U.S. President Donald Trump has claimed that American airstrikes have inflicted heavy losses on Iran's navy, while also confirming his agreement to enter negotiations with the new leadership in Tehran.
As reported by Hvylya, Trump made the announcements via his Truth Social platform and in comments to The Atlantic.
According to Trump, U.S. forces delivered a devastating blow to Iran's naval capabilities.
"I was just informed that we destroyed and sank 9 Iranian warships, some of them relatively large and important. We are going to take care of the rest—they will be at the bottom of the sea very shortly," the U.S. President declared.
He added that a separate attack significantly damaged the Iranian naval headquarters, noting ironically: "Other than that, their Navy is doing very well!"
Amid the ongoing military campaign, the White House chief confirmed his readiness for diplomatic engagement with Iran following the death of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in the strikes.
"They want to talk, and I agreed to talk, so I will talk to them. They should have done it sooner. They should have given what was very practical and easy to do sooner. They waited too long," Trump stated.
While declining to specify a timeline for potential dialogue, he emphasized that many Iranian officials involved in negotiation processes in recent weeks had already been eliminated in the attacks.
"Most of those people are gone. Some of the people that we were dealing with are gone because this was a big... this was a big hit," the American leader added.
As a reminder, the large-scale military operation by the U.S. and Israel against Iran began on February 28. Meanwhile, the U.S. military reported its first casualties of the campaign yesterday: three U.S. service members were killed, and five others were wounded.