Remarks in a Roundtable Meeting With Business Leaders and an Exchange With Reporters in Doha, Qatar

The President. Well, thank you very much, everybody. I want to just thank you for being with us. And I assume the press is ready.

We have a Pulitzer Prize–winning photographer. Unfortunately, he gets it for a shot at the ear. Someday you'll get it for something nice. You'll get it for something nice, Doug [Doug Mills, New York Times].

Q. Thank you, sir.

The President. Well, I want to just thank everybody. It's been a very special trip, and I can tell you that our country is hot. It's hot as a pistol. Never—I don't even think—it's never been so hot.

And if you go back 6 months, it was the exact opposite. We had a man that couldn't even stand up. He was so terrible. What—it's so terrible what he's done to our country, but we've turned it around so quickly. I did not expect to turn it around this quickly.

I think we're the hottest country in the world right now. And 6 months ago, they were laughing at the United States, but they don't laugh anymore.

This has been an amazing trip. And as you know, I'm going to U.A.E. in a little while. We're going to first watch an air show that will be spectacular from our friend, the Amir. He's done a great job. Done a great job.

And I've met such great people. And as you know, that—we're trying to give Yemen a chance, and we're going to give Syria a chance. With Yemen, they have a tremendous Houthi problem. I believe that's a problem for them. You know, you never really know. This is a tricky part of the world.

But we were asked to stop firing at the Houthis, and that's something that they've never asked, because they're tough, and they're good fighters and all, but they're not going to be blowing ships out of the water anymore. So that's what we wanted, and we'll see how that works.

But their emissaries were very, very strong on it. So that's giving—that's a good thing for Yemen, because they want to try and—they're trying to help themselves also. And we want them to get along with Saudi Arabia, because that's been a—that's been a big fight.

And the other, of course, is Syria. We took out the sanctions. And that's been—I didn't even realize it's been many, many years that they've had sanctions. And as you know, there was a very big change at the top, and I thought that we have to give them a chance. They really have no chance with the sanctions. They were very biting. They were top of the line. Nobody could even deal with them. You couldn't even—you couldn't make a phone call to Syria. So we did that.

And I met the new leader of the country, and he's got a, you know, strong past. I'll be very nice. He's got strong past, but I liked him a lot. I think he'll be a great representative, and we'll see. He—you're going to have to have a strong past to put that one around. You can't—you cannot be a weak person. If you're a weak person, we would just be wasting time. So he's a strong guy, and I thought he was good, and let's see what happens. But we're going to give him a fighting chance by taking off the sanctions.

So we've actually been praised for that. The Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia was very strong, "Please do that." He wanted it done.

And President of Turkey wanted it done. President Erdoğan called me. He said, "Is there any way you could do that, because if you don't do that, they don't have a chance."

And so I did it, and it's actually been very popular. The Amir liked it a lot. It's been very, very popular. So, let's see what happens, but it's my honor to have done it.

And with that, we're surrounded by the—some of the greatest businesspeople in the world. We just had a tremendous order of Boeing. This is Boeing, and this is General Electric.

[At this point, the President gestured toward Boeing Co. Chief Executive Office Kelly Ortberg and General Electric Aerospace Chief Executive Officer H. Lawrence Culp, Jr.]

And General Electric, I hear, makes the best large airplane engine in the world by not even a contest. Maybe I'll have to change my engines one day in my plane—[laughter]—because they're not General Electric, but, you know, it's one of those things. But I hear you make the best engines in the world, Larry. Larry is—somehow, his people are General Electric.

First of all, it's one of the greatest turnarounds that you'll ever see in a company, because when you took it over, it was—I want to be respectful—General Electric was in trouble, to put it—I would say—right?—to put it mildly. And now it's a hot company doing great.

And it's—I would imagine the hottest thing is what's happened with the engine division, because this engine is incredible.

Would you like to say a couple of words, Larry, about that? Because he watches—when he sees Boeing, he gets—he's very excited because he supplies, I guess, for the most part, the engines.

Would you like to say something?

Mr. Culp. Sure. Well, Mr. President, thank you, and it's an honor to be here. We're thrilled about the commitment that Qatar Airways has made to both Boeing and GE Aerospace——

The President. Yes.

Mr. Culp. ——with the largest wide-body order, really, in our company's history: over 400 engines, both our——

The President. Wow.

Mr. Culp. ——our GEnx, which powers the 787, the fastest-selling high-thrust engine in history, and our new 9x will power the 777X, which will be the largest commercial engine in the world.

The President. Will that be the same engine other than size, or is it different?

Mr. Culp. It's a step forward and a generation forward as well.

