Trump ‘exasperated’ on Iran with officials lacking consensus on strategy: Report

US President Donald Trump is "exasperated" by stalled efforts to end the Iran conflict and disagreements among his top military advisers, according to a media report on Wednesday.

An unnamed ally told NBC News: "The president is exasperated. I don't think he believed it was going to be this difficult to get the Iranians to agree to a deal. There was not a real strategy for how long or what they should do to get to the endpoint… He did not intend this to be a long, drawn-out war."

A US official said Trump's frustration stems from divisions over how to handle the war, which began with joint US-Israeli airstrikes on Feb. 28 that killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and later escalated into Iranian retaliation, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz and a stalemate.

"After all this time, there is no unity," the official said. "We have had a series of tactical victories, but are facing a strategic defeat without clear policy guidance or a decision about where this is going."

The source also claimed Trump had "erupted" during a national security meeting and shouted expletives at advisers.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt denied the account, saying: "This is false. The president has a great team whom he trusts, and everyone on the team knows he's the final decision-maker."

She added: "The president is not going to stand by as they break the (memorandum of understanding), kill our soldiers and fire at our ships in the strait. So until that behavior changes, his behavior will not change. He's locked and loaded to keep punishing Iran."

Chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell echoed that message, saying the Department of Defense was "locked and loaded, ready to execute the president's directives at a moment's notice."