U.S. Amb. to NATO: We Didn’t Do Iran Sanctions Package Earlier Because ‘You Don’t Maximize Everything’ at First

On Monday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends First,” U.S. Ambassador to NATO Matt Whitaker said that the economic sanctions package on Iran like the one that was announced later that day was not placed on Iran earlier because “there is an escalation that you would go through, you don’t maximize everything that you bring to a conflict like this.” And “incrementally increasing” pressure will work.

Guest co-host Ashley Strohmier asked, “[M]y question is, why wasn’t something like this done sooner?”

Whitaker answered, “Well, Ashley, the real reason is, that, obviously, there is an escalation that you would go through, you don’t maximize everything that you bring to a conflict like this. And so, President Trump has, obviously, kept a clear goal of getting a deal done that guarantees, forever, that Iran does not possess nuclear weapons. And that’s going to always be the number one goal. And so, incrementally increasing the pressure on Iran and the regime, I think, will accomplish that. We have — militarily, they have been decimated. They have no meaningful military that can defend or protect the Iranian people and their navy is on the bottom of the Strait of Hormuz.”

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