President Donald Trump's new comments on the timeline and exit strategy for the Iran war in his explosive interview with NBC's Kristen Welker are the exact last thing the soldiers fighting for America wanted to hear, retired Army Lieutenant General Mark Hertling told MS NOW's Alicia Menendez on Monday.
He weighed in during a discussion that also included Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA), himself a retired Marine veteran.
So far, Moulton argued, Trump's only objective that he has achieved is that "we're not talking about Jeffrey Epstein," to which Menendez noted that MS NOW does still, in fact, devote time to the Epstein saga and the network should "walk and chew gum at the same time."
She then turned to Hertling. "In the past, when presidents have taken us into a war, they have, at a minimum, communicated. They have sold that war to the American people. That is not what this president is doing." She continued that in Trump's interview with Welker, he "failed to answer the questions every soldier eventually asks: What are we trying to achieve? How will we know when we have achieved it? And when are we done? Without answers to those questions? Deployments begin to feel indefinite."
"If you are a servicemember right now, in day 100 of this war, what are you thinking? How is morale?" she asked.
Hertling said that when Welker asked Trump if he'd return our troops home, he said even though it "cost us very little" to keep them there forever, he'd only keep them "until such time as we have a completion."
"From a soldier's perspective, that is cringeworthy," said Hertling. "I've experienced this in Iraq when we were extended for a three-month tour beyond our 12 months in 2004, and it was very difficult to tell not only our soldiers who were expecting to go home. And in fact, a third of our soldiers were already home, and we had to bring them back when we were extended." This is the same kind of thing our troops will be expecting when they hear these remarks, he said.
And ultimately, he added, there's not going to be any "completion" in Iran except perhaps "a draw."
"He believes that the military can solve all problems," said Hertling. "And unfortunately, if that's all you're using, it becomes a hammer. But every problem isn't a nail."
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