United States President Donald Trump has confirmed that he secretly switched planes after a Nato summit in Turkey last month following what officials described as a credible Iranian threat.
Trump told reporters on Tuesday that the decision was made by the Secret Service and the military. “They wanted me to go in a different flight, different plane. I just have to do what they say,” he said. “I guess there was a threat out there. I didn’t really ask too much about it. I get a lot of threats.”
The clandestine manoeuvre on July 8 unfolded at Ankara airport, where Trump was seen boarding Air Force One in view of television cameras. However, according to the Washington Post, he slipped off the presidential jet onto a catering truck that had been elevated plane-side on the opposite side, and was secretly transported to a smaller C-32A military aircraft.
Officials told CBS News that the US had detected a credible Iranian threat to fire a missile at the plane. The New York Times also reported that US intelligence had received information about a person near the Nato summit site who had been seen with a shoulder-fired missile.
Journalists and some White House staff boarded Air Force One unaware the president was no longer on board. They were reportedly told to close their window shades, and the aircraft continued to use the “AF1” call sign as a decoy, while the C-32A flew under the call sign “Reach 18”.
Trump said the jet he boarded instead could have been at “greater risk. I think it was at greater risk because that would be the plane I think that they would be more likely to go for.”
According to the New York Times, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent were among those remaining on the decoy plane.
The plane swap came a day after the US renewed military strikes on Iran following a breakdown in negotiations between Washington and Tehran, and Trump has previously said he was Iran’s “number one target” during the Ankara summit.
