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Trump Takes Questions on Iran War. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired April 06, 2026 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[14:00:00]

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: If you have people shooting at you, expert shots, with the best rifles you can get, and hitting you right between the eyes every single time, and you're looking here and you're seeing and you're looking here, you're out of there. I don't care who it is.

Please.

MARK MEREDITH, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Mark Meredith, Fox News.

TRUMP: I know that.

MEREDITH: Oh, thank you. Can we go back to the weekend? First off, was everyone on board with the operation or were there people that were trying to talk you out of going through with the operation this weekend?

TRUMP: Not everybody was on board.

MEREDITH: Somebody else within -- ?

TRUMP: No, there were military people, very professional, that preferred not doing it. These two were totally on board, which was very important. If they weren't, I would have had a little difficulty. But no, there were military people that said, you just don't do this. You don't go into the heart of a very powerful military. You know, this is, hey, you have countries and countries.

You have some countries where military is not their strong suit. This whole thing is militarized like nobody's ever seen before. Half the people are wearing uniforms. And we had people within the military. Usually it's not done. That's one of the reasons. You know, I was surprised. Somebody said it's the only time it's ever been done. I said, that's not possible.

But it is possible because you're going into hundreds of thousands of soldiers along the path. I mean, look at some of the helicopters, how they got hit. So, yeah, there were people within the military that said it's a wise --

And don't forget, how many men did you send altogether approximately for the operation?

GEN. DAN CAINE, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: I'd love to keep that a secret.

TRUMP: OK. (Inaudible).

(LAUGH)

TRUMP: But I will tell you the number. I'll keep it a secret. But it was hundreds and hundreds of these people. That's pretty good. Is he central? Is he central casting? But hundreds of people went into this journey. Hundreds of people could have been killed. Forget about the equipment, a lot of equipment. Nobody cares.

Hundreds of people could have been killed. So we had people that were within the military that said this is not a wise -- and I understood that. But I decided to do it.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was there a point that you were thinking there's too much on the line and somebody was saying maybe we abort this now and wait? I mean, given the resource like the General said, it seemed like there was so much on the line here. You must have been thinking this could have completely changed --

TRUMP: So the first one, which was in many ways as dangerous as the second, I guess it gets, because we're flying over daylight. You know, we're the best at the world at night. We have goggles that nobody -- we have goggles. I've tried them. They're unbelievable.

I see better with the goggles at night than I see without them during daylight. I mean, daylight today, we have a beautiful day. You see just as well with goggles. In many ways, it's enhanced. So we have the best in the world. So it's much safer for us to do it at night, whereas other people, no other country has that capability.

They don't have that particular piece of equipment like we do. But when I was told flying -- and in daylight, I think we flew seven hours over Iran, and that's a long time, over unbelievably hostile territory where they have nothing but weapons. We took out their anti-aircraft, which is great. We took out their radar, which is great. We took out a lot.

But they still have, you know, what hit this one was a shoulder, handheld shoulder missile, heat-seeking missile. So it's not like, you know, they're totally whatever. But -- and they had probably a little luck because you got to get lucky. But they shot it, and it got sucked in right by the engine. But these guys were out of there. They were great.

Their timing was great. But, no, I was told that this is a very dangerous mission. They didn't say it's a foolish mission. They said, you know, we're going to be sacrificing hundreds of people to do this. This is -- I mean, you have tankers that are flying over this area so that they -- because the flight was so long, they had to refuel. It's a very dangerous mission.

I just felt it was worth it. If you would have told me that we would have been successful, gotten both, and nobody was even essentially injured, I would have said that would be impossible. Yeah, please.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, thank you very much.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you, sir.

TRUMP: We'll come back to you.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK, thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Given that you are now dealing, you say, with a more reasonable, less extreme leadership in Iran, what does that mean for the protesters, for the human rights movement in that country after this conflict? What's your expectation?

TRUMP: Yeah, if they assume control, if we do something and they assume control, I think it's very positive. It's a big step. I don't think you'd see the radicalization that you have seen in the last -- look what happened. I mean, women are being executed because they're not properly clothed, they say. They're not properly clothed, and they execute the women.