The President. So even beyond——

Mr. Culp. Yes.

The President. ——the large one.

Mr. Culp. Very much so.

The President. That's great.

Mr. Culp. And we think that really helps both Boeing and GE Aerospace continue to support not only our investment in domestic manufacturing but, in turn, everything that we're doing to drive the $75 billion annual trade surplus that the aerospace industry enjoys in the U.S. today.

So, we're excited. I know Kelly and the Boeing team have been great partners.

But, Badr, our thanks to you for your trust and your commitment to both GE Aerospace and Boeing. We're—we're gratified.

The President. Yes. Thank you very much.

Kelly, go ahead, please.

Mr. Ortberg. Well, Mr. President, first of all, thank you for your support. This is a major order for us. All of these aircraft will be built in the United States, creating significant number of jobs. And I know that's a key mission of yours, and this order, will help us accomplish that.

Partnership with GE has been great. They do power exclusively our engines, and they're doing a great job here. And we're very pleased to be selected by Qatar for this largest aircraft—wide-body aircraft order in the history of Boeing. A major, major accomplishment for us, and thanks to the administration for your support.

The President. That's the largest order you've ever had, right?

Mr. Ortberg. Yes, for wide-body aircraft.

The President. So one of the largest orders in history. But it almost has to be—if it's the largest order you've had, has to be pretty close to the largest order ever made, right?

Mr. Ortberg. Yes. Yes, that's correct.

The President. And you also—Boeing also got the jet fighter. We selected Boeing for the jet fighter, the state-of-the-art, highest level. It's an amazing-looking plane. If it functions as well as it looks, I think we're going to have a big—[laughter]—we're going to have a big winner.

But we're also looking at some additional jet fighters. We have some really good ones that we have—we're taking a look at—strong look from one of your competitors——

Mr. Ortberg. Yes.

The President. ——I must say. And we're doing something very special.

But it's a special country.

You know, we were losing the Middle East because the past administration didn't handle the relationship properly, didn't show the kind of respect that they deserve.

And me, I have a lot of respect, and I have a lot of liking. I like the Crown Prince a lot—I've known him a long time—in Saudi Arabia. And the amir is fantastic.

And we're going to another country in a little while, U.A.E.—a fantastic man, fantastic leader. And they have great leadership talents in this part of the world, and that's why they're doing so well.

And you probably read today the story about Iran has sort of agreed to the terms. They're not going to make—I'll—I call it, in a friendly way, "nuclear dust." We're not going to be making any nuclear dust in Iran. And we've been strong.

I want them to succeed. I want them to end up being a great country, frankly, but they can't have a nuclear weapon. That's the only thing. It's very simple. It's not like I have to give you 30 pages worth of details. There's only one sentence: They can't have a nuclear weapon.

And I think we're getting close to maybe doing a deal without having to do this—there's two steps. There's a very, very nice step, and there's a violent step. Violence like people haven't seen before. And I don't—I hope we're not going to have to do this. I don't want to do the second step. Some people do. Many people do. I don't want to do that step.

So we'll see what happens. But we're in very serious negotiations with Iran for long-term peace. And if we do that, it will be fantastic—and for this country, in particular, because you're right next door. You're a stone's throw away. Not even, right? You're a foot away. You can walk right into Iran. Other countries are much further away, so probably it's not quite the same level of danger.

But we are going to protect this country. It is a very special place with a special royal family. And the head of the royal family is—two heads of the royal family, really, if you think—great—it's great people, and they're going to be protected by the United States of America. And I think we're not going to have to do it, because I believe very strongly in peace through strength.

Now, we just gave out, in the budget, a $1 trillion budget, which is the biggest we've ever done. A trillion dollars. Never came close to a number like that. We'd be at 800—we'd be at $800 billion. We'd be at maybe 900, 910. We never got anywhere close to a trillion, but we're doing it.

Hopefully, we will not have to use these weapons. We make the greatest weapons in the world. We make the greatest fighter jets. We make the greatest—I guess Larry would know better than anybody, but we make the greatest planes in the world, the greatest missiles and defense systems.

The Patriot system is the best—acknowledged to be. This isn't from me. And we have a lot of it now. It's under order, and we're coming up with new systems.

And we're coming up with a new system of drones, because drones are really—if you look at the war that's going on, it's horrible, but we are watching it very closely, and drones really seem to be taking over that war. And so I hope you're going to come up with some nice, inexpensive engine for a drone so that we don't have to spend so much. [Laughter]

I asked one of the companies—I said, "I want a lot of drones." And you know, in the case of Iran, they make a good drone, and they make them for $35-, $40,000, so I said to this company, "I want to see it." They came in two weeks later with a drone that cost $41 million. I said: "That's not what I'm talking about, $41 million. I'm talking about something for $35-, $40,000 where you send thousands of them up."

