Secretary of State Mike Pompeo admitted that there are big gaps in intelligence that Iran was planning attacks on the Americans, which was an excuse for the assassination of Iranian general Qasem Soleimani.

The secretary of state also insisted that Soleimani was planning "a series of imminent attacks" when he was killed.

"We don’t know precisely when -- and we don’t know precisely where," Pompeo said. "But it was real ... There was a real opportunity here and there was a real necessity here. We made the right decision. The president made the right call."

As reported earlier, the legendary Iranian general Qasem Soleimani was killed as a result of an air strike by the US Air Force not far from Baghdad Airport. President Donald Trump, who ordered his assassination, said he was preparing the killings of Americans in the region, including the bombings of US embassies. Tehran, in its turn, launched a missile strike at two sites in Iraq that were used by the US military.

Trump then said that Washington would immediately tighten economic sanctions against Tehran.