President Donald Trump indicated that the U.S. is close to ending its war with Iran on Tuesday, but he claimed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth wants it to keep going.
The president was speaking in the Oval Office after the swearing-in of former Sen. Markwayne Mullin as the new Secretary of Homeland Security when he made the admission.
“You know, the only two people that were quite disappointed, I don’t want to say this, but I have to,” Trump began. “I said, ‘Pete and General Razin Caine, I think this thing is going to be settled very soon,’ and they go, ‘Oh, that’s too bad.’”
“Pete didn’t want it to be settled,” Trump said, laughing.
It was a bizarre thing to say about a war in which 13 U.S. service members have already died, and some 200 have been wounded since the attacks began.
Moments before Trump claimed Hegseth was disappointed that the war could end soon, he asked his defense secretary to give an update on the war at the White House.
“Pete, do you want to give about a three-minute statement on how we’re doing in this as I call it military operation?” Trump asked the former Fox News host.
“People don’t like me using the word war, but, so I won’t, but the Democrats call it a war,” he added, though Trump, 79, has called it a war numerous times including when he first announced the February 28 strikes in a video and on Tuesday just seconds before he asked Hegseth for an update, declaring: “This war has been won.”
Hegseth then stepped up to the microphone, where he proceeded to heap praise on the president and gush about so-called “Operation Epic Fury.”
“Never in history has a modern military—Iran had a modern military, a modern navy, a modern air force, modern air defenses, leadership, massive bunker—never has a modern military been so rapidly and historically obliterated, defeated, from day one with overwhelming firepower," Hegseth bragged.
The defense secretary claimed the president “untied” the hands of what he called “war fighters” when he sent them to fight, and that they were sent to “destroy the enemy as viciously as possible.”
“We see ourselves as part of this negotiation as well. We negotiate with bombs,” Hegseth added. “You have a choice as we loiter over the top of Tehran, as the president talked about, about your future.”
He argued his department’s job was to make sure Iran did not get a nuclear weapon.
“We’re keeping our hand on that throttle as long and as hard as is necessary to ensure the interests of the United States of America are achieved on that battlefield,” Hegseth added as he waved his arm about.
Trump, 79, argued the war had been “won” and claimed that “the only one that likes to keep it going is the fake news.”
But it comes as the Pentagon is sending thousands more soldiers to the Middle East, including the U.S. Army’s elite 82nd Airborne Division, according to Reuters. One source said the U.S. was set to send between 3,000 and 4,000 soldiers.
The president claimed on Tuesday that the U.S. was negotiating with Iran and said the vice president, secretary of state, his son-in-law Jared Kushner, and special envoy Steve Witkoff were all involved.
The president also bragged about destroying Iran’s navy, with another anecdote about his defense secretary.
“In fact, I was a little upset with Pete. I said, ‘Why didn’t you save the ships? We could’ve used them.’ He said, ‘It’s more fun shooting them down,’” Trump claimed.
