Donald Trump drew fierce backlash on Monday for remarks about sinking Iranian ships.
The president, during an address to House Republicans at his Doral golf course, was praising U.S.-Israeli military operations in Iran, claiming the “enemy” was being crushed “in an overwhelming display of technical skill and military force.”
“Iran’s drone and missile capability is being utterly demolished,” he boasted.
Trump then turned to the Iranian navy:
“The navy is gone. It’s all lying at the bottom of the ocean. Forty-six ships, can you believe it? In fact, I got a little upset with our people. I said, ‘What quality of ship?’ ‘Excellent, sir, top of the line.’ I said, ‘Why don’t we just capture the ship? We could have used it? Why did we sink them?’ He said, ‘It’s more fun to sink them.’”
The comment prompted laughter in the room.
“They like sinking them better. They say it’s safer to sink them. I guess it’s probably true. But, uh, think of it, we knocked out 46 and actually took three and a half days.”
Critics called the comments “disgusting,” “grotesque,” “sadistic” and suggested they will “play well at The Hague,” the home of the International Criminal Court. More than 100 people were reportedly killed in a U.S. attack on an Iranian warship off the coast of Sri Lanka last week.
