‘If US makes a move, we’ll hit them on the head’: IRGC commander

Commander of the Aerospace Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Amirali Hajizadeh warned the United States on Sunday if it attacks Iran, the Islamic republic would strike back. ​Hajizadeh pledge Tehran would “hit Americans in the head if they make a move.”

“An aircraft carrier that has at least 40 to 50 planes on it and 6,000 forces gathered within it was a serious threat for us in the past but now […] the threats have switched to opportunities,” Amirali Hajizadeh, was quoted as saying by the Iranian Students’ News Agency (ISNA).

Another IRGC commander, Hossein Salami, accused the US of waging psychological war in the Middle East, according to a parliamentary spokesman who summarised Salami’s address to the Iranian MPs.

The statement comes after US National Security Adviser John Bolton said that Washington is deploying the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier group along with a bomber task force to the Middle East as a warning to Iran.

Bolton signalled Washington’s readiness to “to respond to any attack, whether by proxy, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or regular Iranian forces”, adding at the same time that the US is not seeking war with Iran.

Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, said in a tweet on Sunday that the US national security adviser, John Bolton, had laid plans for the US to withdraw from the nuclear deal and take a more aggressive posture toward the Islamic Republic even before he took up his current post.

“A detailed blueprint for #FakeIntelligence, #ForeverWar and even empty offers for talks – only phone numbers were not included,” Zarif wrote on Twitter.

Senior Iranian cleric Ayatollah Yousef Tabatabai-Nejad in turn quipped at the US carrier group’s Middle East deployment, suggesting that “their billion-dollar fleet can be destroyed with one missile” if war breaks out.

“If they attempt any move, they will [face] dozens of missiles because at that time government officials won’t be in charge to act cautiously, but instead things will be in the hands of our beloved leader,” Tabatabai-Nejad said, referring to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.