H out his halt strikes, but us to send more troops to Gulf

WARY OF IRAN US to send troops to region; Iran warns any country that attacks it will become ‘main battlefield’

WASHINGTON/DUBAI: The US will send a “moderate” number of troops to the Middle East and additional missile defence capabilities to Saudi Arabia in response to last weekend’s attack on oil facilities, top Pentagon officials said.

US defence secretary Mark Esper said on Friday that the decision came at the request of Saudi Arabia and the UAE and represented a “first step” in the US response. He reiterated US statements that evidence collected to date shows Iran was responsible for the attacks.

The briefing by Esper and Joseph Dunford, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, followed a meeting of national security officials at the White House.

“Iran is waging a deliberate campaign to destabilise the Middle East,” Esper told reporters at the Pentagon. He said the US has shown “great restraint” in responding so far, but called the strike on Saudi Aramco facilities a “dramatic escalation”.

IRAN WILL ‘DESTROY ANY AGGRESSOR’

Iran will pursue any aggressor, even it carries out a limited attack, and seek to destroy it, the head of the elite IRGC said on Saturday, after attacks on Saudi oil sites which Riyadh and US officials blamed on Tehran. “Be careful, a limited aggression will not remain limited. We will pursue any aggressor,” the head of the IRGC, Hossein Salami, said.

“We are after punishment and we will continue until the full destruction of any aggressor.” Iran’s foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif earlier denounced renewed US sanctions against its central bank following the Saudi attacks on September 14 as an attempt to deny ordinary Iranians access to food and medicine.

SAUDI CAUTIOUS AFTER HOUTHI PEACE OFFER

Saudi Arabia gave a cautious response on Saturday to an unexpected offer from Yemen’s Houthi rebels to halt all attacks on the kingdom as part of an initiative to end their country’s devastating war. The Houthi announcement on Friday came on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the start of the conflict.

Saudi minister of state for foreign affairs Adel al-jubeir took a sceptical position to the announcement from Mehdi al-mashat, head of the Houthis’ supreme political council, of a “halt of all attacks against the territory of Saudi Arabia”.

“We judge other parties by their deeds, actions and not by their words, so we will see (whether) they actually do this or not,” said the Saudi minister.

He said Saudi Arabia will wait for the results of an investigation before responding to last weekend’s attack on its oil facilities.