Turkey’s foreign minister said on Monday there is no immediate threat of a military conflict between Iran and the United States, stressing Ankara is working to avert a “disaster”.
"At the moment, there does not seem to be at least an immediate threat of war (between Iran and the United States)," Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told CNN Turk.
"One night during the 12-day June war, we received a phone call from the US Secretary of State (Rubio) who said, 'Tell the Iranians, anything can happen in a few hours'. I talked to my Iranian counterpart and he said, “How can that be possible? We had set a date for the meeting.”
"It was the US that was talking, and Israel that was striking. This time the situation may be different. We are doing everything we can to prevent a disaster," Fidan said.
Asked about the possibility of regime change in Iran, Fidan said, "The regime does not change with an airstrike or anything else. It's a pipe dream."
"The problem is not the regime itself, the problem is the decisions and policies taken by the regime. There are also regimes that are more centrally totalistic than the Iranian regime."
He warned that if an Iran-US war breaks out, it is not clear where it will stop.
"If there is genuine will to resolve the issue, you can see its impact on the ground. What matters to us is that as talks move toward a concrete outcome, the threat of war also steadily recedes," he added.
He said Tehran would abandon proportional retaliation and instead move to strike what he described as the “roots” of American interests across the region.
“In response to a potential act of aggression, we are not looking to respond tit for tat,” Larijani said. “Our posture would move from defensive to offensive, striking points where we believe we must hit the roots of that force’s presence in the region.”
He contrasted what he called a “defensive philosophy” — limited, proportional retaliation — with what he described as a broader strategy that would be activated if the United States initiated hostilities.
“This time, if they do it, we will move beyond that into a much broader offensive approach,” he said, adding that Iran’s “target set changes significantly” under such a scenario.
Referring to past hostilities, Larijani said Iran had gained “a great deal of experience” in the June conflict with the United States and Israel and warned there would be “many surprises” for the enemy.
He also took aim at President Donald Trump’s approach, saying his strategy of launching a rapid strike followed by a propaganda campaign “would not be workable” under the framework set by Iran’s leadership.
“They should prepare many coffins for the bodies of their slain troops who will arrive in Washington,” Larijani said, adding that American interests in the region would “go up in smoke.”
