Last year, the National Security Council asked the Pentagon to come up with military options to strike Iran, current and former U.S. officials told The Wall Street Journal.
The request came in September after three mortars were fired at the diplomatic quarter in Baghdad where the U.S. Embassy is located; the shells were reportedly launched by a group with ties to Iran. There was minimal damage and no one was hurt, but the incident set National Security Adviser John Bolton off and several meetings were held to discuss a response. This worried officials at the Pentagon and State Department, who felt this was an intense reaction. "People were shocked," a former official told the Journal. "It was mind-boggling how cavalier they were about hitting Iran."
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