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Chapter 1: What recent events have escalated the conflict between the U.S. and Iran?
With U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, followed by Tehran's retaliation across the region, the U.S. is now engaged in open conflict with Iran. The question many Americans are asking is, are we once again at war in the Middle East? Hello and welcome to USA Today's The Excerpt. I'm Dana Taylor. Today is Tuesday, March 3rd, 2026. What does an open conflict with Iran mean for the U.S.
in terms of military commitment and risk to American troops serving overseas? Joining me now to share her insights on what is quickly becoming a widening conflict in the Middle East is USA Today White House correspondent Francesca Chambers.
Chapter 2: What does an open conflict with Iran mean for U.S. military commitments?
It's good to speak with you, Francesca. Thanks, Dana. Francesca, for months, President Donald Trump has ratcheted up pressure on Iran for a new nuclear deal. Has the Trump administration made clear both why the U.S. decided to strike Iran and why now?
In his first public remarks from the White House since the war began, President Trump said on Monday that the Trump administration tried to negotiate with Iran that nuclear pact that you were referring to. But Iran did not heed the United States warnings not to rebuild its nuclear program.
So in justifying the strikes, the president brought up both that nuclear program, but he also talked about Iran's ballistic missiles. missile program. He said that it was growing, quote, rapidly and dramatically, and it posed a very clear, colossal threat to the United States, as well as U.S.
Chapter 3: What justifications did President Trump provide for the strikes on Iran?
bases and forces that are overseas. And he said, again, that Iran was making ballistic missiles that would soon have had the capability of reaching what you described as our beautiful America in those remarks. Now, experts have pushed back on some of the things that President Trump has said in the last few days, as well as what U.S. officials have said in the lead up to these strikes.
One of them, including being how soon it was that Iran could have had ballistic missiles that could have reached the continental United States. The War Powers Act of 1973 was intended to limit unilateral military action by a president. Has Congress been briefed or asked for authorization?
So Secretary of State Marco Rubio first began briefing top congressional leaders on the day of the State of the Union Address last week on Tuesday. We knew that already. That was publicly known. But then since then, U.S. officials have said that Rubio also called top congressional leaders as a bipartisan group called the Gang of Eight.
And it includes the House Speaker, the Senate Majority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader, the House Minority Leader, as well as the chair and vice chair of both the House and Senate Intelligence Committees. They say that he called them to give them a heads up on the strikes. He also spoke to armed services members, we're told.
Then, Secretary of State Marco Rubio also briefed those top congressional leaders on Monday on Capitol Hill. Rubio was expected on Tuesday to give a wider briefing to members of Congress. How did this strike come together, Francesca? So we heard from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth during a briefing at the Pentagon on Monday.
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Chapter 4: How has Congress responded to the military actions against Iran?
Talk about this as well as General Dan Kaine. Talk about this also. They said that the president on Friday at 3.38 p.m. gave the final green light for these strikes to go ahead. Now, we know that the Israelis struck first and then the United States came in swiftly behind the Israelis to conduct these strikes. This was a massive operation on the U.S.
side that involved fighter jets as well as B-2 bombers. It had refueling stations involved in this as well. This was something that they detailed during that initial briefing that they gave at the Pentagon. This is, of course, a rapidly developing story, but what's been the impact on US bases, including, of course, the four American lives lost over the weekend? Iran has struck at least six U.S.
military facilities in the Middle East, including Bahrain, Iraq, UAE, also Kuwait. Now, Kuwait is where those American service members that you referred to before died. Originally, that number was three. And then one of them who was injured ultimately ended up perishing as well.
And the president, when he spoke about this on video over the weekend, it was a video address that was taped from his Mar-a-Lago estate. and then put out on social media. He said that sadly, there will likely be more. He said, but that's the way that it is. Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in the joint strikes.
Chapter 5: What is the timeline for the current military operation in Iran?
President Trump is calling on Iranians to overthrow their government. Is it clear who the U.S. would like to see lead Iran? Not at this time. I mean, when President Trump has taken a number of calls from reporters over the last few days, in addition to the video addresses and the public remarks he's made, he specifically noted that the folks that the United States may have had in mind
to take over Iran were also killed in the strikes. And dozens of Iranian leaders at this point, more than 40 were killed in those strikes. And so Trump has said that he doesn't actually have anybody in mind at this point to lead Iran, although he has said that that is up to the people of Iran. And with respect to the protesters,
He said that I made a promise to you and I have fulfilled that promise. The rest will be up to you. But he said that the United States would be there to back the protesters. And we heard him say initially after he confirmed the strikes that this would likely be their best opportunity in generations to reclaim their government.
President Trump and military leaders have said Operation Epic Fury, what this is called, is expected to last for weeks, not days. Is it clear really how long this will last? We've heard the president talk about four to five weeks. He's also said that it's ahead of schedule. He originally thought he said that it would be about four weeks as his timeline.
But also we've heard Hegseth and other officials say that if it has to go longer, then it will go longer. But they're also saying that they don't expect this to be something that's going to last for years.
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Chapter 6: Are there any ongoing diplomatic efforts between the U.S. and Iran?
That's how it's different, they're saying, than something like the Iraq war, for instance. They don't envision, as Hegsa said during his briefing, putting 200,000 boots on the ground and spending 20 years there. At the same time, they're also not completely and totally ruling out boots on the ground, saying they'll do whatever is necessary.
