President Donald Trump accused the media of demeaning the military after the initial U.S. intelligence report on Iran leaked.
The president did not deny the existence of the preliminary assessment or its content, which suggested the strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities resulted in limited damage, but he insisted it was wrong.
He also claimed to have spoken to one of the pilots, who told him it was a “perfect” bomb drop.
Then Trump again harangued reporters for attacking the brave men and women who carried out what was an operationally successful mission on Saturday night to drop the bombs and exit Iran without being fired on.
“They were maligned and treated very bad, demeaned by fake news CNN,” Trump claimed on Wednesday.
He continued minutes later, when he repeated his claim that the reports criticized the men and women who carried out the mission.
“They’re the best shots in the world. They call them shots, that’s what they are, and wait a minute, and I just hope you can give them the respect they deserve because they came home to fake news and like gosh, oh gee, there was hardly any damage,” Trump said of the pilots.
The early intelligence undermining Trump’s repeated claims that the sites were obliterated came from the Defense Intelligence Agency within the Pentagon.
This story will be updated.
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