President Donald Trump broke his silence on the clandestine operation that had him spirited away from his own Air Force One aboard a catering truck in Turkey. The extraordinary security maneuver, kept under wraps for weeks, was reportedly triggered by a specific Iranian assassination threat.
Donald Trump says the military aircraft he boarded in Turkey faced ‘greater risk’ than Air Force One
The president challenged the prevailing narrative that the switch protected him, instead arguing the decoy operation merely shifted the danger onto his own shoulders. “I think actually the plane that I flew on was at greater risk,” Donald Trump told reporters on Tuesday (via Reuters).
He suggested that any adversary sophisticated enough to track his movements would likely have seen through the Air Force One ruse. “I think it was at greater risk because that would be the plane I think that they would be more likely to go for.”
The chain of events began following a NATO summit in Ankara. Trump initially boarded Air Force One as normal. Moments later, he exited in secrecy via a catering truck and transferred to a military aircraft for the flight to Britain.
The White House had previously stated the president was flying aboard the recognizable blue-and-white jet, and the decoy operation remained a secret until The Washington Post first reported it earlier this week.
The incident immediately started debate over whether the strategy left aides and journalists traveling on the original plane exposed. But Trump deflected responsibility for the optics. “Well, it’s only up to Secret Service.”
He continued, “I just follow what they’d like to do, so I go by Secret Service and the military,” he said. Further adding, “I guess there was a threat out there. I didn’t really ask too much about it. I get a lot of threats.”
After all, the operational security scramble played out amid escalating hostilities in the war with Iran, which shares a border with Turkey. The trip also was the first international voyage for a newly renovated Qatari-donated jet. Trump’s unexpected announcement that he would depart Ankara using an older Air Force One variant had initially prompted questions about the new plane’s security.
Originally reported by Devanshi Basu on Mandatory.