We should also note that an Iranian official who was a top national security advisor there has said that they are ready for a prolonged war, this person said, if that's what's needed to take place. Well, sticking with the remaining Iranian leadership and their response, what's the status of talks between the U.S. and Iran as any diplomacy taking place right now?
So Amman had originally been mediating those talks between the United States and Iran, those nuclear negotiations, and had said over the weekend that they thought that there was still room to pull this back through diplomacy. But the U.S. officials who spoke to reporters over the weekend said that they had determined that Iran was playing games in these negotiations.
Essentially, they were trying to buy time, as the U.S. has put it, to try to rebuild that nuclear program and to work on their ballistic missile program. And eventually the Trump administration just determined that they couldn't afford to wait any longer. That's their rationale for it.
Meanwhile, the Iranian government has said that they were in those talks in good faith, but now the remaining leadership, as you referred to, the negotiator that the National Security Advisor has referred to before, says that they will not be negotiating with the United States. As you noted, we've now seen strikes on multiple Arab countries, including Lebanon.
Has the administration addressed concerns about destabilizing the Middle East? And really, where do our allies stand here? So some of the United States' allies have been quick to point out that they weren't involved in these strikes, particularly the European countries came out.
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Chapter 7: How have international allies reacted to the U.S. strikes on Iran?
France, Germany, Britain, they were all part of that original nuclear pact that the United States under Trump's first administration pulled out of. And they've called for a return to these negotiations in the past.
But meanwhile, while Britain has said that it wasn't part of these strikes initially, it's now allowing the United States to be able to use its bases in the region to conduct operations if need be. Francesca, as we saw with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, the Trump administration appears to have no qualms about targeting heads of state when they deem it necessary.
Has the killing of Khomeini intensified debates about the legality of doing so? Well, this goes also back to what we were discussing before about Congress and Democrats in particular wanting the administration to get their permission to do this. They're forcing a war powers vote this week in the House of Representatives. They'd like to see one in the United States Senate as well. But the U.S.
has essentially said, by the way, in response to just all of these things that This operation in Iran shows that the United States and President Trump are very serious about using military power when they feel that they need to.
I mean, they've pointed in the last few weeks both to what happened in Venezuela, as you're referring to, as well as those strikes that took place last summer to show and say that when President Trump warns that he could take military action, that he's not playing around. How has the president's party responded to the strikes in Iran and this widening conflict in the Middle East?
Are Republicans firmly behind the president? I think Congress, for the most part, has been very supportive. I mean, this is largely broken down along party lines, Republicans in support and Democrats against. But there are some Republicans, such as Rand Paul, who's been a huge proponent of voting for wars and non-interventionism, calling for the president to come and ask Congress questions.
for their permission. And then, of course, you have folks like former Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who broke with the president over the fact that she said that he was more focused on foreign policy and not enough on affordability issues. She left Congress earlier this year while she was fighting with President Trump over these things.
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Chapter 8: What are the potential implications of the conflict for American public opinion?
She is one of the people who was speaking out at great length over the weekend to essentially say that the president and vice president and administration campaigned on no more foreign interventionism, no more endless wars. And then they've also taken new strikes just in the last two months in both Venezuela as well as Iran.
There are other folks in the president's party, such as television personality Tucker Carlson, who has said to said over the weekend, essentially, that he described it in an ABC News interview as absolutely disgusting and evil. So certainly the GOP isn't completely unified.
And I would also note that the American public, too, when you look at polling on this, it also shows that there are some Republicans who don't support this. In a Reuters poll over the weekend, 43 percent of Americans disapproved of the strikes and 29 percent weren't sure. But 27 percent said that they approved of them.
So that was roughly, you know, one in four Americans who approve of the strikes overall. What will you be watching for over the next few days, Francesca, whether that be from President Trump or lawmakers on the Hill? Sure. So we'll be keeping an eye on these four powers resolution votes that I was discussing before, but also what President Trump continues to say about this.
He has taken questions in terms of taking some calls. from reporters. But those addresses that he gave, the initial video addresses he gave, were recorded without reporters in the room and sent out over social media accounts. He delivered the remarks on Monday that I was talking about on this issue, but he didn't take questions then.
And certainly he's taken questions in terms of reporters calling him on the phone and asking the president about this. But absolutely, we'll be looking to see what other
opportunities that there are to ask the president and the administration, including those defense officials who also took questions at a briefing on Monday about, again, some of the things we're discussing here, how long that they expect at this point that this is going to last, who they expect that the leadership of Iran is going to be at this point.
Francesca Chambers is a White House correspondent for USA Today. Thank you so much for coming back on The Excerpt, Francesca. Thanks so much. I appreciate it. Thanks to our senior producer, Kaylee Monahan, for her production assistance. Our executive producer is Laura Beatty. Let us know what you think of this episode by sending a note to podcasts at usatoday.com. Thanks for listening.
I'm Dana Taylor. I'll be back tomorrow morning with another episode of USA Today's The Excerpt. Draft season means millions of fans are refreshing their team's pages on USA Today Network right now. Returning to sports content they trust again and again. During that surge, the brand customers see most is the one they remember. In fact, 57%.
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