Rouhani: War with Iran will be ‘mother of all wars’

“War with Iran is the mother of all wars,” Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Tuesday in a speech at the Foreign Ministry also broadcast live on state TV.

“Peace with Iran is the mother of all peace, war with Iran is the mother of all wars,” Rouhani said.

The Iranian president’s words were directed at the West, in particular the U.S., which reimposed sanctions last May and has been ramping up the pressure on Iran ever since.

The situation has escalated in recent months starting with the U.S. sending a carrier strike group to the region in early May, a result of “a number of troubling and escalatory indications and warnings” by Iran, said National Security Adviser John Bolton at the time.

Since then, Iran shot down a U.S. drone and seized two oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, most recently one on Sunday. Iran seized a British-flagged tanker on July 19, apparently in retaliation for Britain taking an Iranian tanker at Gibraltar.

Rouhani warned in his speech that “shipping might not be safe in the Strait of Hormuz oil waterway,” Reuters reports.

“A strait for a strait. It can’t be that the Strait of Hormuz is free for you and the Strait of Gibraltar is not free for us,” Rouhani said.

The U.S. is working on forming a coalition of countries that will protect oil shipping in the critical Strait of Hormuz, through which one-fifth of the world’s oil passes.

Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford said in July that the Pentagon has developed a specific plan, and that he believes it will be clear within a couple of weeks which nations are willing to join the effort.