Trump reportedly doesn't know what happened at Pearl Harbor
President Trump may need a history tutor.
A Very Stable Genius, a new book by Washington Post reporters Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig based on hundreds of interviews, alleges Trump seemed to know next to nothing about the events of Dec. 7, 1941 when he visited Pearl Harbor in Hawaii for a private tour of the U.S.S. Arizona Memorial alongside his former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, a retired Marine Corps general.
"Hey, John, what's this all about?" Trump reportedly asked Kelly. "What's this a tour of?"
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The authors wrote, per an excerpt in the Post, that Trump did seem to understand Pearl Harbor was significant, but was light on the details. He reportedly appeared to think he was visiting the site of a historic battle, which isn't necessarily an inaccurate description — the attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise Japanese military strike against a U.S. naval base that prompted Washington's entry into World War II.
Either way, it's generally considered one of the more significant singular events in U.S. history, so it's probably worthwhile for the commander-in-chief of the armed forces to become familiar. Read more at The Washington Post.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.
-
‘One day fentanyl will come back — and there will be little anyone can do’Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
15 years after Fukushima, is Japan right to restart its reactors?Today’s Big Question Balancing safety fears against energy needs
-
The Week contest: Farewell, RoombaPuzzles and Quizzes
-
Halligan quits US attorney role amid court pressureSpeed Read Halligan’s position had already been considered vacant by at least one judge
-
Can anyone stop Donald Trump?Today's Big Question US president ‘no longer cares what anybody thinks’ so how to counter his global strongman stance?
-
How Iran protest death tolls have been politicisedIn the Spotlight Regime blames killing of ‘several thousand’ people on foreign actors and uses videos of bodies as ‘psychological warfare’ to scare protesters
-
Trump’s Greenland ambitions push NATO to the edgeTalking Points The military alliance is facing its worst-ever crisis
-
Venezuela: Does Trump have a plan?Feature Oil and democracy are both on the table
-
Trump ties Greenland threat to failed Nobel Peace bidSpeed Read ‘I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace,’ Trump said
-
The Board of Peace: Donald Trump’s ‘alternative to the UN’The Explainer Body set up to oversee reconstruction of Gaza could have broader mandate to mediate other conflicts and create a ‘US-dominated alternative to the UN’
-
Can Starmer continue to walk the Trump tightrope?Today's Big Question PM condemns US tariff threat but is less confrontational than some European allies
