Pete Hegseth got into a heated exchange with CBS’s Margaret Brennan on a segment of “Face the Nation” on Sunday. The Secretary of War dismissed the claim that the U.S. military is facing a shortage of its stockpile of weapons. Hegseth’s statement comes after he testified before Congress earlier this year that it could take “months and years” to replenish the reserves of certain weaponry.
Pete Hegseth clashes with CBS host over weapons stockpile
The verbal clash began when CBS host Margaret Brennan asked Pete Hegseth whether he supported allowing Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy to produce Patriot missile interceptors. The Defense Secretary did not give a direct response to the question. He stated, “Nobody makes better and more munitions than the United States of America, and we are open to co-production wherever we can.”
“And because of this administration, we’re supercharging our arsenal of freedom, building more, building faster, opening up the Pentagon, ripping through the Pentagon bureaucracy to force industry to move faster so…” he added, before Brennan pressed, “but there are… a crisis…”
In response, Hegseth emphasized, “Our stockpiles are strong, and they will only get stronger in the future.” When Brennan further probed that there is a “crisis with those stockpiles right now,” the Secretary of War staunchly maintained, “No, there’s not.”
Brennan then referred to the contradiction in Hegseth’s previous testimony, to which he retorted, “That is a manufactured story that the media wants to peddle. And ultimately, our stockpiles are great, and they’ll only get stronger.”
Hegseth added, “You don’t have to read back to me what I testified. I speculated that some munitions take more time than others. We’ve got lots of them. We’re building more than ever before. The Biden administration gave away hundreds of billions to Ukraine. And so President Trump had to refill, and he has.”
