CNN anchor Jake Tapper on Friday tore into President Donald Trump’s claims about Iran’s military following reports that a U.S. aircraft had been shot down.
On his eponymous show, “The Lead with Jake Tapper,” the host used Trump’s own words in a prime-time address this week to challenge his claim that Iran had been “completely decimated.”
“Iran's military says it has struck a second U.S. combat plane today, claiming an A-10 Thunderbolt II, called the Warthog, crashed into the waters of the Persian Gulf," Tapper told viewers.
He added that the “search continues for a second crew member of a different downed U.S. fighter jet.”
Tapper then played Trump’s recent remarks.
“We've beaten and completely decimated Iran,” Trump said during a prime-time address to the nation on Wednesday. “They are decimated both militarily and economically and in every other way.”
The CNN anchor responded by telling viewers, “One of the most basic rules of military strategy is don't forget the enemy gets a vote. Today's developments raise questions about what President Trump just asserted there.”
Citing new CNN reporting, Tapper said Friday that “roughly half of Iran’s missile launchers are still intact and thousands of one-way attack drones remain in Iran’s arsenal.”
“Obviously, I don't want to downplay the fact that the U.S. military has done a tremendous amount of damage to the Iranian military,” Tapper said. But, he added, “at this juncture of the war, especially when the president is claiming we're two or three weeks away from ending the whole thing, at least one U.S. fighter jet has been shot down, if not two, including the Warthog.”