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US President Donald Trump took to the podium to address a waiting hall of listeners and press at the Congressional Institute, where he began by talking about the Iran war.
“We took a little excursion because we felt we had to do that to get rid of some evil, and I think you’ll see it’s going to be a short-term excursion,” Trump assured the audience.
Stating that Operation Fury was a great name for the military operation, Trump said that the world respected the US more right now than they ever would have respected them before.
“Together with our Israeli partners, we’re crushing the enemy in an overwhelming display of technical skill and military force, [while] Iran’s drone and missile capability is being utterly demolished, their Navy is gone, it’s lying all at the bottom of the ocean, 46 ships, can you believe it?
“In fact, I got a little upset with our people, I said ‘What quality ship was that? Was it top of the line?’ I asked, ‘Why did we not just capture the ship? We’re going to use it. Why did you sink it?
“He said it’s more fun to sink it, that’s what they said, they like sinking them better, they say it’s safer to sink them, I guess it’s probably true.”
Trump continued: “Their terrorist leaders are gone, or they’re counting down the minutes until they are gone, think of it, we had leaders, and now they’re gone – we had new leaders in their place, and now nobody has any idea who the people are who are going to be head of the country – we will not relent until the enemy is totally and decisively defeated.
“We’ve already won in many ways, but we haven’t won enough,” stated Trump, adding that: “We go forward more determined than ever to achieve ultimate victory that will end this long-running danger once and for all.”
Trump stated: “One trillion dollars for the United States military this year and now the world is witnessing the importance of that investment with one of the most complex and stunning operations ever conducted and that’s Operation Epic Fury – that is a great name, Epic Fury.
“The world respects us right now more than they have ever respected us before – the United States of America is the greatest and most exceptional nation in human history, and we will not be threatened by evil terrorists and lunatics any longer.”
Speaking about the casualties in the war, Trump noted: “The hardest thing is to go to Dover because Dover is where, for the most part, a lot of the fallen, the warriors, the great young people who have died in the war, seem to mostly go – Dover does a great job of handing things.
“Iran was supposed to be this big powerful country, we wrapped the hell out of them, and you know, I don’t know when they cry ‘uncle,’ but they should have cried it down days ago, right? But they don’t have anything left.”
On Iranian nuclear progression, Trump commented: “If we didn’t do that B2 attack, Israel would have been wiped out, they would have had a nuclear weapon within two weeks after that, and even now, I think they were looking to take over the Middle East.
“Democrats are always saying, ‘no, no, there was no reason,’ well – I’ll give you the best reason of all – within a week, they were going to attack us 100 percent, [because] they were ready, [but] we’re going to have a much safer world as soon as it’s finished, and it’s going to be finished pretty quickly.”
Changing the subject for a minute, Trump once again mocked French President Emmanuel Macron: “I called the countries up, I called up France, I said, ‘Emmanuel, you have to cut your… your good friends from America, a reasonable deal.
“What’s happening is you are paying a tiny fraction for drugs as we… ‘No, no, Donald, I cannot do anything about that.’ I said: ‘Yes you can, you can,’ and he said: ‘no, no, I will not do it, I will not do it.
“Because he’d have to raise his pill from 10 dollars to 20 and maybe even 30. Ours would come down from 130 dollars to 20 dollars – think of that – from 130, that’s what you’re gonna get – from 130 to 20, but he has to double his price from 10 dollars. And they were the boss. I said, ‘No, no, you will.’ ‘No, Donald, Donald, I cannot do that.’
“And I heard this from all the other countries, too – very elegant people – and they were saying ‘no, no, no, we cannot do this, we will not do this.’ I said ‘Yes you will, 100%.’ ‘No, no, we will not.’ Because, you know, they have to double up their price.
“And I said: ‘Well, here’s the story. If you don’t do it, I’m going to put, in the case of Emmanuel,’ I said: ‘A 100% tariff on all wines and champagnes coming into the United States.’
