Senator Jack Reed says at hearing that defense secretary failed to give Trump accurate picture of war in Iran.<\/p>\n
Pete Hegseth has failed to give Donald Trump an accurate picture of the war on Iran while resorting to \u201cdangerously exaggerated\u201d statements to create an inaccurate picture of a US military triumph, a senior Democrat told a Capitol Hill hearing on Thursday.<\/p>\n
Jack Reed, the ranking Democrat on the Senate armed services committee, told Hegseth, the defense secretary, that far from victory, US citizens were having to bear the cost of a war they did not support in the form of increased fuel prices.<\/p>\n
\u201cAmerican families are bearing the cost of a war they wanted nothing to do with and have gained nothing from and yet, Secretary Hegseth, you declared victory a month ago,\u201d said Reed, a senator from Rhode Island.<\/p>\n
The comments came at the opening of the second successive day of congressional testimony from Hegseth and Dan Caine, the chair of the US armed forces\u2019 joint chiefs of staff, who are testifying over the Pentagon\u2019s record $1.45tn military budget submission.<\/p>\n
As with the previous day\u2019s appearance before the equivalent committee in the House of Representatives, the hearing quickly devolved into confrontation over the war with Iran, which has become stalemated after eight weeks of fighting and seen the regime in Tehran close the strategically vital strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n
Protesters briefly interrupted the hearing as Hegseth made an opening statement. Shouts of \u201cwar criminal\u201d and \u201cdespicable\u201d were heard before the protesters were expelled and proceedings resumed.<\/p>\n
Reed immediately went on the offensive, accusing Trump of going to war without a \u201ccoherent strategy\u201d while declining to \u201cmake a case to the American people or consult Congress\u201d.<\/p>\n
But his statement reserved the fiercest personal criticism for Hegseth, who stood accused of failing to give Trump essential information or advice, while pursuing a personal agenda as service personnel were injured or killed in battle.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe problem with your statements, Mr Secretary, is they are dangerously exaggerated,\u201d Reed said. \u201cIran\u2019s hard line regime remains in place. It still retains stockpiles of enriched uranium, and its nuclear program remains viable.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am concerned that you have been telling the President what he wants to hear instead of what he needs to hear. Bold assurances of success are a disservice to both the commander in chief and the troops who risked their lives based on them. Our military has performed heroically, but military force without a sound strategy is a path to long-term defeat.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reed also seized on Hegseth\u2019s often bellicose rhetoric, in which he has disparaged the need for rules of engagement and vowed to pursue Iranians \u201cno mercy\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cToo often you have made dangerous statements that are counterproductive to the mission you boasted about,\u201d he said. \u201cQuote, \u2018no stupid rules of engagement\u2019, just days after hundreds of Iranian school girls were tragically killed in a missile strike, you have made troubling statements about showing no mercy and no quarter to the Iranians orders that would constitute war crimes.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said that while US forces were in harms way Hegseth had devoted his time to personal priorities, including overhauling the Pentagon\u2019s chaplain corps and services, cancelling flu vaccine requirements and barring service personnel from attending certain universities.<\/p>\n
Reed also criticised Hegseth\u2019s decision this week to invite the singer and rapper, Kid Rock, to an army base for what he called a \u201cjoy ride\u201d on an Apache helicopter, as well as for firing multiple senior commanders \u2013 frequently on the basis of race or gender \u2013 and blocking the promotions of others.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou are hollowing out our military defensive experience and highest performing senior officers while making young officers wonder if they should continue to serve,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Hegseth reprised criticisms he had made of Democrats and \u201csome\u201d Republicans at Wednesday\u2019s hearing, when he had called critics of the war effort \u201creckless, feckless and defeatist\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs I said yesterday, and I\u2019ll say it again today, the biggest adversary we face at this point are the reckless naysayers and defeatist words of congressional Democrats and some Republicans,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He dismissed critics as \u201cdefeatists from the cheap seats who two months in, seek to undermine the incredible efforts that have been undertaken and the historic nature of taking on a 47-year threat with the courage no other President has had, to great success and great opportunity for preventing Iran from having a nuclear weapon\u201d.<\/p>\n
Hegseth later clashed with two other Democrats, Kirsten Gillibrand and Richard Blumenthal, over his claims that the war had widespread public support and had achieved its goals in militarily defeating Iran.<\/p>\n
Gillibrand, a senator from New York, told him: \u201cI don\u2019t know if you fully appreciate how much the American people do not support this war. It\u2019s an unauthorized war \u2026 Why do you continue to prosecute a war that the American people aren\u2019t behind.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hegseth replied: \u201cI believe we do have the support of the American people.\u201d<\/p>\n
Opinion polls have repeatedly indicated that a majority of the US public opposes the war, with many concerned about its economic consequences and the risks of a broader conflict.<\/p>\n
Blumenthal, a senator from Connecticut, said: \u201cI know you have characterized this war as an astonishing military success, but the American people aren\u2019t buying it. One point is irrefutable, which is, America never succeeds in war unless the American people are behind and if what you\u2019re seeing as success now is winning, I would hate to see what losing looks like.\u201d<\/p>\n
He then tried to change the subject, asking Hegseth if he agreed with an assertion by Trump on Thursday that Ukraine had been \u201cmilitarily defeated\u201d by Russia.<\/p>\n
However, the defense secretary sidestepped the question and instead appeared sufficiently stung by Blumenthal\u2019s criticism into admitting that public support for the Iran campaign was less solid than he claimed \u2013 for which he blamed Democrats and the media.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe negative nature in which you characterize the incredible and historic effort in Iran is part of the reason, senator, why the American people view it the way they do,\u201d Hegseth said.<\/p>\n
#IranWar #USPolitics #SenateHearing #DefenseSecretary #PeteHegseth #JackReed #MilitaryBudget #TrumpAdministration #WarCriticism #PublicOpinion<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Senator Jack Reed says at hearing that defense secretary failed to give Trump accurate picture of war in Iran. Pete Hegseth has failed to give Donald Trump an accurate picture of the war on Iran while resorting to \u201cdangerously exaggerated\u201d statements to create an inaccurate picture of a US military triumph, a senior Democrat told […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14441,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-iran-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14440"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14440\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}