Trump defends letting Iran maintain missile arsenal

President Trump on Wednesday defended letting Iran maintain its large arsenal of ballistic missiles when discussing the emerging deal with Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

The president said during a Group of Seven (G7) press conference in France that the U.S. will be working with Persian Gulf allies in addressing issues not related to Iran’s nuclear program, including the conventional missile program, but noted that Tehran will still have some ballistic missiles left.

“I mean, they have to have some, because other people have some. You got to have some,” Trump said.

“I like some of these guys, but I…don’t think they’re smart. Sir. You shouldn’t let them have any missile,” the president said of unnamed advisors. “I said, well, what am I going to do? Am I going to let Saudi Arabia have missiles, but they can’t have them? Yes, sir.”

“Doesn’t work that way, you know, it doesn’t work that way, and missiles aren’t the problem,” he said. “Missiles, they hurt a little location, but they don’t blow up the planet.”

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has said that Iran’s ballistic missile production capacity has been “functionally defeated” following U.S. and Israeli strikes, which kicked off on Feb. 28, while acknowledging that Tehran does retain some stockpiles of those munitions.

Hegseth claimed in mid-March that every Iranian company that builds components of ballistic missiles “has been defeated, has been destroyed.”

Hegseth has also argued that Iran intended to use its missile arsenal to create a protective umbrella to protect its nuclear program, justifying the focus on missile launchers and production sites during U.S. and Israeli strikes.

During the negotiations over the potential peace deal, Iran has argued that changes to its missile program were one of the red lines, munitions they have utilized in recent months to hit U.S. bases in the Gulf, along with targets in Israel.

When asked later during the press conference why it is acceptable for Iran to keep some of that capability, Trump argued that Tehran has fewer missiles than “other” countries currently.

“We knocked out probably 84-85 percent of their missiles. The rest of them are underground; they can’t even get them out, you know,” the president told reporters.

U.S. intelligence agencies assessed that Iran retained around 70 percent of its mobile launchers and approximately 70 percent of its prewar missile stockpile, which includes ballistic missiles and smaller cruise missiles, The New York Times reported in mid-May.

“They don’t want to be firing missiles right now. They’re going to have a hard time rebuilding,” Trump told reporters Wednesday. “They’re going to have a hard time rebuilding.”