And that's a great way—and they're very good, too, and fast and deadly—horrible, actually. When you look at what's happening with Russia and Ukraine, the drone is killing tremendous numbers of people. You hide behind a tree, and the drone comes down, and it circles you with—with fire. You don't have a chance. The tree comes down also, by the way. It's so intense. The trees—I mean, you see these trees being knocked down like—like—they're being sawed down by a top-of-the-line timberman. Like—like—you know who? Sean Duffy.

Do you know that Sean Duffy, the head of the Transportation Department, who's working right now on the airports and getting a system—because Biden didn't do a thing for 4 years, and Pete Buttigieg was the head, and he goes bicycling to work. He's—he takes a bicycle to work. Can you believe he's head—he's running the biggest air system in the world, and he takes a bicycle to work? What a—and—and they say he's going to run for president. I don't see it. Who knows, right? But I don't see it.

But when I look at what they've done, it is so horrible what they have done. And the work they did do, they wasted billions of dollars. They tried to hook up air systems to copper, and they tried to hook up copper to glass, and the glass doesn't work with the copper. And they had 30,000 different contractors doing 30,000 jobs.

And when they put it all together—they spent billions of dollars—it didn't even come close to working. And we're going to be giving out a brandnew system. It's very important. We'll have the best system. And we think we know who that system is, but we have a lot of bidding.

But we want one check. We want a unified system. We don't want to have 5,000 contractors in all different places, some digging ditches and some not doing ditches because they want to go by satellite. Satellite seems to be the way to go. But—so we're going to be giving that out pretty soon.

But what people don't know about Sean, because I mentioned lumberjacks, that, Sean—you probably didn't know this, that—I'm not talking about this Sean. This Sean, no, not—this is not. This is a different Sean. Sean Duffy, the head of Transportation. He's a great Sean, though, I have to tell you.

But Sean Duffy was the world champion for five years, climbing trees and down, up and down—world champion. So that's what you call a serious lumberjack. And he's doing a fantastic job too. A really respected guy and a terrific guy.

And I mentioned the champion, because when somebody is a champion—he's the world champion for a long time. He came down—when you come down those trees, coming down at—at a rapid—he said, "That started getting your back—you will often break your back." You miss a shot, and you're coming down a lot faster than the human body was meant to come down. But he's doing a fantastic job at Transportation.

But this has been a very historic trip. I watched some of the people talking about it, and even what I would perceive as enemies of ours—people that are not fair from the press—are saying it's been amazing. We've raised trillions of dollars in investments. It's been—there's never been anything like it.

And just to finish, we have a country that now has—I think, Howard, we can say that—at least $10 trillion of investment and potential investment. And if the past administration did a half a trillion dollars, it was, like, a lot. But we did it in 2 months, because it's actually a little more than three months, but I always say the first month, I had to get a little bit acclimated, so I didn't really do this the first. But when we started—so we've really been doing it—Susie, right?—for 2 months. So, in 2 months, we're going to have over $10 trillion. Nobody's ever come close—no country has ever come close to that. No country.

And I want to thank the amir, because he put up a lot and—in terms of investment. It could amount to 2 million, 3 million, maybe even 4 million jobs in the United States.

And more importantly, it's really important stuff. It's tremendous refining capabilities. It's capabilities for very high-end—AI is a big subject, and it's a big subject over here too. I always say, "What are you investing in?" It seems one thing everybody seems to have in common is AI.

So I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad—maybe you shouldn't do it because too many people are doing it, or maybe you should follow the crowd, fellas. Okay. So you'll—you're going to figure it out.

We have a man who's here who has been unbelievable: Scott Bessent, who's our Secretary of the Treasury and who's so respected. When he speaks on television, it's like everyone just says, "Oh, okay." I had somebody the other day—he said, "Well, Scott Bessent said." I said, "Well, that's pretty good, Scott, you know." [Laughter] So I'm a believer. I'm a believer. But when he speaks, the markets really listen.

And the big thing is that we have—to me, the most important thing of all is that—forget about the recent stock market being so good. Much more importantly, we have hundreds of different big companies pouring into America now, creating jobs like we have never seen before.

Now, the bad news, it takes a little while for that to—you know, when you build your factory, and it takes a year and a half, 2 years. And they're going to build them very fast, and they don't need financing. That's the nice part. They don't need any financing. They have plenty of it.

