War Chiefs Confronted Over Trump Threat at Briefing— Blow Off Shouted War Crimes Question

President Donald Trump’s top war leaders were confronted at a briefing over his threat to destroy a desalination plant and the policy of “no quarter,” both of which have been criticized as potential war crimes.

In an early-morning rant on Monday, Trump threatened — among other things — “blowing up and completely obliterating all of their Electric Generating Plants, Oil Wells and Kharg Island (and possibly all desalinization plants!),” which is a potential war crime.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth held a joint press conference on Tuesday morning alongside Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine to update the Pentagon press corps as the Iran war enters its second month.

Toward the end of the briefing, a reporter asked Caine about the “legality” of striking the water plant. As he wrapped up his response, another shouted question challenged Hegseth’s declarations of “no quarter” to the enemy — which was ignored:

REPORTER: Do you still believe – you said previously that the Iranian leadership would surrender – do you still believe that? And is the United States still committed to Dato’s collective defense?

And to Chairman Cain, could you give us a sense of your thinking about the legality of striking desalinization plans if the President were to order that?

SECRETARY OF DEFENSE PETE HEGSETH: I would just say that any mission that ends on our terms, go on and call it a surrender, call it defeat, call it what you want, we remain committed to a conflict that ends our terms and the President’s terms.

There’s no doubt about that.

And as far as NATO’s concerned, that’s a decision that’ll be left to the President, but I’ll just say a lot has been laid bare. A lot has shown to the world about what our allies would be willing to do for the United States of America when we undertake an effort of this scope on behalf of the free world.

These are missiles that don’t even range the United States of America. They range allies and others.

And yet, when we ask for additional assistance or simple access-facing overflight, we get questions or roadblocks or hesitations.

And the President’s pointing out, you don’t have much of an alliance if you have countries that are not willing to stand with you when you need them.

He’s simply pointing that out. And ultimately, it’ll be his decision of what that looks like after this is complete.

CHAIRMAN OF THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF GENERAL DAN CAINE: I’ll just, I won’t talk about any particular target.

This really builds on Jillian’s question too that I don’t think I completely answered.

But you know, the joint force is the most professional force in the world and we have numerous processes and system to carefully consider the whole range of considerations from civilian risk to legal considerations with any target.

And as targets come before us, we run them through the same process that we always do and always strike lawful targets in accordance with the normal procedures that we use.

REPORTER: General Cain, do you agree with “no quarter, no mercy” for enemy combatants, as Hegseth has said?

Watch above via Department of War and press pool.

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