CHARLESTON, W.Va. — U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito said Friday she respects the caution being exercised by President Donald Trump in his decision to pull back a military response to Iran but what Iran does shouldn’t be taken lightly.
“Iran is a terrorist nation. They want to kill America and we’ve got to take them seriously and make sure they know we mean business,” Capito told MetroNews during an appearance in Charleston Friday.
Capito said she hopes Americans realize that Iran is a threat to the U.S.
“They don’t hold the same value systems that we have,” she said.
Trump had ordered a military response Thursday to Iran’s shooting down of an unmanned American drone. He told NBC News Friday he changed his mind when he learned up to 150 American soldiers could be killed as part of that response.
“I thought about it for a second and I said, you know what, they shot down an unmanned drone, plane, whatever you want to call it, and here we are sitting with a 150 dead people that would have taken place probably within a half an hour after I said go ahead,” Trump told NBC “Meet the Press” Host Chuck Todd. “And I didn’t like it, I didn’t think, I didn’t think it was proportionate.”
Trump also told Todd there were no planes in the air.
“No, but they would have been pretty soon, and things would have happened to a point where you would not turn back, you could not turn back,” Trump said.
Capito calls this week’s events involving Iran “quite alarming.”
“It’s very troubling, very aggressive,” she said.
Capito said she doesn’t believe President Trump wants to engage in any kind of full-fledged military activity.
“He’s trying to get us out of Afghanistan. He’s shrunk the troops in Iraq. He’s trying to shrink the troops in Syria,” Capito said. “His actions just over the last 24 hours show he wants to be cautious about this before he commits us to anything. If he goes full-fledged into it he needs to come to Congress. I think he would but I don’t think that’s what he wants to do.”