U.S. Air Force personnel perform pre-flight checks on a B-2 Spirit stealth bomber during Operation Epic Fury, March 17, 2026. President Donald Trump on Thursday, March 26, 2026, said the war in Iran was “way ahead of schedule.” (U.S. Air Force)
President Donald Trump on Thursday said the war in Iran was “way ahead of schedule,” claiming the Middle Eastern country’s military capabilities have been “obliterated,” even as Tehran insists it is not interested in negotiations to end the conflict.
“We estimated it would take approximately 4-6 weeks to achieve our mission, and we’re way ahead of schedule if you look at what we’ve done in terms of the destruction of that country,” Trump said during a White House Cabinet meeting.
In its latest update, U.S. Central Command said it has significantly degraded Iran’s military capabilities, destroying large portions of its navy and missile production sites as the war approaches the one-month mark.
The U.S. has struck more than 10,000 targets, destroying 92% of Iran’s largest naval vessels and damaging or destroying two-thirds of its missile and drone production sites and shipyards, Adm. Brad Cooper, commander of U.S. Central Command, said Wednesday on X.
The command has also claimed that Iran’s drone and missile launch rates are down by more than 90%, drastically reducing its ability to attack American forces and regional neighbors.
“My operational assessment continues to be: Iran’s combat capability is declining as U.S. combat capability continues to increase,” Cooper said.
The White House says it is engaged in talks to end the joint U.S.-Israeli operation, which has resulted in the deaths of 13 U.S. troops and killed more than 2,400 people in Iran and Lebanon, according to those governments’ figures.
Iranian state media on Wednesday said the country’s leaders had rejected the U.S.’s 15-point ceasefire proposal, and said Iran will end the war when it decides to do so and its conditions are met.
However U.S. officials, including Trump, insist the talks are still on.
“They are begging to make a deal, not me,” Trump said on Thursday, adding: “In the meantime, we’ll just keep blowing them away, unimpeded, unstopped.”
The U.S. is preparing to send thousands more troops to the region, including Marines and paratroopers, as Iran continues its airstrikes and retains a chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz. Israel on Thursday said it had killed the commander of Iran’s navy, Alireza Tangsiri, whom Israeli officials said was directly responsible for the blockade on the strait.
Iran is looking to formalize a transit fee for the Strait of Hormuz, with lawmakers working on a draft bill to impose a toll in exchange for providing security to ships passing via the key waterway, according to the Fars news agency.
Trump had set a deadline for Iran to negotiate an agreement to end the war by the end of the week, though the ongoing impasse has raised questions about the likelihood for a deal in that timeframe. Vice President JD Vance may travel to Pakistan for Iran talks this weekend, CNN reported.
Since the war started on Feb. 28, Iran has effectively shuttered the conduit for about a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas, triggering a global supply shock. The Islamic Republic is still able to export its own crude from the strait, likely earning hundreds of millions of dollars of extra income.
While Iran’s total number of launches has dropped significantly since Feb. 28, it could be due to a change in strategy, cautioned Kelly Grieco, a senior fellow at the Stimson Center and expert on U.S. defense policy.
Grieco noted that though Iran’s volume of attacks has decreased, their accuracy has improved. Missiles and drones targeting energy and civilian infrastructure are having better success hitting their targets compared with the first days of the war, she said. While the decreased volume could be due to the U.S. destroying Iran’s weapons stockpiles, it could also be a long-term strategy to keep pressure on the U.S., Israel and the Gulf.
“They’ve found what they think is the sufficient number (of attacks) to remain that persistent threat, and because the volume is lower, they can sustain that for a really long time,” Grieco said. “That’s a possibility.”
The U.S. may have been successful in destroying Iranian launchers, but the regime also has a desire to limit its fire for the purposes of survival, said Behnam Ben Taleblu, the director of the Iran program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
“This may be the opposite of ‘use it or lose it,’ ” he said.
The Strait of Hormuz, which is an essential maritime corridor for nearly 20% of the globe’s oil and gas, remains a key pressure point. The halt in shipping has already led to a surge in fuel prices, and a prolonged disruption could have negative impacts on global GDP and inflation, according to the OECD, an international organization focused on economic policy.
Grieco said the strait’s closure is the strongest indicator that Iran is still a threat. And while the U.S. may have decimated large portions of Iran’s naval fleet, the biggest threat to maritime shipping is coming from Iran’s missiles and drones, especially those launched from small, fast-attack boats.
Iran meanwhile continued to carry out attacks against Israel and its neighboring nations on Thursday. Kuwaiti officials said they were intercepting drones and missiles. In the United Arab Emirates, two people were killed and three others injured by shrapnel from a ballistic missile interception, according to officials in Abu Dhabi.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on Wednesday announced that a summit between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping that was slated for later this month would instead take place in May. Trump had postponed the meeting after launching the war, which brought fresh strains to U.S.-China ties. Iran is a major trading partner for China, the world’s largest crude importer.
