President Donald Trump on Tuesday issued an apparent rebuke of German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s criticism of American strategy in Iran, saying that the German leader doesn’t “know what he’s talking about.”
Merz, Trump claimed, “thinks it’s OK for Iran to have a Nuclear Weapon” — something Merz did not say in his Monday criticism of the U.S.-Israel campaign.
President Donald Trump speaks as he and First Lady Melania Trump host Britain’s King Charles III and Queen Camilla during a State Dinner in the East Room of the White House in Washington, April 28, 2026.
Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images
“If Iran had a Nuclear Weapon, the whole World would be held hostage. I am doing something with Iran, right now, that other Nations, or Presidents, should have done long ago,” Trump said.
“No wonder Germany is doing so poorly, both Economically, and otherwise,” Trump added in the post.
Merz said at an event on Monday that the U.S. had “no strategy” in Iran and was “being humiliated by the Iranian state leadership.”
-ABC News’ Michelle Stoddart