But they're building factories at levels—we've never seen anything like it. And these are, you know, $10 billion, $12 billion, $50 billion. I said, "How do you spend $50 billion on a factory?" We have the chip companies coming in from Taiwan. We have Jensen, as you know, coming in with $600 billion.

We have the—actually, the biggest company of them all. You know all about it—coming in. That was a big—Mr. Wei. I said, "Mr. Wei, you're a smart man, aren't you?" I never met him. And I said, "Because I understand you control 99 percent of the chips." "Oh, yes. Oh, yes, I do." I said, "That's pretty good." I said, "Is there any way of breaking that grip?" They said it would take you many years. So I said: "You know what? If you can't beat him, you join him." But he's going to be building the biggest factory anywhere in the world in Arizona and spending over $200 billion.

And we have Apple, as you know, that's coming in. And I had a little problem with Tim Cook yesterday. I said to him: "Tim, you're my friend. I've treated you very good. You're coming in with $500 billion, but now I hear you're building all over India. I don't want you building in India. You can build in India if you want to take care of India, because India is the highest—one of the highest tariffed nations in the world. It's very hard to sell into India." And they've offered us a deal where—where basically they're willing to literally charge us no tariff.

So we go from the highest tariff, you couldn't do business in India—we're not even a top 30 in India because the tariff is so high—to a point where they have actually told us—I assume you too—Scott, you were working on that also—that there will be no tariff, right? Would you say that's a difference? They're the highest, and now they're saying, "No tariff."

But I said to Tim—I said: "Tim, look, we've treated you really good. We put up with all the plants that you built in China for years. Now you've got to build us—we're not interested in you building in India. India can take care of themselves. They're doing very well. You're—we want you to build here." And they're going to be upping their production in the United States—Apple. So Apple is already in for $500 billion, but they're going to be upping their production, so it'll be great.

So I really think we have—we've gone from a laughing stock 6 months ago to the hottest country anywhere in the world. And that's not just in business, that's in everything else, and it's psychologically hot too.

And I just want to thank everybody for being here.

I want to thank the media. The media, I have to say, has been very fair. They've been very fair. They've been terrific, actually. I was watching some of our—normally, they would not say good things, but they're having a hard time saying bad because this is a record tour. There's never been a tour that will raise—it could be a total of three and a half, four trillion dollars. This—just in this four or five days, and it's from great people.

And our relationship now is very strong with Saudi Arabia. Nobody's coming—nobody is going to be bothering that relationship. Nobody would be able to break that relationship because of my relationship with the Crown Prince and the family. The relationship is really strong.

And when you talk about Qatar, the relationship is equal. I mean, it's just like nobody is going to break that relationship. We've never—we have never had a relationship with Qatar as strong as it is now. You know that better than anybody, and they're very happy, and we're going to protect you. We're going to protect you. That's the one thing you need, maybe, but I don't think you're going to need too much of that.

And I said last night—it was a great meeting, great everything. They brought in Lee Greenwood to sing. It was a beautiful—it was a beautiful evening, and I appreciate it.

But I said last night that Iran is very lucky to have the Amir, because he's actually fighting for them. He doesn't want us to do a vicious blow to Iran. He says: "You can make a deal. You can make a deal." He's really fighting. And I really mean this. I think that Iran should say a big thank you to the amir because the amir is fighting very much that we don't.

And there are many people that want me to go the other route. They say, "Just knock it out," because nobody can beat us. No—we have the strongest military in the world, by far—not China, not Russia, not anybody. We have the best military equipment in the world. And we have the strongest military in the world.

If you remember ISIS—General "Razin" Caine, right?—we knocked it out in 3 weeks. Remember, they said it would take 4 years to knock out ISIS? We did it in 3 weeks. That's because you had the right leader. With a stupid person, you'll, you know, do it in—you'll do it in 4 or 5 years. You won't even do it. You'll fight for 4 years, and then you'll leave, you know, like we always do. You fight, fight, fight.

We had a President that blew up half the Middle East, and then he left. That was it. You know, it was like—spent $10 trillion on blowing up the Middle East, and then he left. Just said, "Let's leave now." We left with nothing.

And we don't do that. We take care of our friends.

And so you have a great ally in us, and there's nobody even close. In terms of military power, there is nobody close. And I'm not only talking about nuclear. I don't like to mention the word, because the nuclear is so destructive that, you know, it brings you into a different category. But we're number one in nuclear.

I rebuilt our military, by the way, in my first term. We—I—we had a really successful first term. Then the election was rigged, and I had to wait. And it became more historic, and I was able to watch and see.

And the good news is, they—although, it's bad news in another way, but the good news is that Biden was so bad—worst President we've ever had by far. There was never a President like this. This man was grossly incompetent, and now that's been proven. But people were able to see how bad it is, and it gave me a mandate.

