'This ended the war': Trump compares US strikes on Iran to Hiroshima
Speaking alongside the Nato secretary general, Mark Rutte, Donald Trump compared the US strikes on Iran to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, saying: 'This was essentially the same thing: that ended that war; this ended the war.' Trump's comments came after a Pentagon report that said the US strikes on Iran's nuclear sites only set the programme back by months. Trump has rejected these claims
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Reuters
28 minutes ago
- Reuters
US and Iran disagree on scale of damage to nuclear facilities from US strikes, Kremlin aide says
MOSCOW, June 25 (Reuters) - The United States and Iran disagree when it comes to how much damage U.S. air strikes caused to Iranian nuclear facilities, Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov said on Wednesday. Ushakov said Moscow welcomed the ceasefire between Iran and Israel and hoped it lasted and noted what he said were differing assessments of the impact of the U.S. attack. "The one that carried out the strikes believes significant damage was inflicted. And the one who received these strikes believes that everything was prepared in advance and that these objects did not suffer excessive, significant damage," Ushakov told reporters. A spokesman for Iran's Foreign Ministry said earlier on Wednesday that the U.S. strikes had caused significant damage to Tehran's nuclear facilities. Earlier in the day, the Kremlin had said it thought it was too early for anyone to have an accurate picture of the extent of damage caused.
The Independent
30 minutes ago
- The Independent
NATO boss praises ‘Dear Donald' for pushing alliance to boost defense spending: ‘You made this change possible'
Eight years after Donald Trump used his first appearance at a NATO leaders summit to castigate members of the alliance for 'not paying what they should be paying' for their own defense needs, the 32-member bloc is pledging to more than double their military budgeting commitments — and the American president is getting credit. Speaking at the outset of the group's annual confab at The Hague, Secretary General Mark Rutte said the alliance was poised to take 'historic, transformational decisions to make our people safer, through a stronger, fairer and more lethal NATO ' by implementing a 'concrete plan' for each member of the alliance to spend a full five percent of gross domestic product on defense, through a combination of 'core defense' and 'defense and security-related investments.' Rutte, a former Dutch prime minister who was selected as NATO's chief civil servant and diplomat last year, said the move was 'required' to make the alliance 'fairer' by ensuring that each member 'contributes their fair share for security' as he echoed a complaint voiced by Trump during his first summit in 2017, when the American leader groused that members' failure to meet a two percent defense spending threshold was 'not fair to the people and taxpayers of the United States.' 'For too long, one ally, the United States carried too much of the burden of that commitment, and that changes today,' Rutte added. The NATO leader then began praising Trump in a section of his remarks that evoked the statements of adulation that are heard at the American leader's cabinet meetings, addressing him first as 'President Trump,' then as 'dear Donald' before saying it was Trump who 'made this change possible.' 'Your leadership on this has already produced $1 trillion in extra spending from European allies since 2016 and the decisions today will produce trillions more for our common defense to make us stronger and fairer by equalizing spending between America and America's allies,' he said. He added that NATO members would also agree to 'further increase defense production' with what he described as 'a huge expansion of our defense industrial base on both sides of the Atlantic,' calling the development 'good for our security' as well as 'good for our economies and good for our jobs.' Rutte's remarks echoed a text message he'd sent to Trump the day before — which the president had captured in a screen grab he then posted to social media — in which he congratulated Trump for 'decisive action' in ordering airstrikes on Iranian nuclear sites over the weekend and hailed him as 'flying into another big success in The Hague' on account of the agreement for NATO members to up their defense spending to five percent of GDP. 'You will achieve something NO American president in decades could get done. Europe is going to pay in a BIG way, as they should, and it will be your win,' he said. When the 32 heads of state and government representing each of the allies met on Wednesday, they agreed to ratify the five percent threshold, writing in a joint declaration that each nation would commit to that minimum expenditure 'annually on core defense requirements as well as defense-and security-related spending by 2035 to ensure our individual and collective obligations.' Of that amount, 3.5 percent of each country's GDP will go to 'resource core defense requirements' with the remaining 1.5 percent allocated for 'critical infrastructure' protection as well as 'civil preparedness and resilience' and strengthening countries' defense industrial bases. Each country will be required to submit annual plans to show 'a credible, incremental path' to reaching the five percent spending threshold, the declaration said. In what appeared to be another carrot aimed at garnering the president's support, the NATO leaders also stated a commitment to 'eliminate defense trade barriers' and 'promote defense industrial cooperation' by leveraging transatlantic partnerships, as well as as an agreement to reaffirm 'enduring sovereign commitments to provide support to Ukraine ' including 'direct contributions towards Ukraine's defense and its defense