White House urging Trump to end war with Iran

U.S. President Donald Trump said he was eyeing a quick end to the war in Iran, as some of his advisers privately urged him to look for an exit plan amid spiking oil prices and concerns that a lengthy conflict could spark political backlash, The Wall Street Journal reported.

It was reported that the advisers want him to assert that Washington has achieved much of its objectives in the Iran war.

The report added that some of Trump's aides have also cautioned him that a prolonged military confrontation will erode his support even if Republicans largely support his anti-Iran strikes for the time being.

“When the price of gas and oil rise, so does everything else. Given affordability was already an issue, this leads to real challenges,” Trump's outside economic adviser Stephen Moore said.

According to the newspaper, the Trump administration hoped that "the February 28 decapitating strike on the Iranian leadership - including the killing of the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - would trigger either a collapse of the Iranian regime or the repeat of the Venezuela scenario, in which more pragmatic officials chose to cooperate with Washington."

The publication also states that "neither of these scenarios has materialized so far." The article notes that the Washington administration appears to have failed to accurately assess how Iran would respond.