Trump complains dog got more credit for Baghdadi raid than he did
Donald Trump has been revealed complaining that the military dog, honoured for its role in the operation that killed Isis leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, “got more credit than I did”.
An audio of the president talking to Republican donors at his Mar-a-lago estate in Florida, details him providing details of the targetted killing of Iranian military leader, Qasem Soleimani.
In his speech to the donors, details of which were obtained by CNN, he claimed Soleimani had been “saying bad things about our country” before the strike, which led to his decision to authourise his killing.
“How much of this s**t do we have to listen to?” Mr Trump asked.
“How much are we going to listen to?”
The killing of the 62-year-old military leader, sharply escalated tensions in the region, and Tehran responded to the killing by attacking two bases in northern Iraqi used by US and Iraqi forces.
Mr Trump claimed the attacks had not harmed any American soldiers, but on Friday the Pentagon revealed that 34 service members had diagnosed with traumatic brain injury following the rocket attacks.
During his speech Mr Trump also referred to last October’s military operation that resulted in the death of Baghdadi.
The month after the raid, Mr Trump honoured a military dog named Conan, that was involved in the operation, and gave it at an award at the White House.
CNN’s @Kevinliptakcnn obtained audio of Trump speaking at a high-dollar fundraiser on Jan. 17. Here’s the transcript of Trump’s account of how the Baghdadi raid came to be and how it unfolded. pic.twitter.com/SkNRvkhd9M
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8)
“Conan came over from the Middle East — just arrived with some of the great people from the special forces that did the…flawless attack,” the president said. “And al-Baghdadi is gone. That was a flawless attack and I just met quite a few of them. And we just gave Conan a medal and a plaque.”
Speaking to donors in Florida, Mr Trump also repeated his claim the Isis leader had died “screaming”.
He said the “press wanted to give the dog much more credit than than they gave me” for the killing.
“It’s true. The dog got more credit than I did,” he said. “The dog Conan became very famous.”
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