industry' that can be counted towards the five percent of GDP require for defense spending. The NATO leaders' agreement to step up their defense spending comes after years of pressure from Trump, including both implicit and explicit threats to the alliance's mutual defense provisions, raising fears that the American leader would either pull the United States out of the alliance entirely or simply refuse to come to another nation's aid in the event of an attack. Former officials who served in Trump's first administration have said that he expressed a desire to exit the United States from the North Atlantic Treaty, which he has long described as something akin to a mafia protection racket or a country club in which member states pay 'dues' in exchange for American military protection. During last year's presidential campaign, Trump went so far as to say that he'd 'encourage' Russia to 'do whatever the hell they want' to a NATO ally if that country were 'delinquent' on defense spending, prompting Rutte's predecessor, Jens Stoltenberg, to state that a suggestion that "allies will not defend each other undermines all of our security." His remarks on the campaign trail were part of a pattern set during his first appearance at a NATO summit in 2017, when he claimed 'many' allies owed 'massive amounts of money from past years and not paying in those past years,' which he continued as recently as Tuesday, when he refused to state whether he would commit the United States to continued support of the mutual defense provision in the NATO treaty that saw America's allies come to her aid after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on New York and Washington. Asked if he was still committed to Article Five of the North Atlantic Treaty, which states that an attack against one member is considered an attack against all of the organization's 32 member nations while en route to The Netherlands aboard Air Force One, Trump declined to say, telling reporters: 'It depends on your definition. There's numerous definitions of Article Five. You know that, right?' The president added that he was nonetheless 'committed to being ... friends' with the other members of the alliance because he had 'become friends with many of those leaders' and was 'committed to helping them.' When pressed to explain his comments and given another chance to voice support for mutual defense, he told reporters he was 'committed to saving lives' and 'committed to live and safety' while promising to give his 'exact definition' of Article Five once he arrived in The Hague rather than doing so 'on the back of an airplane.' And as he sat next to Rutte during a brief media availability Wednesday morning, Trump appeared to have found more favorable feelings towards Article Five when he was asked once more about his support for the mutual aid provision. 'We're with them all the way,' he said. Asked to clarify his stance during a later bilateral meeting alongside Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof, Trump replied: 'I stand with it.' 'That's why I'm here. If I didn't stand with it, I wouldn't be here,' he said.
The Independent
35 minutes ago
- The Independent
Pentagon slams fake memo claiming to be from Pete Hegseth after it goes viral
A viral image purporting to be a memo from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth forbidding servicemembers from wearing their uniforms in social media posts has been debunked by the Pentagon. The false memo bears the Department of Defense 's insignia but claims to come from the 'Office of Military Standards and Ethics,' which does not exist, as Pentagon spokesperson for personnel and readiness Jade Fulce pointed out to Stars and Stripes. The false order lectures military personnel about the 'unauthorized use' of their uniforms in online posts. It warns that 'all service members are prohibited from posting content in uniform for personal branding, monetization, entertainment or social media growth without explicit written approval from their unit's Public Affairs Office. 'Using it to build a following, chase internet clout, or promote personal narratives is a direct insult to the profession of arms and the Americans who trust us to defend them.' The official guidance on the matter is straightforward: anyone wearing a military uniform to identify themselves as a service member, directly or indirectly, must remember that they are considered a representative of the U.S. Armed Forces and should conduct themselves accordingly. The Vanguard Wall Podcast reportedly responded to the fake memo by using artificial intelligence to create a video satirizing the confusion it spawned, in which a fictional service member complains: 'How am I supposed to monetize myself now? I just bought an Audi – the uniform is the brand!' The timing of the memo is also a giveaway, given that Hegseth is currently preoccupied by the tensions between Israel and Iran, having overseen the U.S. bombing raid on Tehran's nuclear sites on Saturday, so is unlikely to have time to turn his attention towards such a minor detail of protocol. Influencer and Marine veteran Kayla Haas wrote on X that although she identified the memo as fake, she wished it were real. 'The Office of Military Standards and Ethics doesn't exist. The formatting is off. No directive number, no signature, no trace on official channels. That said? I agree with the spirit of it. And I wish a version was real,' Haas posted. These topics (with the exception of monetization, in my opinion) are gray at best and hard to enforce. How do you define 'personal branding'? Is it a promotion ceremony photo? A fitness page? A deployment video?' 'Some service members use social media well to educate, inspire, and uphold the best of the military. Others chase clout, rake in money, and damage trust in the institution. We need clearer lines. Not censorship, but well-defined standards.'
