U.S. President Donald Trump believes Secretary of War Pete Hegseth misled him about American weapons stockpiles depleted during the war against Iran, The Washington Post reported, citing sources in the U.S. administration.
On the sidelines of a July 31 Cabinet meeting at Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland outside Washington, Trump demanded that Hegseth explain "why he had apparently been misled on extreme munitions shortages that now threaten to limit military options with Iran."
Trump vented at Hegseth because he thought the munitions problem had been fixed, the report said. The shortage of long-range missiles and air-defense interceptors was among the reasons Trump decided against launching additional massive strikes on Iran, the newspaper emphasized.
The U.S. used more than 850 Tomahawk cruise missiles and over 1,000 THAAD and Patriot interceptors in the first weeks of the war against Iran, according to the report. Meanwhile, the ATACMS stockpile has been "drained to the extent that there’s basically none left."
The dispute between Trump and Hegseth reflects the U.S. president’s "increasing frustration" with the Pentagon chief, the newspaper said. Hegseth blamed Deputy Secretary of War Stephen Feinberg both for the munitions shortages and for failing to ensure that Trump was fully informed about them.
On August 5, Hegseth said that a CNN report claiming the Pentagon’s stocks of key munitions had fallen to dangerously low levels was inaccurate. The Associated Press reported in late July that Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine had directly informed Trump that current missile inventories limited Washington’s options for further escalation against Tehran. Trump previously denied reports that munitions shortages, including a lack of air-defense missiles, had contributed to his decision not to resume full-scale hostilities against Iran.
