Trump speaks out on confronting Russian aggression
Former President Trump weighs in on the Russia-Ukraine war in an exclusive interview on 'Hannity.'
Former President Donald Trump warned that nefarious global actors like Chinese autocrat Xi Jinping are watching the Biden administration's response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, further suggesting that their preparations were not sufficient to ward off such a crisis.
In an exclusive interview with "Hannity," Trump said none of the bloodshed Putin is exacting on Ukrainian civilians would happen if he were still in office.
"It's so sad because this would have never happened. If we had the Trump administration, there was no chance that this would happen. And I know [Putin] well, and this was not something that was going to happen at all," he said.
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Trump added that America's enemies were likely emboldened by Biden's botched withdrawal from Afghanistan which left 13 American servicemembers dead and billions of dollars of American military technology ripe for the taking.
President Donald Trump meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the G20 Summit, Friday, July 7, 2017, in Hamburg. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
"It's not even believable how incompetent that was, the way they withdrew or surrendered, or whatever you want to call it," he said.
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"Bad things started happening… I'll tell you Putin was watching and President Xi was watching and the leaders in Iran were watching, and Kim Jong Un was watching, North Korea. They were all watching," Trump told host Sean Hannity.
"They no longer respect our country. And that's how this came about. It would have never, ever happened."
Polish President Andrzej Duda, right, shakes hands with US Vice President Kamala Harris on the occasion of their meeting at Belwelder Palace, in Warsaw, Poland, Thursday, March 10, 2022. (Saul Loeb/Pool Photo via AP)
Trump said he had a "very strong conversation" with President Putin while he was in office, and that Putin would not have invaded Ukraine during a Trump administration.
"And he understood, and I won't go into the great details of the conversation because nobody has to know that. But I will tell you, it never, ever would have happened if we were if … I was president," he said.
Trump added that Vice President Kamala Harris embarrassed the United States during her junket to Warsaw this week, remarking that she "laughed [like] a mad woman" when discussing the Ukraine war with President Andrzej Duda.
"We have people in there that are grossly incompetent. And you know it, and so does everybody else."
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