They absolutely -- they shoot them right on the street. Now, you have a much different group of people. Now, I'm not saying -- we are dealing with them. Essentially, they have until 8 o'clock tomorrow night, Eastern Time. But we are dealing with them. I think it's going well.

[14:05:00]

Mr. Witkoff is here, and J.D. is involved in the dealing. Mr. Witkoff is sitting right here, and I think it's going fine, but we'll have to see. You have to understand, we've been dealing with these people for 47 years. I'm standing here with a much more powerful Iran as of a month ago, not anymore. Right now, they are decapitated.

But I'm standing here a month ago with a much more powerful Iran than it was at any point during 47 years. This should have been handled by seven presidents, a lot of presidents. And those presidents are saying now, every one of them to their friends, we should have done this a long time ago. So it's not something I like doing. It's very dangerous.

And we're getting them at the height of their strength. If I didn't terminate the Barack Hussein Obama Iran Nuclear Deal, they would have had a -- don't forget, that was a path to a nuclear weapon. Remember this. He chose Iran over Israel, pure and simple.

How Israel can vote for a Democrat is if you're Jewish in New York City or anyplace else in this country and how you can vote for a Democrat is unbelievable because he chose Iran, a very hostile Iran. Remember when he filled up a 757 with cash, billions of dollars of cash, and he sent it over to them.

Then they gave them tens of billions of dollars. He chose Iran over Israel and really the Arab world, if you look, because, you know, the other Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE. I mean, you take a look. I mean, I can add Kuwait and I can add Bahrain, and you can add others. He chose such an unlikely candidate. Nobody could believe it.

Frankly, if you're going to choose between Iraq and Iran, he should have chosen -- he should have befriended Iraq. He went in the exact opposite direction of all thinking. And he made a terrible mistake. But that was a road to a nuclear weapon. And when I terminated that, everyone said, oh, he terminated it.

It was one of the best things we ever did because he had a road to a nuclear weapon. And it was good. It was a very short-term deal. You know, countries don't do 10 year deals. Countries do hundreds of years. You don't do a 10-year deal. For a country, you need -- this isn't you're a landlord, you're renting a store on a certain street and you give somebody a five-year or 10-year lease. This is a country.

It was a short-term deal. It was ready to expire. I terminated it before it expired, took a lot of heat, and it was one of the best things I ever did because he would have had a nuclear weapon. Then he would have had another nuclear weapon, had those beautiful B-2 bombers not gone in eight months ago and obliterated that set.

And by the way, the word is obliteration. CNN said, well, maybe it wasn't complete. It was so complete that they still haven't been able to get it. It was obliteration. But if we didn't hit them, that was a courageous decision too, because we had all those planes flying in at night with very little cover, unbelievable stealth planes, and they were able to do their job.

If we didn't do that, Iran would have had a nuclear weapon at a high level, either one of those two instances. And if they did, in my opinion, I told this to Bibi Netanyahu yesterday, Israel would have been extinguished. Large portions of the Middle East would have been extinguished, whether it's Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, or others.

And you saw that with thousands of missiles raining down upon them. They didn't think they were going to be hit. They thought they'd be watching us fight. And all of a sudden, UAE got hit by 1,500 missiles. He would have taken them out also. And they were powerful.

If I didn't come along and terminate the Obama deal, which was terrible, the Iran nuclear deal was a road to a nuclear weapon, a big one, unlimited, legally. I terminated it without even much thought. It was so easy. I terminated that and then the B-2 bombers. And I did one other thing. I had killed Qasem Soleimani, who was an evil genius.

And the reason I did it, I heard he was going to knock out five of our military bases. And had he lived, I believe we would be fighting perhaps a different Iran right now because he's never been replaced. And I also, I did one other, but this one was not picked up.

Osama bin Laden, if you read my book, I said, you got to take him out one year before the World Trade Center came down. So I wish you'd read the book.

