WH in-town pool report #7/ POTUS on Iran in detail

Here is POTUS's full response to the first question on Iran.

Question: "Mr President, the Vice President said yesterday that he would not describe the conflict with Iran as a war. But the US resumed strikes for the first time in recent weeks. Can you explain to the American people: if this is not a war, what exactly is it?"

POTUS replied: "Well, I tell you what. A lot of people don't call it a war. I call it a military conflict because it's small potatoes for us. It's not a big thing. We did Venezuela and we did this. In Venezuela we lost nobody. In this we lost 18 people and in Vietnam we lost 100,000 people and in other conflicts you lost tens of thousands of people.

"I would say that it's intermittent. We do intermittent strikes. I heard what he said and it was interesting because I think that there's a lot of truth to it. We're not fighting right now. There's no fighting. We're taking out a lot of oil, we control the Hormuz Strait, we control it very strongly. We did a hit on certain areas around the Hormuz Strait. We took our their radars, as you know, you know that very well.

"We took out some aircraft. We took out some other things that for them used to protect the Hormuz Strait when they had it under very tight control but now we control it and we're taking out - last night we took a lot of boats. A lot of ships came through and they come through every day. So I can understand what he's saying. It's a military conflict but it's very intermittent. I could see somebody not calling it a war."

The reporter followed up, saying it does not feel like "small potatoes" as 18 service members have died and there are record long deployments.

POTUS responded: "Why is it record long? How long were we in Vietnam? How long were we in Vietnam? How long were we in Vietnam? We're at five months now. And you know what we did in five months? They're not going to have a nuclear weapon. That's what we did. Iran will not have a nuclear weapon because if they did you probably wouldn't be standing here very long. Iran will not have a nuclear weapon. We've stopped them from having.

"We may hit Pickaxe very soon because if there was anything going on with Pickaxe. But because of all of the things - you know, we're leading in space now by a lot. When I first took over in my first term, we were a distant third to Russia and to China. We're leading in space. We know everybody that's moving at Pickaxe. We know everybody that's moving everywhere all over Iran and, if anything goes bad, we hit 'em, we hit 'em hard.

"But we've been in there for five months and in five months what did we do? We stopped them from having a nuclear weapon. If we didn't go in there you wouldn't have Israel right now. You wouldn't have the Middle East and they probably would go at European cities and our cities next. But we stopped them from having a nuclear weapon.

"And you know what? We lost 18 souls, 18 great souls. I was there to greet the families of those people at Dover and they're great. I got very friendly with some of the families. They're incredible families. One is too much but in Vietnam we lost tens of thousands of people. In Afghanistan we lost a lot. Sleepy Joe Biden lost 13 just by standing at an airport, an airport that they shouldn't have been at because they should have used Bagram, not the local little airport right in the middle of the city. They lost 13 but they lost 78 people in terms of their arms, their legs, their face was just wiped out. You don't mention that. You don't mention that.

"What we've done is amazing. We took over Venezuela and we have essentially taken over Iran. Now, there's been no shooting for days. Before the hit that we gave them the other night to wipe out their – they had radar, very sophisticated, they brought in radar because we knocked it out once, now we knocked it out twice, now we don't notice any activity. I think they're tired of putting it in and getting blown –.

"But the Strait of Hormuz is taking a lot of ships. We're getting a lot of ships out of there. A lot of oil is coming out of the Strait. There are no mines whatsoever. We have no mines. You know why? We took out all the mines. They had some mines. We took 'em all with our minesweepers – they go underwater, nobody can see them, the best in the world. So we're doing a great job and I would say it's a military conflict, if you want. Some people could call it – I don't think it matters what you call it. What matters is the fact we have had tremendous success. We've stopped Iran from having a nuclear weapon."

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David Smith

Washington bureau chief

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