranian leader of the scale of the deaths.
More than 26,300 people have been arrested, the activists’ group said, raising fears that some detainees could face execution in a country already among the world’s leading users of capital punishment.
Tensions spilled beyond Iran’s borders this week when the PKK terrorist group based in northern Iraq said Tehran launched a drone and missile strike on one of its bases near Irbil, killing at least one terrorist.
The group released mobile phone footage showing a fire burning in the predawn darkness.
Iranian state television, which has acknowledged similar strikes in the past, did not confirm the attack.