[14:10:00]

But you -- as a president, to be a good president, I believe you have to have good instincts. And a lot of this is instinct. Yeah, please.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you so much for taking my question today, Mr. President. Mr. President, last week, you suggested that Europe should take the lead on reopening the Strait of Hormuz. Has circumstances changed now that you're issuing a direct 48 hour, I mean, 48-hour ultimatum?

And secondly, would a new ceasefire include Israel, or would it just be between Iran and the U.S.?

TRUMP: I can't talk about ceasefire. But I can tell you that we have an active, willing participant on the other side. They would like to be able to make a deal. I can't say any more than that.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, you've listed the goals.

TRUMP: Who you with? Who you with?

DIYAR KURDA, RUDAW MEDIA NETWORK: My name is Diyar Kurda with the largest Kurdish media outlet, Rudaw Media Network. It's based in Iran.

TRUMP: Go ahead.

KURDA: Mr. President, you said before that you don't want the Kurdish forces to enter Iran and be harmed. Do you still want them to stay away? Or what role do you expect them to play now?

TRUMP: I'd rather have them stay away. I'd rather have them stay away because I think they bring with them some problems and some difficulties. And I don't think -- they bring death, I mean, you know, to themselves. But I'd rather have them stay away.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Go ahead.

ZOLAN KANNO-YOUNGS, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, NEW YORK TIMES: Thank you, Mr. President, for the question. Deliberate attacks on civilian infrastructure violate the Geneva Conventions and international law.

TRUMP: Who you with? Who you with?

KANNO-YOUNGS: I'm with the New York Times. I'm Zolan from the New York Times. Are you concerned --

TRUMP: Failing. Failing. Circulation way down at the New York Times.

KANNO-YOUNGS: Are you concerned that your threat to bomb power plants and bridges amount to war crimes?

TRUMP: No, not at all. No, I'm not. I hope I don't have to do it. But again, I just said, 47 years, they've been negotiating with these people. They're great negotiators. And because they're not going to have a nuclear weapon.

And if somebody that takes my place someday is weak and ineffective, which possibly that will happen because we had numerous presidents that were weak, ineffective, and afraid of Iran. We're never going to let Iran have a nuclear weapon. And if you think it's OK for people that are sick of mind, that are tough, smart, and sick, really sick from a policy standpoint, from a standpoint -- any which way you want to say, mentally, these are disturbed people.

If you think I'm going to allow them -- and powerful and rich, to have a nuclear weapon, you can tell your friends at the New York Times, not going to happen.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Quiet, quiet, quiet. You no longer have credibility at the New York Times. Because the New York Times said, oh, Trump won't win the election and I won in a landslide. I won every swing state. New York Times said, oh, Trump won't win the election. New York Times has no credibility. The credibility they have is it used to be all the news that's fit to print. A great -- the old gray lady, it was great.

But they're running on past fumes, and you can't keep doing that. You have to be able to give the correct news. And people like you, who I know, are fake. You're fake.

Go ahead, please.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, your messaging on the war has moved from, the war is coming to an end, to we're going to be bombing Iran to the Stone Ages. And we've heard a range of those sort of messages.

TRUMP: Sure.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So are you -- so which is it? Are you winding this down? Or are you escalating it?

TRUMP: I can't tell you. I don't know. I can't tell you. Depends what they do. This is a critical period. They have a period of, well, till tomorrow at eight o'clock. I gave them an extension. They asked for an extension of seven days, right? I said, Steve, give them 10 days. 10 days is up, actually today. So I gave them 11, I guess, indirectly. I thought it was inappropriate the day after Easter. I want to be a nice person. They have till tomorrow. Now, we'll see what happens.

I can tell you they're negotiating, we think, in good faith. We're going to find out. We're getting the help of some incredible countries that want this to be ended because it affects them also. A lot of people are affected by this. But we're giving them -- we're giving them till tomorrow, eight o'clock Eastern time. And after that, they're going to have no bridges. They're going to have no power plants. Stone ages, yeah, stone ages.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: CNN fake, yes. Go ahead.

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Are you willing to make a deal that does not include reopening the Strait of Hormuz, or is that now a top priority?

TRUMP: I would say it's a very big priority because, see, that's one thing that's a little different than other things. We can bomb the hell out of them. We can knock them out for a loop.

