“It’s small potatoes for us.” That was how President Donald Trump described the U.S. war with Iran from the Oval Office on Friday, Sept. 4, 2026, a day after his vice president refused to use the word war at all.
Asked about JD Vance’s comments, Trump said he understood where the vice president was coming from. “A lot of people don’t call it a war. I call it a military conflict because it’s small potatoes for us. It’s not a big thing,” he said. He called the U.S. strikes on Iran “intermittent” and added: “There’s a lot of truth that we’re not fighting right now. There’s no fighting.”
Vance had spoken at a White House briefing on Thursday. Asked whether the fighting might end before the Nov. 3 midterm elections, when Republicans are trying to hold their narrow majorities in Congress, he would not predict that the six-month-old conflict would be over by then. “I wouldn’t call it a war,” he said. “Right now, there is no active shooting.”
Iran had fired at Kuwait, a U.S. Gulf ally, that same Thursday, answering rounds of U.S. strikes earlier in the week, the Associated Press reported. CNN noted that the U.S. said it hit nearly 60 military targets around the Strait of Hormuz this week, among them air defense sites, radar systems and communications sites, while escorting ships through the waterway.
The cost, by Trump’s own count
The conflict has cost U.S. taxpayers more than $37.5 billion, AP reported, and 18 U.S. service members have died. CNN added that it caused a spike in gas prices. A reporter pressed Trump on calling it “small potatoes” with that death toll. He answered by pointing to Iran’s nuclear program, which he said had been defanged. “Iran will not have a nuclear weapon because if they did you probably wouldn’t be standing here,” he said.
He also reached for comparisons. “We did Venezuela and we did this. In Venezuela, we lost nobody,” Trump said, referring to the January U.S. operation that seized former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and took him to New York City to face federal drug trafficking charges. “And this, we lost 18 people. And, in Vietnam we lost 100,000 people. And in other conflicts, we lost tens of thousands of people.”
U.S. National Archives records put the Vietnam War toll at 58,220 members of the armed forces. The war with Iran began Feb. 28. The U.S. and Israel have carried out only air strikes and have sent no troops into the country.
China and the next target
Trump also spoke about Beijing. The administration has been leaning on sanctions against Iran’s trading partners, CNN reported, but has stopped short of punishing China, Tehran’s biggest economic lifeline. Trump plans to host Chinese President Xi Jinping for a state visit this month. “They are not really involved. Very little involvement by China,” he said.
He hinted at more strikes to come. “We may hit Pickaxe very soon,” he said, naming the underground site where Iran is believed to have moved part of its stockpile of highly enriched uranium.
On the label itself, he shrugged. “I don’t think it matters what you call it,” Trump said. “What matters is the fact that we have had tremendous success.”
Sources
- Trump calls Iran conflict 'small potatoes' and defends Vance's position that it's not a 'war'
- Trump says Iran conflict, which has killed 18 US service members and injured hundreds more, is 'small potatoes'
