JD Vance Defends Iran War, Criticizes Past ‘Dumb Presidents’ | EUROtoday

Vice President JD Vance on Monday accused a journalist of “trying to drive a wedge” between him and President Donald Trump relating to the Iran battle when reminded of his earlier stance on U.S. navy operations abroad.

The heated alternate between Vance and RealClearPolitics reporter Philip Wegmann went down at an Oval Office press occasion, throughout which Wegmann pointed to studies of the vp’s skepticism on Operation Epic Fury whereas asking if he was “completely on board with the current war” in Iran.

“Look, I think that I know what you’re trying to do, Phil, you’re trying to drive a wedge between members of the administration, between me and the president,” Vance stated. “What the president said consistently, going back to 2015, and I agreed with him, is that Iran should not have a nuclear weapon.”

“We have taken this military action under the president’s leadership,” he continued. “I think all of us, whether you’re a Democrat or Republican, should pray for success and pray for the safety of our troops.”

When Wegmann pointed to Vance’s “past statements,” nonetheless, the vp doubled down.

Watch a clip of Vance’s remarks by way of Forbes beneath.

“I think one big difference, Phil, is that we have a smart president, whereas in the past we’ve had dumb presidents,” he stated. “And I trust President Trump to get the job done, to do a good job for the American people and to make sure that the mistakes of the past aren’t repeated.”

Vance, who served within the Marine Corps in Iraq, appeared on “The Tim Dillion Show” simply days earlier than the 2024 presidential election, the place he proclaimed that an Iran battle can be “a huge distraction of resources” and “massively expensive to our country.”

“Our interest, I think, very much is in not going to war with Iran,” he stated on the time.

A 12 months earlier, he shared related sentiments on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” saying that the U.S. must be centered on its efforts to “de-escalate the situation” fairly than initiating a battle in Iran.

“If [Iranians] play an excitatory role in the conflict, we need to be willing to respond,” he defined. “If they hit us, we have to hit them back. But if you’re talking about an attack on the Iranian mainland, I think that would be a significant escalation. Right now it would be a mistake.”

In current weeks, Trump and his aides have gone to nice lengths to justify the U.S.’s joint navy strikes with Israel on Iran. Earlier this month, the president laid the blame on his predecessors, former Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, on social media earlier than claiming it was his “opinion” that Iran was “going to attack first.”

On Tuesday, National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent resigned from his function, noting he “cannot in good conscience support” the battle provided that Iran “posed no imminent threat to our nation.” Kent, a conspiracy theorist, has longstanding ties to far-right extremist teams.

“It is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” he wrote in his resignation letter.

At least 13 American service members have been killed in Iran’s counterattacks to date.