[14:15:00]

But to close the Strait, all you need is one terrorist that somehow has a truck loaded with -- because you can carry them in trucks, large trucks -- a water mine, drop them in the water, and now you tell people that own ships that cost a billion dollars to, don't worry about the mine. You can do that even just by saying we put mines in the water.

So it's not like the rest. We can knock out their military. We already have. We've knocked out their Navy. We've knocked out their Air Force completely. We've knocked out 158 ships in three days. We've knocked out even their mine droppers. They don't have any mine droppers anymore, but they put them on other boats and they could drop them. I'm not even sure they have any mines yet, by the way. I'm not sure.

I don't -- I'm -- personally, they say there might be eight. I don't know. I don't know. I think there might be none because they're very good bullshit artists. That's why for 47 years, they've been bullshitting other presidents and they haven't done the job and people are living in hell. You live in that country. They're living in hell. No, I think that 47 years of this stuff is long enough.

They're at the weakest point they've ever been. They have no Navy. They have no Air Force. They have no anti-aircraft weaponry. They have no radar. They have no communication. In fact, the biggest problem we have in our negotiation is that they can't communicate.

I said to Steve, what are they saying? Sir, they can't communicate. They have no method of communication. So we're doing -- we're communicating like they used to communicate 2,000 years ago with children, bringing a note back and forth. They have no communication.

But all I want to see is I want to have a safe world. And you're not going to have a safe world. Israel will be gone. The Middle East will be gone. And then they're coming for Europe. And I have to tell you, I'm very disappointed in NATO, very. I think that NATO -- I think it's a mark on NATO that will never disappear, never disappear in my mind.

You know, they're coming to see me on Wednesday. They're going to say, oh, we'll do this, we'll do that. Now they all of a sudden want to send things, you know. But they said it loud and clear at the beginning when I spoke to U.K. of all. I would have said they would have been the first because they've been, they're the oldest. And I say, yeah, I'd love to have a little help.

He said, no, sir, we'd rather wait till you win. I said, I don't need help after we win. They have two old broken aircraft carriers, barely work. I said, I guess we can use them. Who the hell knows? I called the general. He didn't even want -- he said, we don't really need them. We got -- we got the SS Abraham Lincoln, sir. We don't need them.

You know, we have in terms of technology, we had one day 101 missiles going at 2,700 miles an hour aimed at the Abraham Lincoln. 101 missiles, out of 101 missiles, 101 missiles were shot down. Unbelievable technology.

Ten years ago, five years ago, I don't know if that would have been possible. But ten years ago, that would have been -- that wouldn't have been possible. 101 missiles heading to a ship that's not that far off the coast. And out of the 101 missiles, we shut down all 101. We have weaponry. The Patriots are unbelievable. We have weaponry that's unbelievable. Yeah.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Go ahead, please.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you, Mr. President. You said earlier today during the (inaudible) that you would like to take Iran's oil, but Americans want U.S. forces home.

TRUMP: Correct.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's that trade off?

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: If I had my choice. If I had my choice -- yeah, because I'm a businessman first. With Venezuela, as you know, the war was over in about 45 minutes. And we have great people running Venezuela, very good people. I mean, the relationship is good. And we are a partner with Venezuela.

And we've taken hundreds of millions of barrels, hundreds of millions, over 100 million barrels already is in Houston, refined and out and paid -- paid for that war many, many times over -- many times. You know, the old days to the victim, OK, you know that -- to the -- to the winner belong the spoils, go the spoils.

And I've said, why don't we use it? To the victor go the spoils. And we don't have that. We haven't had that in this country probably in 100 years, because even the Second World War, you look at the Second World War, we didn't have it with the Second World War.

We helped rebuild all those countries. We rebuild Germany. How about Germany telling us -- Germany telling us that, well, it's not their war. We had nothing to do with it. They wanted me to go and tell them everything I was doing. We didn't know anything about it.