“‘Donald! You cannot do that!’ I said: ‘I’ve already got the legislation, it’s right in front of my desk, I’m gonna sign it!’ ‘Donald,’ he said: ‘Donald, I will agree to this.’ So he agreed, everybody agreed, I got every country to agree, no other president could do some of the shit I’m doing.”
Speaking about Chuck Schumer, Trump said: “He is now a Palestinian, officially, he has registered as a Palestinian, he’s taken the biggest turn of any human being I’ve ever seen, he’s gone from totally pro-Israel to totally pro-Palestinian – he wants to protect the Iranian people that are quite nasty.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said only one month ago: “I have many jobs as a leader… and one is to fight for aid to Israel – all the aid that Israel needs, I will continue to fight for it – we delivered more security assistance to Israel, our ally, under my leadership than ever, ever before – we will keep doing that.”
Trump then turned his focus to election fraud, noting that: “There’s not a country in the world that does mail-in ballots anymore, they tried it, France tried it, it failed – there are no elections so corrupt as the elections in the United States of America.”
Turning focus back to Iran after, Trump confirmed that the US military had sunk 51 ships: “I didn’t know they had that many, didn’t last very long – their drone manufacturing has been hit starting today, we know all the places where they manufacture the drones, and they are being hit one after another.
“Their missile capability is down to about 10 percent, maybe less, we’re also hitting where they make missiles and where they deliver missiles.
“We’ve struck over 5,000 targets to date, some of them very major targets, we’ve left some of the most important targets for later – in case we need to do it, if we hit them, it’s going to take many years for them to be rebuilt – uh, having to do with electricity production, and many other things.
“So we’re not looking to do that if we don’t have to, but they’re the kind of things that are very easy to hit, but very devastating if they are hit – we are waiting to see what happens before we hit them, we could take them all out in one day.”
Trump stated that the US were now using low-cost interceptors to effectively combat Iranian drones, while the B-2 bombers recently launched dozens of 2,000 pound bombs to destroy missile launchers all over Iran.
“We’ve taken out their leadership twice and maybe three times,” Trump continued: “We want to be involved, we don’t want another president that maybe wouldn’t be willing to do what I’m willing to do for the good of the world, for the good of our nation.”
President Trump then alleged: “They told Witkoff, in a nutshell: ‘We want to build nuclear weapons,'” adding that: ‘They never negotiated in good faith, they still continued to say: ‘We want to build nuclear, we want enrichment at levels that are unacceptable,’ when they even turned down an offer for unlimited free nuclear fuel forever.
“The regime was trying to reconstitute its weapons program at a different site – they couldn’t go back to where they were – the three sites that we obliterated, but they were starting at another site, a different kind of site, and that was protected by granite – granite is pretty good, but they wanted it protected a lot deeper – they wanted to go much deeper, and they had started the process, while rapidly building conventional ballistic missiles – they were going to do it all at the same time, that threatened our overseas bases and soon could have reached even our own homeland.”
Trump commented on new defences coming soon: “The laser technology we have now is incredible, it’s coming out pretty soon, where literally lasers will do the work of, at a lost less cost, what the Patriots are doing and what other things are doing.”
“They did something stupid, they attacked their neighbours,” Trump continued: “Iran’s neighbours came onto our side and started attacking them, and actually quite successfully,” before reassuring the audience: “The Strait of Hormuz is going to remain safe, we have a lot of Navy there.”
Speaking about the current oil situation, Trump said: “It affects other countries much more than it affects us – the United States isn’t really affected, we have so much oil, we have tremendous oil and gas, much more than we need.”
In terms of China, Trump said: “We’re in a very good position, though it’s very unfair to other parts of the world, China is an example – for other parts of the world, including countries like China, they get a lot of oil through the Straits, so we’re doing this.
