The Wall Street Journal:

By Lara Seligman, Shelby Holliday and Marcus Weisgerber

The Pentagon has told a second aircraft carrier strike group to prepare to deploy to the Middle East as the U.S. military readies for a potential attack on Iran, according to three U.S. officials.

President Trump said Tuesday that he was weighing sending a second carrier to the Middle East to prepare for military action if negotiations with Iran failed. The order to deploy could be issued in a matter of hours, one of the officials said.

The officials cautioned that Trump hadn’t yet given an official order to deploy the second carrier, and that plans could change. The carrier would join aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln that is already in the region.

One of the officials said the Pentagon was readying a carrier to deploy in two weeks, likely from the U.S. East Coast. The aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush is completing a series of training exercises off the coast of Virginia, and it could potentially expedite those exercises, officials say.

The warship can launch and recover strike, electronic attack and reconnaissance aircraft. That includes carrier versions of the F-35 Lightning stealth fighter, according to a Navy official. The Wall Street Journal has previously reported any military strike inside Iran would likely use stealth aircraft, such as F-35 or F-22 Raptor jet fighters and B-2 Spirit bombers.

Trump met Wednesday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House to discuss Iran negotiations. Details regarding a potential second round of talks with Iran have yet to be ironed out, officials say.

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