Tehran, Iran – Iranian authorities have signalled they could shift to a more offensive approach to the war with the United States as a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Washington expires.

Brigadier General Yadollah Javani, head of the political bureau of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), told state television on Sunday night that his forces were ready to take whatever action is needed to defend the country.

Tensions between Iran and the US over control of the Strait of Hormuz have continued to rise despite a ceasefire being agreed between them in June. While the MoU effectively collapsed after fighting restarted last month, the agreement officially expires on Monday.

“The enemy started the war and our efforts have been defensive, although they might take on an offensive aspect,” said Javani.

He did not elaborate on what exactly the offensive measures could entail, but said opponents should expect “strategic surprises”.

IRGC spokesman Hossein Mohebbi last week identified US and regional allies’ infrastructure – such as energy networks, power plants and internet-connected systems – as potential targets, if the US hits Iran’s civilian infrastructure.

Hardline Iranian politicians and media outlets have discussed the idea of mounting a ground incursion against US interests in Bahrain and Kuwait if Washington invades Iran.

Analysts have raised questions over the feasibility of that and the risks involved, while there is no recent indication that the US is planning ground operations in Iran.

The Iranian emphasis on offensive deterrence against the US comes after Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, viewed as a hardliner, consolidated his power by appointing several IRGC old guard and confidants to key military and security positions last week.

Khamenei said Major General Ahmad Vahidi’s rise to commander-in-chief of the IRGC must represent a mix of “maximum deterrence” with readiness for “powerful offensive operations against the enemy”.

Vahidi said Khamenei’s leadership and the Iranian armed forces had managed to “bring to its knees the most heavily-armed army in world history” after the US and Israel launched strikes in Iran on February 28, starting fierce fighting between the two sides.

US President Donald Trump reiterated on Friday his claim that Iran was defeated in the war while facing a naval blockade acting as a “wall of steel”. He also said the Strait of Hormuz would “pretty soon” be declared US territory.

The White House later suggested that comment was a joke, but Iran’s army chief, Amir Hatami, reacted by setting a $30,000 reward for any man who kills or captures a US soldier, if they are involved in any ground operation on Iranian soil. Women would be given twice the reward if they managed such a feat, he added.

“Our hands are open in terms of reaching the aggressors and they will become more open through our initiatives,” Hatami said, referencing recent Iranian attacks on US forces in Jordan.

Mohsen Rezaee, who has the powerful position of secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, suggested that the Trump administration might have been considering ground operations on Iranian territory, but held off as a result of “half-baked plans”.

Rezaee said that the US Central Command had refrained from hitting Tehran or northern Iran during the two-week flareup in fighting in July, instead attacking about 50 cities in 15 provinces.

He believed that the purpose of the air raids was to prepare for a ground assault to take control of the Strait of Hormuz and potentially reach nuclear facilities in Isfahan, where highly-enriched uranium is suspected of being buried under the rubble of US strikes.

Bridges, roads, maritime control towers, radar and other coastal installations, and military facilities were struck to cut off logistical supplies to southern Iran, Rezaee noted.

“They had not calculated that to land troops for the Strait of Hormuz, it’s not doable with 40,000-50,000 soldiers, you must bring at least 100,000 people,” he said. “You must cross the Zagros Mountains and be able to pass the Fars province.”

Iranian media and commanders have reported in recent weeks that scenarios are in place to defend individual islands and coastal areas in southern Iran that the US military might consider seizing. They include the critical oil export terminals on Kharg Island.

Iranian territories around the Strait of Hormuz have been reinforced with rapid-response units.

Army spokesman Mohammad-Reza Akraminia said last week that the aim will be to prevent any foreign troops landing on Iranian territory.

“If the Americans enter one of our islands, we will certainly target them on our own islands, let alone on other countries’ soil,” he told state TV.

Authorities have also signalled they are ready for any unrest provoked by separatist groups near Iran’s western borders with Iraq and Turkiye, or in the east with Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The IRGC has reportedly bolstered defences and continued to launch missile and drone strikes against armed groups based in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Iran shrugs off expired MoU

Javani, the political chief of the IRGC, said in a separate interview on Monday that the Strait of Hormuz will only fully reopen when Washington implements commitments agreed under the MoU signed in June.

Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that a two-month window to halt fighting was not specifically mentioned in the MoU text. The ministry also dismissed that the expiration had any particular significance to the war with the US, or Tehran’s ongoing talks with Oman regarding Hormuz.

“It has been proven many times that the Islamic Republic of Iran is not a party to devise its policies under pressure, ultimatums and deadlines. We decide based on our evaluations of what guarantees national interests and security,” Baghaei told reporters during a briefing on Monday.

He said the talks with Oman have so far been delayed in producing an arrangement on the partial reopening of Hormuz due to legal and technical complexities, the multiple actors involved and “ill-wishing parties” seeking to spoil the process.

Parliament speaker and chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said during a speech on Sunday night that the MoU was a “document of pride and victory in the field of diplomacy”.

Ghalibaf insisted that the Islamic Republic had emerged “victorious”, both politically and militarily, from the war with the US and Israel.

“I don’t mean that we destroyed their armies, I mean that they attacked us while clearly and repeatedly citing nine objectives, but did not achieve any of these goals at any level. That was the biggest abject failure for the US and the Zionist regime,” he said.

Ghalibaf has not yet managed to convince the Iranian leadership to agree on a long-term diplomatic resolution with the US to end the war.( Al Jazeera)

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