Trump makes Pearl Harbor joke during meeting with Japanese prime minister

Trump invoked Japan's December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor when speaking about recent U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran during a meeting with Japan's prime minister.

President Donald Trump on Thursday invoked Japan’s December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor when speaking about recent U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran during a bilateral meeting at the White House with Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.

Asked by a reporter why the U.S. didn’t tell Japan or other allies about its decision to strike Iran before it did so, the president said: “We went in very hard and we didn’t tell anybody about it because we wanted surprise. Who knows better about surprise than Japan? OK, why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbor?”

“You believe in surprise, I think, much more than us,” Trump added, referencing the 1941 attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii that precipitated the United States’ entry into World War II.

Despite fighting on opposite sides of the war, which culminated in the United States’ dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, the U.S. and Japan signed a peace treaty in September 1951 and have been allies since.

Trump’s comment drew a few laughs from around the Oval Office, which was occupied by Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other administration officials. Members of the Japanese delegation and members of the U.S. and Japanese press corps were also in the room.