“We have a very good relationship with President Xi and China – I’m going there in a short period of time, and we’re protecting the world from what these lunatics are trying to do – very successfully, I might add.”
Trump said of Russia: “We’re also waiving certain oil-related sanctions to reduce prices – we have sanctions on some countries, but we’re taking those sanctions off until this gets straightened out – then, who knows, maybe we won’t have to put them back on, but when the time comes, the US Navy and its partners will escort the tankers through the Strait if needed – I hope it’s not needed, but if it is, we’ll escort them right through.”
Taking questions from reporters, one asked that when Trump called it an excursion, did that mean he thought it could be over this week, to which Trump replied: “No, but very soon.”
Speaking about Cuba, Trump then said: “!t may be a friendly takeover, it may not be a friendly takeover – it wouldn’t matter because they’re really down to fumes, as they say – they have no energy, they have no money, they’re in deep trouble on a humanitarian basis – they will either make a deal, or we will do it just as easy anyway.”
President Trump then went on to deny that the US was behind the Minab school strike in Iran despite footage that showed otherwise, while suggesting that Iran may have Tomahawks and could have conducted the strike.
“I haven’t seen it yet, and I will say that the Tomahawk – one of the most powerful weapons around – is used by, you know, sold to and used by other countries, and whether it’s Iran, who also has Tomahawks – they wish they had more – or whether it’s Iran or somebody else, the fact is that a Tomahawk is very generic, it’s sold to other countries, but that’s being investigated right now,” Trump said.
When asked by a reporter about the rising fuel prices, Trump claimed: “I knew oil prices would go up if I did this, and they’ve gone up probably less than I thought they would.”
Another reporter said there were reports that Iran had pressed that trigger button to activate sleeper cells abroad, to which Trump rescinded: “Well, they’ve been trying for a long time, we’ve been very much on top of it.”
Asked his thoughts on Iran’s new Supreme Leader Seyyed Mojtaba Khamenei, Trump said: “I was disappointed because we think it’s going to lead to more of the same problem for the country, so I was disappointed to see their choice.”
Pressed further about who Trump thought would be ideal in the Iranian leadership, Trump said: “I like the idea of, you know, internal and external, I would like to see somebody from the inside – they talked about the son of the Shah, but, you know, he hasn’t been there for many years.”
One reporter stated that Trump had suggested how Iran had got its hands on a Tomahawk and bombed the elementary school on the first day of the war, asking why Trump was the only one saying this, to which the President replied: “Because I just don’t know enough about it, I think it’s something that I was told is under investigation, but Tomahawks are used by others, as you know – numerous other nations have Tomahawks, they buy them from us.”
Reporters also wanted to know whether there had been any points of disagreement between Trump and JD Vance about Iran, to which Trump replied he didn’t think so: “He was philosophically a little bit different than me, he was maybe less enthusiastic about going, but he was quite enthusiastic.”
When asked about the situation with the Strait of Hormuz, Trump responded: “I want to keep it open, I want to keep it good, it doesn’t pertain to us as much as it does to China – we’re really helping China here and other countries, because they get a lot of their energy from the Straits, but look, we have a good relationship with China, it’s my honour to do it.”
Trump was asked by another reporter whether the new Iranian Supreme Leader had a target on his back, to which the President commented: “I don’t want to say whether or not he does, because that would be inappropriate – I had a target on my back because, as you know pretty well, they caught the assassin that was after me – so we just got them first.”
A reporter then stated that the President had informed the Iranian people that he would help them, but the earlier speech sounded more like Trump was willing to end the fight after military objectives had been wrapped up, asking whether that was a betrayal of the people, to which Trump commented: “I would like to help them if they can behave, but they have been very menacing – they have to be in a system that allows them to be helped.”
Asked about his conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump said: “We talked about that with President Putin – he was very impressed with what he saw because nobody has ever seen anything quite like it.
“We want a system that can lead to many years of peace, and if we can’t have that, we might as well get it over with right now.”