Well, if I would have told them, they would have leaked it and we wouldn't have been nearly as successful possibly. Right? But to the victor belong the spoils. [14:20:00]

So we haven't heard -- we haven't heard that in, I think, maybe hundreds of years. Now with Venezuela, and we -- just so you understand, the people of Venezuela, they say if I ran for president of Venezuela, I'm polling higher than anybody has ever polled in Venezuela. So after I'm finished with this, I can go to Venezuela. I will quickly learn Spanish. It won't take too long. I'm good at language. And I will go to Venezuela. I'm going to run for president.

But we're very happy with the president-elect that we have right now, the people that are running it. If you remember Bush with Iraq, they fired the generals, they fired the police, they fired the people that worked in their equivalent of the White House. They fired everybody. And you know what they had? They had they had a mess. And you know what happened? ISIS formed.

Those generals and those soldiers got together. The police got together. They all got together. They formed ISIS. Not going to happen with us. So Venezuela has been an incredible -- it's been an incredible situation. We went in. We were very successful, military power like nobody has ever seen.

The general -- Venezuelan general said I was on that site. I said I've never seen ferocity like that. I've been doing this for 40 years. He said I've never seen it. They hit us from 17 different -- it was -- they were all set. They saw that big, beautiful aircraft carrier, the Ford in that case. And planes were pouring off at one o'clock in the morning. So typically, when you see that late at night, you know, you could be in trouble. Right?

And we're already -- they had their equipment. It was Russian. And they had Chinese equipment. It was all set. They were going to give us a fight, he said. And then they came and they came at speeds like we've never seen. And they came at 17 different angles. The general and his people, that was a lot of angles. They hit him from every angle. He said we knew it was over in three minutes. We were waiting for them.

Their equipment didn't work. And there's a reason it didn't work. Someday we'll explain that to people. They pressed the button, nothing happened. They pressed it again and again, nothing happened. And he said, we knew this whole thing was over in three minutes. We've never seen any -- he used the word ferocity, the ferocity of these planes from 17 different angles. And it was over. They went inside.

And remember, that was on a military base with thousands of soldiers. And those soldiers looked and they said, get the hell out of here. Thousands, we didn't have thousands. We had like 200 people. So we have a great military.

And I'll tell you what, somehow this rescue captured the world's attention, more so than normally. You're talking about two people. But this rescue captured the world's attention. But we did it in Venezuela. That was amazing. And now we have a very bad man in prison and going to trial. I mean, he released, aside from the drugs, which he was terrible, Maduro released hundreds of thousands of people from jails into our country. Drug dealers, murderers, the worst people in the world were released into our country because we had a stupid president who probably didn't know. And we had a border czar who never went to the border and never once called our great border patrol agents, right? Not once, Kamala.

She never called the border patrol. She never said, how are we doing? I used to call the border patrol guys every day. You can ask them, Paul, ask any one of them. Brandon, ask them all the time. How are we doing? How are we doing? And we now, I'm proud to say, have a totally sealed border. Nine months, nobody has come in through our border.

And nobody even tries because they know they're not going to get through. So we don't have caravans anymore.

So maybe one or two more and we'll be done.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, are you allowed to -- or are you willing to end this conflict with Iran charging tolls for passage through the Strait?

TRUMP: Us charging tolls?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Iran.

TRUMP: What about us charging tolls?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is that something you're considering?

TRUMP: I'd rather do that than let them have them, right? Why shouldn't we? We're the winner. We won, OK? They are militarily defeated. The only thing they have is the psychology of, oh, we're going to drop a couple of mines in the water, all right? No, I mean, we have a concept where we'll charge tolls, OK? I thought you meant us.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Your question would have been more accurate if you said us.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just to clarify, in order for Iran to successfully meet your deadline tomorrow, do they have to make a deal, open the Strait, or both?

TRUMP: We have to have a deal that's acceptable to me. And part of that deal is going to be we want free traffic of oil and everything else.

(CROSSTALK)

[14:25:00] UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, thank you very much. You've said glory be to God in this conflict. Do you believe that God supports the United States' actions in this conflict?

