![](\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/img-assets\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2269572137-e1775571455472.jpg?w=2048\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump posted a dire warning on Truth Social Tuesday morning that Iran\u2014one of the oldest civilizations on Earth, a country of 90 million people\u2014may be destroyed within hours.<\/p>\n
\u201cA whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,\u201d Trump wrote. \u201cI don\u2019t want that to happen, but it probably will.\u201d<\/p>\n
The post landed a little less than 12 hours before Trump\u2019s 8 p.m. ET deadline for Iran t<\/a>o reopen the Strait of Hormuz and came after the U.S. conducted more than 50 strikes on military targets on Kharg Island early Tuesday, according to two U.S. officials cited by the Wall Street Journal. <\/em><\/a>Kharg is Iran\u2019s main oil export hub, responsible for shuttling through 20% of the world\u2019s oil.\u00a0<\/p>\n Trump then pivoted in the same post to suggest that Iran\u2019s regime has already collapsed. \u201cNow that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS?\u201d he wrote, before landing on: \u201c47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!\u201d<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s threatened targets\u2014Iran\u2019s power plants and bridges<\/a>\u2014would almost certainly constitute war crimes under international humanitarian law, which prohibits attacks on civilian infrastructure that isn\u2019t directly serving a military purpose. The Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols explicitly bar strikes on objects \u201cindispensable to the survival of the civilian population,\u201d a category legal scholars say clearly includes electrical grids that power hospitals, water treatment, and food storage for 90 million people. <\/a>But beyond the humanitarian costs, blacking out the entire nation would be economically catastrophic for the region<\/a> and could trigger a global recession.\u00a0<\/p>\n Vice President JD Vance, speaking in Budapest alongside Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n, insisted the strikes did not represent a change in strategy and said \u201cfundamentally the military objectives of the United States have been completed\u201d in Iran. The ball, he said, is now in Tehran\u2019s court.<\/p>\n Even some of Trump\u2019s closest allies expressed alarm at the apocalyptic rhetoric. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.), a firm Trump supporter, told podcaster John Solomo<\/a>n he was \u201choping and praying\u201d Trump was \u201cjust using this as bluster.\u201d Johnson added, \u201cWe are not at war with the Iranian people. We are trying to liberate them.\u201d<\/p>\n Qatar called for restraint on the President\u2019s part.<\/p>\n \u201cEscalations left unchecked will get us in a situation where it can\u2019t be controlled \u2013 and we are very close to that point,\u201d Qatar\u2019s Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed Al-Ansari said during a press conference. \u201cThere are no winners in the continuation of this war.\u201d<\/p>\nLeaders and markets respond<\/h2>\n