"We are not looking for new bases. I want to be clear on that," said General Kenneth McKenzie, head of the US Army Central Command (Centcom), during a tour of the Middle East.

"What we would like to do, without shutting down these (current) bases .... is to have the ability to go to other bases to operate in a period of heightened risk," he explained.

"These are things that any prudent military planner would want to do to increase their flexibility, to make it more difficult for the adversary to target them."

The Wall Street Journal reported on plans for ports and air bases in the kingdom's western desert, which the US military would seek to develop as positions to be used if war were to break out with Iran.

At the year's end, the US military deployed the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz to the region and had two B-52 bombers overfly the area.

The show of force was intended to deter Tehran from carrying out any attack on US forces on the first anniversary of the assassination by the United States of top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani.

President Joe Biden's administration said Thursday it was ready to meet with Iranian officials under EU auspices to jumpstart diplomacy, and reversed Trump's widely derided contention that the United Nations had imposed new sanctions on Iran.

Even close US allies had dismissed the argument and the United Nations said that no such additional sanctions had come into force.