President Donald Trump on Thursday invoked Japan’s December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor when speaking about recent U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran during a bilateral meeting at the White House with Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.
Asked by a reporter why the U.S. didn’t tell Japan or other allies about its decision to strike Iran before it did so, the president said: “We went in very hard and we didn’t tell anybody about it because we wanted surprise. Who knows better about surprise than Japan? OK, why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbor?”
“You believe in surprise, I think, much more than us,” Trump added, referencing the 1941 attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii that precipitated the United States’ entry into World War II.
Despite fighting on opposite sides of the war, which culminated in the United States’ dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, the U.S. and Japan signed a peace treaty in September 1951 and have been allies since.
Trump’s comment drew a few laughs from around the Oval Office, which was occupied by Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other administration officials. Members of the Japanese delegation and members of the U.S. and Japanese press corps were also in the room.
The president went on to explain further why the element of surprise was important in the ongoing war with Iran, which began late last month after the U.S. and Israel launched a joint operation against Iran.
“We had to surprise them and we did and because of that surprise, the first two days we probably knocked out 50% of what we — much more than we anticipated doing. And if I go and tell everybody about it, it’s no longer a surprise,” Trump said.
Trump also joked about the war with Iran last week, telling NBC News in a phone interview that the U.S. military had “totally demolished” most of Kharg Island in earlier strikes, but “we may hit it a few more times just for fun.”
Kharg Island is a strategic island off the coast of Iran that houses some of the nation’s oil infrastructure.
During the bilateral meeting, the president answered several other questions about U.S. military operations in Iran, including questions about an upcoming funding request from the Pentagon and rising oil prices that have stemmed from the ongoing war.
The Washington Post reported Wednesday that the Defense Department plans to request $200 billion from Congress to support ongoing military operations in Iran.
The president confirmed that number, but said the request for that amount is “for a lot of reasons, beyond even what we’re talking about in Iran.”
“This is a very volatile world, and the military equipment, the power of some of this weaponry is unthinkable. You don’t even want to know about it. Oh, you could end this thing in two seconds if you wanted to,” Trump added.
He also said that oil prices have not jumped as high as he anticipated they would after the war began. The president’s comments come as prices have surged in recent weeks as Iran has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, a vital maritime passageway in the Middle East.
“Everything was going great, the economy was great, oil prices were very low, gasoline was dropping too,” Trump told reporters. “And I saw what was happening in Iran and I said, ‘I hate to make this excursion, but we have to do it,’ and I actually thought the numbers would be worse.”
While making a decision to strike Iran, the president said he thought, “Oil prices will go up, the economy will go down a little bit.”
He added, “I thought it would be worse, much worse actually,” before saying, “It’s not bad and it’s going to be over with pretty soon.”
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