During his Veterans Day speech at Arlington National Cemetery Wednesday, President Donald Trump celebrated recent military operations and said an arch he plans to build at the cemetery’s entrance would honor those who served.
In a 35-minute speech following a wreath-laying ceremony at the cemetery’s Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Trump praised service members who participated in military operations in Venezuela and Iran and said they have been “absolutely incredible.”
Comparing the lengths of the Korean, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan wars and the number of casualties – roughly 103,400 in total – Trump noted his operations had few deaths and said they have made the “world a much safer and better place.”
“In Iran, where we stopped them from having a nuclear weapon, the B-2 bombers, they took them out. We began operations against Iran seven months ago, of which only a few weeks were active hard fighting. We lost 18 beautiful souls,” Trump said.
The Venezuela operation, which resulted in the capture of President Nicolas Maduro, took just hours without any U.S. deaths, Trump said.
“We’re taking out billions and billions of dollars of oil and all sorts of other things [out of Venezuela]…Nobody’s ever seen anything like it. And we’ve paid for the cost of the war many, many times over already — nobody has ever even envisioned that. To the victor belong the spoils,” Trump said.
Eleven troops have died of combat-related injuries — as of Nov. 9 — since the start of the Iran operation in February and 12 perished from “non-hostile” causes, according to the Pentagon.
Joining the president at the Arlington Memorial Amphitheater in Virginia were former Marine and Vice President J.D. Vance; former Marine Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins, a retired Air Force Reserve colonel; their wives; guests; and representatives from major veterans’ organizations.
The Tomb of the Unknowns lies roughly a third of a mile from where Trump plans to build what he calls a “Triumphal Arch,” a 250-foot granite memorial at the cemetery entrance between the Lincoln Memorial and the cemetery’s hilltop centerpiece, Arlington House, former home of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.
When Trump first proposed the arch last year, he joked it was to celebrate him. He has since said it would commemorate the nation’s 250th birthday, serve as a monumental gateway to the capital city, give Washington an arch it does not have – the “greatest of them all,” according to Trump – with a dual purpose of serving as a military platform used to house drones, ammunition and snipers.
On Wednesday, Trump said it was for veterans, whom he alleged have “been waiting for it for 200 years” for such a structure.
“Soon we’re going to dedicate a magnificent triumphal arc [sic] to our veterans, and that’s in honor of our great veterans and our great military,” Trump said.
Trump’s remarks followed a federal judge’s ruling last week delaying construction. Three veterans sued in February to stop its construction, and on Friday, during a hearing on the proposed monument conducted by the National Capital Planning Commission, dozens more veterans testified against it.
The vets say the arch, which could have has many as 2,000 to 22,400 visitors per day, according to the National Park Service, would disrupt funerals at Arlington, overshadow graves and destroy the cemetery’s quietude.
Speaking at a veterans rally at the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, Michael Lemmon, one of the veteran plaintiffs, said the cemetery was built “on hallowed ground” to preserve the memory of service members and allow friends and family to pay respects.
“This 250-foot monstrosity would profoundly disturb the peace and tranquility owed them by towering over both the dead and the living, violating that pact,” Lemmon said.
The NCPC voted Friday 8-4 to approve the arch. All members — who were appointed by Trump — are serving in the administration or are congressional Republicans who voted for the structure.
“President Trump’s historic vision for a monumental arch at Memorial Circle would complete a project over a century in the making, and honor our nation and her veterans, and provide the sacred ground of Arlington National Cemetery with the monumental gateway it deserves,” Chairman Mark Paoletta said during the meeting.
The three veterans who filed suit – Lemmon, Shaun Byrnes and Jon Gundersen – filed an additional request for an injunction on Tuesday, seeking to stop construction until their suit is settled.
The current injunction runs through Nov. 19.
On Tuesday, nine members of the Kennedy family, including children and grandchildren of former U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., sued to stop construction, saying the shadow the structure would cast on their loved ones’ graves would “fundamentally alter the experience” of visiting their plots.
The Kennedy suit is now one of at least four filed against the arch’s construction.
The proposal is among the numerous projects Trump has undertaken to alter the landscape of Washington, D.C. In addition to the arch, Trump demolished the White House’s East Wing to construct a massive ballroom, renovated the Reflecting Pool — a restoration that initially failed as a result of poor workmanship — fixed fountains, added his name to the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and later threatened to tear it down, and is now working to turn a 104-year-old public golf course into a luxury facility.
The arch, Trump said, is part of his vision for the city.
“Each day at Arlington Cemetery, sometimes as often as 30 times a day, a bugler plays the sound of Taps over a new grave of an American veteran. In those 24 notes, there is sadness, there is pain, but there is always pride, pride in our nation, pride in our flag. And there’s never any doubt, no doubt, that our heroes served a noble cause,” Trump said.