TRUMP: I do, because God is good.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Because God is good and God wants to see people taken care of. God doesn't like what's happening. I don't like what's happening. Everyone says, I enjoy -- I don't enjoy this. I don't enjoy -- these two guys don't enjoy it. You know, people say, oh boy, they're so tough. They don't want -- they don't like -- I don't like seeing people killed.

I've ended eight wars. Nobody has ever done it. The person who won the Nobel Prize came to me and said, you deserve the Nobel Prize. She announced that. When they announced, they said, goes to Maria. She's a great person, really a good person. She said, no, no, no. This is ridiculous. They gave me the Nobel Prize. President Trump ended eight wars.

I could go over every one of them, including India and Pakistan, where the Prime Minister of Pakistan said, President Trump saved from 30 to 50 million lives. That makes me much happier than what we're doing right now. That makes me much happier. We have one more to end, by the way.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: President, yesterday in your Truth Social, you called the Iranians crazy bastards.

TRUMP: True.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is your response to critics who say that it is --

TRUMP: I don't care about critics.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is your response to critics who say that it is your mental health that should perhaps be examined as this war continues?

TRUMP: Well, I haven't heard that. But if that's the case, you're going to have to have more people like me. Because our country was being ripped off on trade and everything for many years until I came along. So if that's the case, you're going to have to have more people.

Dasha, go ahead.

DASHA BURNS, WHITE HOUSE BUREAU CHIEF, POLITICO: You said that very little is off limits in Iran as far as targeting --

TRUMP: Yeah. BURNS: -- including power plants, bridges. You've mentioned those.

TRUMP: Very little is off limits.

BURNS: Are there certain kinds of civilian targets, though? I'm thinking schools or hospitals that you --

TRUMP: I don't want to tell you that.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: We have a plan because of the power of our military where every bridge in Iran will be decimated by 12 o'clock tomorrow night, where every power plant in Iran will be out of business, burning, exploding, and never to be used again. I mean complete demolition by 12 o'clock.

And it'll happen over a period of four hours if we wanted to. We don't want that to happen. We may even get involved with helping them rebuild their nation. And you know what? If that's the case, the last thing we want to do is start with power plants, which are among the most expensive thing and bridges. You saw the bridge. The bridge went.

We were very close to a deal. And then I got a call from Mr. Witkoff, Mr. Kushner, and J.D. saying, I think they're breaking the deal. I said, tell them that's OK. Don't worry about it. But tell them to look out their window and watch. And within 45 minutes, I gave the order to knock out the biggest bridge. I gave the order, knock out the biggest bridge in, I believe, the Middle East, but the biggest bridge in Iran. And within 10 minutes after I gave that order, that bridge was over.

So do I want to do that? No. Do I want to destroy their infrastructure? No. It will take them 100 years to rebuild. Right now, if we left today, it would take them 20 years to rebuild their country, and it would never be as good as it was.

And the only way they're going to be able to rebuild their country is to utilize the genius of the United States of America.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, on NATO, you voiced your displeasure with NATO in the past. Is there a danger to the U.S. not being the de facto leader of the alliance and then other powers within the alliance then getting the decision-making when it comes to wars and nuclear weapons?

TRUMP: No, it's not a danger. NATO is -- look, we went to NATO. I didn't ask very strongly. I just said, hey, if you want to help, great. No, no, no, we will not help. I said, that's all right. You don't want to help? Because I've always said NATO is a paper tiger. See, NATO is a paper tiger. Putin is not afraid of NATO. Putin is afraid of us, very afraid of us.

And he has explained it to me a lot of times. I got to know him very well. I know him very well. NATO is a paper tiger. NATO is us. And when we needed them, but we didn't need them, by the way. We didn't need them, obviously, because they haven't helped at all. Just the opposite. They've actually gone out of their way not to help. They didn't even want to give us landing strips, think of it.

And it's not just NATO. You know who else didn't help us? South Korea didn't help us. You know who else didn't help us? Australia didn't help us. You know who else didn't help us? Japan. We've got 50,000 soldiers in Japan to protect them from North Korea. We have 45,000 soldiers in South Korea to protect them (ph) from Kim Jong-un, who I get along with very well, as you know --