Trump Insulted Troops By Saying He ‘Let’ Them Win: Former Army General

In his Thanksgiving message to troops, President Donald Trump gave himself credit for “letting” them win — a comment retired Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling thought was insulting to the soldiers, many of whom have been fighting for their country for ages.

On Thursday, Trump called to wish the United States troops serving overseas from his Mar-a-Lago estate. In the video teleconference, Trump went on about how people of the U.S. are talking about “the progress you’ve made in the last few months since I opened it up.”

The self-crediting bit of his speech did not end there.

“We’re being talked about again as an armed forces — we’re really winning,” he said, News reported. “We’re not fighting anymore to just walk around, we’re fighting to win, and you people are really, you’ve turned it around over the last three to four months like nobody’s seen, and they are talking about it, so thank you very much.”

Insinuating that his predecessor President Barack Obama held back the winning streak of the troops through his policies, Trump said, “They say we’ve made more progress against ISIS than they did in years of the previous administration. And that’s because I’m letting you do your job.”

Hertling, who is also a CNN military analyst, said some of the things the president said during his Thanksgiving speech did not sit well with him and came off as insulting to the troops.

“First of all, I’m thankful for the fact that he did address the soldiers. But the message I heard and some of the things he said would not have rung very well with me had I been a deployed soldier,” Hertling said, the Hill reported. “We have been winning. You’re talking to soldiers and military personnel around the world who have been in this fight for 17 years, and to suddenly be told they’re winning now when they weren’t winning before is somewhat insulting.”

Hertling also said Trump’s comments about the booming economy and skyrocketing stock market in the nation is not something the troops overseas want to necessarily hear.

“The comments about the economy and where the economy is growing, deployed soldiers don’t want to hear about that, they want to hear, ‘hey thanks,’” he said.

Meanwhile, the press at the White House had a confusing day as they were given mixed signals about what the president’s itinerary looked like for the day.

“While the White House communications staff expects the press pool to have a ‘low-key day’,” a statement from the White House read, “the president will NOT have a low-key day and has a full schedule of meetings and phone calls”.

However, one and a half hours later, Trump’s motorcade rolled out of his private Mar-a-Lago playground and headed to Trump International Golf Club, where the president spent five hours, leading to speculations that he had chosen to play golf for the day.