On Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said reports of the depletion of U.S. military stockpiles were a “manufactured story.”
Host Margaret Brennan said, “Let me ask you before you go about what is going on with U.S. munitions and stockpiles here. Ukraine’s President Zelensky was on this program a few weeks ago. He made a plea not just for more interceptors, but for the ability to produce them, for friendly governments to be able to produce patriots. Some Republican lawmakers support this idea. Do you?”
Hegseth said, “Nobody makes better and more munitions than the United States of America, and we are open to co-production wherever we can. And because of this administration, we’re supercharging our arsenal of freedom, building more, building faster, opening up the Pentagon, ripping through the Pentagon bureaucracy to force industry to move faster. So our stockpiles are strong, and it will only get stronger in the future.”
Brennan said, “But there is a crisis with those stockpiles right now in private industry.”
Hegseth said, “That is a manufactured story that the media wants to peddle.”
Brennan said, “You have testified to it in front of Congress.”
Hegseth said, “Ultimately our stockpiles are great and they only get stronger because of the way this president has.”
Brennan said, “You testified under oath that it would take years to rebuild those stockpiles.”
Hegseth said, “You don’t have to read back to me what I testified. I speculated some munitions take more time than others. We’ve got lots of them, we’re building more than ever before. The Biden administration gave away hundreds of billions to Ukraine. And so President Trump had to refill, and he has, and we have in real time.”
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