President Donald Trump revealed astonishing new details on Monday about the successful rescue mission to find the downed American airman who was left wounded in Iran for almost 48 hours.
‘So in a breathtaking show of skill and precision, lethality and force, America’s military descended on the area … engaged the enemy, rescued the stranded officer, destroyed all threats and exited Iranian while taking no casualties of any kind,’ the President said, flanked by top officials.
At a press conference in the White House briefing room, the President described an all-hands-on-deck operation that employed 155 aircraft – including 64 fighter jets, 48 refueling tankers, 13 rescue aircraft, three helicopters ‘and more.’
The search was for a weapons systems officer who was lost after his F-15E went down on Good Friday.
The pilot had been previously rescued the day of the crash.
‘He scaled cliff faces, bleeding rather profusely, contacted his platoon, treated his own wounds and contacted American forces,’ Trump said of the WSO, who was rescued on Easter Sunday.
‘God was watching us,’ the President said. ‘We were in Easter territory,’ he remarked.
The President said more aircraft was brought in for the mission than was needed to conclude it.
‘We blew up the old planes,’ he described . ‘We blew them up to smithereens.’
‘It was sandy, wet sand, so we thought there may be a problem taking off because of the weight of the plane,’ he continued. ‘And then we also had all the men jumping back onto the planes, and they got pretty well bogged down.’
The President said US forces used a ‘farm not a runway’ to land and execute the search and rescue operation.
Trump said the US military had a ‘contingency plan.’
‘Which was pretty unbelievable. Where lighter, faster aircraft came in and they took them out,’ he described.
He said the old planes were destroyed ‘because we had equipment on the planes’ they the US didn’t want in enemy hands.
‘We didn’t want anybody examining our anti-aircraft equipment and other equipment. So these were large planes that were old, pretty old, and we blew them up,’ Trump divulged.
The President noted how the WSO was able to activate a ‘beeper’ that showed US forces where to search for him, leading to the airman’s rescue and likely saving the soldier’s life.
‘It was like finding a needle in a haystack,’ Trump said.
The downed airman first contacted his US counterparts by radioing in: ‘God is good,’ Secretary of War Pete Hegseth recounted, adding ‘we leave no man behind.’
The callsign of the plane was ‘Dude 44,’ Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Dan Caine said, and a horde of aircraft were sent in within hours to rescue the pilot.
Caine celebrated the swift recovery of the pilot on Friday and the immense planning that went in to rescue the WSO.
Caine noted that a special operations force fought their way into save the downed WSO early on Sunday morning, even into the morning light.
‘We will always bring overwhelming skill and firepower,’ the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs added.
When Trump was asked how many servicemembers were involved in the mission, Caine interjected: ‘I’d love to keep that a secret.’
‘OK, well … but I will tell you the number. I’ll keep it a secret. But it was hundreds and hundreds of these people,’ the President responded.
At the top of the briefing, Trump also chided an unnamed media outlet for reporting that there was a pilot that survived the crash, tipping off Iranians that there was a target they could chase.
‘We have to find that leaker, because that’s a sick person. Probably didn’t realize the extent of how bad it was. I can’t imagine that person did, but we’re going to find out.’
‘It’s national security and the person that did the story will go to jail if he doesn’t say and that doesn’t last long,’ the President added.
The White House did not immediately respond to the Daily Mail’s request to identify the reporter mentioned.
Later at the briefing, Trump chided a reporter from the New York Times, calling it ‘failing’ and saying the paper has ‘no credibility.’
Trump also threatened to unleash hell on Iran on Tuesday should it not strike a deal with the US to avoid further destruction.
‘The entire country can be taken out in one night, and that night might be tomorrow night,’ the President said, adding fuel to his previous threat that he’d target Iran’s infrastructure.
When asked whether the war was wrapping up or escalating – scenarios that Trump has both teased – the President gave a clarifying answer.
‘I don’t know. I can’t tell. It depends what they do,’ he responded.
The President was later asked whether Iran simply had to make a deal to meet his deadline – or open the Strait or Hormuz – or both.
‘We have to have a deal that is acceptable to me,’ he said. ‘And part of that deal is going to be, we want free traffic of oil and everything.’
