US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has said that the United States is “vulnerable” and that its military will need to be built up if he wins the presidency in November. In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, the ex-president said that the country’s defense forces have nearly run out of ammunition.
According to Trump, US war stores were also nearly empty when he took the helm in 2017. He said that, during his four-year term, he managed to restock the military “so much that it was coming out the gills.”
“Now, we don’t have ammunition. How would you like to be President Xi [of China] sitting there, saying America has no ammunition? We’re so vulnerable,” the former president said.
Asked whether he is planning to rebuild the “zapped” military if reelected, Trump pointed out that six ships were “going to be dry-docked, not because they’re dead, but because they can’t get sailors.”
“There’s no sailors. They also announced we’re very low on ammunition,” the presidential nominee said, though he didn’t elaborate on what announcements he was referring to.
However, a 312-page assessment released in late July by the US congressional Commission on the National Defense Strategy, warned that the US military “lacks both the capabilities and the capacity required to be confident it can deter and prevail in combat.”
Trump suggested that the US shouldn’t be revealing such information to enemies, blasting the “stupid person” announcing that ammunition was depleted.
“We are giving it to all of our people all over the world, in particular Ukraine. We’re giving them billions of dollars of stuff,” he said.
Washington has been providing Ukraine with substantial economic and military aid, drawing condemnation from Russian officials, who have accused the US of playing a direct role in the conflict.
Trump had previously claimed that Vice President Kamala Harris, who in July assumed the role of Democratic candidate, would continue the “endless war” started by her boss. However, the former president did not lobby his congressional allies to block a $61-billion aid package to Kiev earlier this year. Back then, he said that in future he would support lending, rather than gifting, money to Ukraine.