President Donald Trump told NBC's Meet the Press on Sunday that he is open to deploying American troops on Iranian soil to retrieve and destroy the country's highly enriched uranium, with or without Tehran's cooperation. The remarks came as a fragile ceasefire buckled under a weekend of drone shootdowns, missile launches, and retaliatory strikes across the Persian Gulf.
Asked directly by moderator Kristen Welker whether he would send U.S. forces to retrieve Iran's nuclear stockpile, Trump laid out a two-track framework: a negotiated entry if a deal is reached, or a military one if it isn't.
The president's comments land at a moment when the three-month-old conflict, designated Operation Epic Fury, has already claimed the lives of 13 American service members and cost U.S. taxpayers at least $29 billion, as reported by the Daily Mail. That figure, disclosed by Pentagon comptroller Jules Hurst to lawmakers on Capitol Hill on May 12, jumped from an April estimate of $25 billion. The tab is climbing fast, and the White House is pressing Tehran to come to the table before it climbs further.
Trump described the material in question as "highly enriched uranium," though he offered his own shorthand. He told Welker:
"Yeah. So the official name is highly enriched uranium. And I call it nuclear dust because it seemed to be nice, and everyone understands it better, and it's sort of cute, and people picked it up."
The lighter tone gave way to a harder edge when Trump outlined how a retrieval operation would work under a negotiated deal:
"But the way you do it is if we make a deal, if we make a deal now we're friendly, we'll all go together. It'll be our equipment. We'll take it out and destroy it, whether it's onsite or whether we take it offsite."
And if no deal materializes? Trump left no ambiguity.
"Now, if we don't make a deal, then we're going to take them out militarily very harshly. And we'll wait till we do that before we go, in which case we'll have safety either way."
He added one more line that distilled the posture into a single sentence: "We will go with them, or without them. But we won't have people shooting at us, okay?"
That framing, cooperation or force, but either way the uranium comes out, represents the clearest public statement yet of what the administration considers the non-negotiable endgame. Trump has consistently refused to offer sanctions relief or unfrozen assets to Tehran without a completed agreement, and Sunday's interview extended that posture from economic pressure to physical seizure of nuclear material.
Trump's interview aired against a backdrop of escalating hostilities that tested whatever ceasefire framework had been holding.
On Friday, the U.S. military shot down four Iranian drones heading toward the Strait of Hormuz, then struck some of Iran's coastal radar sites in retaliation. On Saturday, American forces downed two more Iranian one-way attack drones that threatened maritime traffic over the same waterway.
Tehran responded earlier Saturday by firing ballistic missiles and drones toward Bahrain and Kuwait, claiming it had targeted American military assets in both countries. Bahrain's government said the incoming fire was intercepted.
Iran also accused the United States of attacking surveillance facilities on Qeshm Island and near Sirik, calling the strikes a ceasefire violation. Tehran insisted those facilities existed to protect borders and "ensure the security of navigation in international waters."
U.S. Central Command pushed back Saturday evening on social media, writing that "American forces remain postured and ready to continue defending against Iranian aggression."
Six drones shot down in two days. Ballistic missiles launched at two Gulf states. Radar sites hit. And both sides accusing the other of breaking the ceasefire. That is the environment in which Trump is now publicly discussing boots on Iranian ground.
The financial trajectory of Operation Epic Fury has drawn increasing attention on Capitol Hill. When the Pentagon estimated $25 billion in April, the number was already staggering. By May 12, Hurst told lawmakers the figure had reached at least $29 billion, a $4 billion jump in roughly a month.
That pace matters. Thirteen American service members have died. The conflict has stretched past three months. And Congress is not a passive audience. Four House Republicans recently crossed the aisle to support a Democrat-backed war powers resolution challenging the president's military authority in Iran, a sign that the political ground beneath the operation is not as solid as the White House might prefer.
Trump pushed back on the suggestion that the conflict amounts to the kind of open-ended military commitment he has long criticized. When Welker pressed him, the president drew a sharp distinction.
"When you say I promised, I didn't promise anything. I don't like these endless wars. This is not an endless war."
He added: "We've been doing this for three months. Much of it has been under the form of a pretty good form of ceasefire. The blockade has been amazing."
He also rejected the premise that he had guaranteed no war would occur: "Well, well. First of all, I didn't guarantee no war. Why would I have built the strongest military in the world."
The Trump administration is pressing Iran to accept a deal that would end the conflict. But the terms remain publicly undefined. Trump did not specify what Iran would receive in exchange for surrendering its enriched uranium, nor did he describe what verification mechanisms would govern a cooperative retrieval.
What he did make clear is that the status quo, a ceasefire in name, with drones and missiles flying, is not acceptable indefinitely. The two-track message to Tehran is blunt: negotiate, and American forces enter as partners; refuse, and they enter after a military campaign.
That posture has generated fierce partisan debate in Washington. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has already rejected Democratic claims that Trump's Iran decisions are influenced by personal financial considerations, the kind of accusation that reveals more about the accuser's political incentives than about the policy itself.
Meanwhile, the broader Middle East picture remains volatile. A caption in the reporting referenced smoke billowing from southern Lebanon following an Israeli strike as seen from Nabatieh, Lebanon, dated June 6, 2026. Trump has acknowledged heated exchanges with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu as Israel-Hezbollah tensions complicate the wider Iran diplomatic effort.
Several critical questions hang over the president's remarks. No specific Iranian site or sites containing the enriched uranium were identified. No troop deployment order has been publicly issued or confirmed. The exact terms of a possible deal remain undisclosed. And the names and circumstances surrounding the 13 American service members killed in Operation Epic Fury have not been detailed in public reporting.
Trump also pivoted during the interview to discuss U.S. engagement in Venezuela, suggesting the administration sees multiple pressure campaigns operating simultaneously. But the Iran question, and specifically the question of American forces on Iranian soil, overshadowed everything else.
The president's willingness to state the objective this plainly is itself a strategic signal. Whether Tehran reads it as a bluff, a threat, or an invitation to negotiate will shape the next phase of a conflict that has already cost billions of dollars and American lives.
Say what you will about the approach, at least the commander in chief told the country, and the enemy, exactly what he intends to do. That's more than most presidents offer when the stakes are this high.
