Donald Trump made a Pearl Harbour gag so awkward that it triggered painful groans from Oval Office reporters.
The US President was sat down next to the Japanese Prime Minster, no less, when he decided to joke about the Second World War.
‘Why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbour?’ he asked a Japanese reporter, despite having been born five years after the attack on the Hawaiian naval base.
It all started with an innocent question to Trump about why the US did not warn its allies before they launched their first wave of strikes against Iran last month.
The President began as you would expect: ‘Well, one thing, you don’t want to signal too much. You know, when we go in, we went in very hard, and we didn’t tell anybody about it because we wanted…surprise.’
That last word appeared to spark an idea for a joke in Trump’s head as his counterpart Sanae Takaichi squirmed in her seat.
He asked ‘Who knows better about surprise than Japan?’, which got some awkward chuckles from behind the camera.
Unfortunately Trump continued: ‘Why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbor?’
Cue shocked noises from the press pack. Ms Takaichi’s face was a picture.
The President added: ‘You believe in surprise I think much more so than us.
‘And we had a surprise.. and because of that surprise we probably knocked out 50% of what we did and much more than we anticipated doing.’
The surprise Japanese attack on US warships in Pearl Harbour, Hawaii, on December 7, 1941 killed 2,390 Americans.
The US declared war on Japan the next day, with the then President Franklin D. Roosevelt calling it ‘a date which will live in infamy.’
It led to a brutal four-year war across Asia, which ended in Japanese surrender in August 1945, after the US unleashed two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Ms Takaichi, who has just won a resounding election victory at home, has enjoyed a close relationship with Trump since entering office.
The US President’s visit to Japan last October was widely seen as heralding in a new ‘golden age’ in bilateral ties.
The relationship has appeared more tense since the start of the US and Israeli war against Iran.
Trump demanded Japan and other countries help secure the vital Strait of Hormuz to protect oil shipments being fired upon by Iran.
That request received a lukewarm response, leading the President to post that the US did ‘NOT NEED THE HELP OF ANYONE!’
In a joint statement along with the UK, France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands published today, Japan expressed its shared ‘readiness to contribute appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage’ through the strait.
Pouring more praise on Trump in the Oval Office, Ms Takaichi said: ‘I firmly believe that it is only you, Donald, who can achieve peace across the world.
‘I am ready to reach out to many of the partners in the international community to achieve our objective together.’
It has emerged that at least 16 US military aircraft have been destroyed since the start of the war with Iran, including 10 Reaper strike drones hit by enemy fire.
But the hardest losses so far have been accidents after three US F-15s were shot down by a ‘friendly’ Kuwait pilot. A KC-135 tanker was also destroyed during a refueling operation accident, killing all six crew on board.
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