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Published : 11 Jul 2026, 05:16 PM
US President Donald Trump has mistakenly said the "Islamic Republic of Japan" fired 111 missiles at an American aircraft carrier, misidentifying Iran in remarks that do not match official US military accounts.
Speaking alongside Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Ankara on Jul 8, Trump described the USS Abraham Lincoln as "one of the most beautiful" and "one of the biggest" carriers, USA Today reports.
"A few months ago... we had 111 missiles shot by the Islamic Republic of Japan," he said, adding that the missiles were fired at the carrier over about an hour and all were intercepted.
No country by the name "Islamic Republic of Japan" exists. Iran's official name is the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Japan and the US, meanwhile, have been treaty allies since 1952, with around 60,000 American troops currently based in the East Asian country.
Trump's remark appears to conflate two separate incidents involving the Abraham Lincoln and Iran.
In February, the US shot down a drone that approached the carrier in the Arabian Sea, not far from Iran's southern coast, shortly before the US and Israel launched strikes on Iran.
The following month, Iran claimed it had struck the carrier with a ballistic missile, a claim US Central Command rejected, saying the missiles "didn't even come close" and that the Lincoln continued flight operations against Iranian targets.
The war between Iran and Israel, which has drawn in US strikes, is now in its fourth month.
