U.S. President Donald Trump has likened American strikes on Iranian nuclear sites to the end of World War II, claiming the operation ended the Iran-Israel conflict despite intelligence assessments suggesting limited impact.
Speaking at a NATO summit in The Hague on Wednesday, President Donald Trump defended the scale and effectiveness of recent U.S. strikes on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, calling the damage “very severe” and comparing it to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
"The intelligence was ... very inconclusive," Trump said during a joint appearance with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. “It was very severe. It was obliteration.”
His remarks follow reports by Reuters and other media outlets that the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) believes the strikes may have set Iran’s nuclear programme back by only a few months.
Trump dismissed the report as preliminary and accused the media of undermining the military operation. “It was an attack against our pilots,” he said, referring to news coverage of the DIA’s assessment.
Trump claimed the operation brought an end to the hostilities between Iran and Israel, stating: “When you look at Hiroshima, if you look at Nagasaki, that ended a war, too. This ended a war in a different way.”
The president was joined at the summit by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. Both echoed Trump’s scepticism of the intelligence community’s evaluation, with Hegseth calling the leaked DIA report “low-confidence” and “politically motivated”.
He also revealed that the FBI is investigating the source of the leak. Rubio, meanwhile, accused those who shared the report of mischaracterising its findings, saying: “This is the game they play.”
The Trump administration has long maintained that Iran must be prevented from acquiring nuclear weapons. The strikes, though controversial, are being promoted by The White House as evidence of its firm stance.
Trump’s defence of the operation comes amid political pressure from some within his own base who argue that the strikes contradict his “America First” approach.
Still, the administration touted a diplomatic breakthrough at the summit, with NATO members agreeing to increase their defence spending to 5% of GDP — a goal the U.S. had pushed for.
In a final statement, Trump cited an Israeli Atomic Energy Commission report claiming Iran’s nuclear ambitions had been pushed back “many years”. He also confirmed that U.S. and Iranian officials are expected to meet next week, though he added that Tehran is unlikely to resume its nuclear programme after the strikes.
Ukrainian drone strikes killed two people in western Russia's Tula region overnight, the region's Governor ...
Iran said it destroyed a U.S. naval drone at the entrance to the Strait of Hormuz, while Washington announced sanctions targeting Iran-backed Katai...
Algeria has ordered the closure of its airspace to all civilian and military aircraft registered in the United ...
Four people were killed, including a child, in Ukrainian strikes on the Russian port city of Novorossiysk overnight, according to the governor of the Krasnodar region. Ukraine's drone forces commander, Robert Brovdi, said Russian military ships were destroyed in the attacks.
Overnight Iranian strikes on an air base in Jordan damaged multiple U.S. aircraft and left one without a wing, American media reported. Meanwhile, explosions were heard across parts of southern Iran according to local media reports.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) said on Wednesday they attacked two U.S. vessels and eight oil tankers in the Persian Gulf, calling the strikes a response to a U.S. attack on five Iranian tankers.
Ukrainian forces struck a Russian oil refinery in Siberia and a seaport in Dagestan in the past 24 hours, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. He will meet Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Thursday to discuss air defences for Ukraine over winter.
Nobel laureate Geoffrey Hinton has warned against rushing to develop artificial superintelligence, arguing that scientists still do not know how to ensure systems more capable than humans remain safe and under control.
Ukrainian drone strikes killed two people in western Russia's Tula region overnight, the region's Governor Dmitry Milyaev said. Russian strikes on Kyiv early on Friday injured eight people, city authorities said.
Twenty-five years after the September 11 attacks drew the U.S. into Afghanistan, the Taliban is seeking a new relationship with Washington built on diplomacy, investment and trade, despite deep divisions between the former enemies.
For weeks, Indians have watched a bespectacled civil servant become an unlikely social media star. Tukaram Mundhe, Maharashtra's food safety commissioner, posts photographs of cockroach-infested kitchens and rat droppings on warehouse floors, and his raids are shared like reality television.
Algeria has ordered the closure of its airspace to all civilian and military aircraft registered in the United Arab Emirates, marking a sharp escalation in tensions after Algiers formally cut diplomatic relations with Abu Dhabi.
Ukrainian forces struck a Russian oil refinery in Siberia and a seaport in Dagestan in the past 24 hours, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. He will meet Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Thursday to discuss air defences for Ukraine over winter.
You can download the AnewZ application from Play Store and the App Store.
What is your opinion on this topic?
Leave the first comment