U.S media reported that on 10 May, the acting Pentagon chief "presented an updated military plan that envisions sending as many as 120,000 troops to the Middle East should Iran attack American forces or accelerate work on nuclear weapons". President Trump subsequently dismissed the story as "fake news". "We have not planned for that", he maintained. "Hopefully we're not going to have to plan for that. And if we did that, we'd send a hell of a lot more troops than that".