We won all seven swing States. We won the popular vote by a lot. We won the counties by 2,725 to 505. That's why the map is completely red. When you look at it, the map—it was a—it was an obliteration, this election, and we got 312 electoral votes. So it's—it was just an obliteration. And that means mandate. And we have a mandate that nobody's had.

They said, "The most consequential election"—and this was a enemy paper—"the most consequential election in 129 years."

So it's been a tremendous trip. I've really liked it. You know, look, this is going—we're going 20 hours a day. And people say, "How do you do it?" And I said, "I do it because I like it. I like it. I like the people I'm dealing with."

I said last night they—we—I stood in a line for—it seemed like hours. I said hello to Larry. I said hello to Kelly. I said hello to your 250 competitors. I said hello to everybody. [Laughter] And that was a long sucker, I want to tell you. [Laughter] They say, "How do you do it?" I said, "I do it because I like the man standing on my left." And I said it two nights before about the crown prince, but last night I had the amir, and he's fantastic. And I said, "It's really not hard."

You know, when you like the people and when you are doing something—we have a term: MAGA, Make America Great Again. A very simple term. And I remember Biden saying, "We will not let MAGA take over this country." I said: "No, no, you stupid person. It says, 'Make America Great Again.' It's okay if it takes over the country. It's called Make America Great Again."

And that's where we are right now. It's America—we'll put America first. But because we're putting it first, we're doing so well. There's going to be plenty left over to help the world, and we can help the world psychologically. So we think we're going to do well with Russia-Ukraine. Five thousand soldiers are being killed every single week, on average. Five thousand.

And they're not from here, and they're not from the U.S.A. They're from Ukraine and Russia. So some people would say, "Why are you bothering?" Because these are 5,000 young people. Well, they're getting older because they've gone through so many that they are actually getting older. But these are 5,000 people that leave their home, wave goodbye to their parents. Their parents are so proud of them—their sisters, their brothers—and that's the last they ever see them. They're wiped out.

And if you would see the satellite pictures—I get satellite pictures of that battlefield, and I want to tell you, I've never seen anything like—I wish I never saw it. You have heads and arms and legs strewn all over the field, and you just take a look at that. And you know, when you think, 5,000 a week on average, and that's actually a no—a low number.

So we're going to see if we can end that.

I was thinking about going, but it's very tough because of what we're doing today and tomorrow. But you know, if something happened, I'd go on Friday, if it was appropriate. But we have people right now negotiating, and I think that—I just hope that Russia and Ukraine are able to do something, because it has to stop. Not only the money—we spent $350 billion there. Just handed it. Nobody even knows where the money—they just send them a check. There's no accounting. There's no one. It's just, "Give them money."

Every time this—every time he came—I have to hand it to him. I think he's the greatest salesman maybe in history. [Laughter] Every time he came to the United States, he'd walk away with $100 billion. You know, that's a good salesman, right?

Even by your standards. This is a big standard right here.

[The President gestured toward Minister of State for Energy Affairs Saad Sherida al-Kabi of Qatar.]

But that's a pretty good standard—no, he'd walk in, leave with $100 billion. Last time he didn't do as well. He only got $60 billion. [Laughter] And it was so easy. It was like taking candy from a baby. That was the last administration. This administration has been a little bit tougher.

But we'd like to see it end, and I think we're going to have a chance at doing it.

And we'd like to see if we could solve the Iran problem in an intelligent way, as opposed to a brutal way. There's only two: intelligent and brutal. Those are the two alternatives.

So I want to thank everybody for being here very much. And we're going to take some questions, and perhaps now we'll ask the press to leave, and we're going to see you at the airfield. We're going to have a display of American equipment.

[Several reporters began asking questions at once.]

Okay, yes. Jennifer [Jennifer Jacobs, CBS News], go ahead.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin of Russia

Q. Mr. President, no—Mr. President—Mr. President, no—no Putin in Turkey. No Putin in Turkey. Are you disappointed by that?

The President. No, I didn't anticipate. I actually said, "Why would he go if I'm not going?" Because I wasn't going to go. I wasn't planning to go. I would go, but I wasn't planning to go. And I said, "I don't think he's going to go if I don't go." And that's turned out to be right.

But we have people there. Marco, as you know, is doing a fantastic job. Marco is there, secretary of State, and we have people there. But I don't—I didn't think it was possible for Putin to go if I'm not there.

Jennifer.

Proposed U.S. Sovereign Wealth Fund/Tariffs

Q. Do you have an update, sir, on the sovereign wealth fund—your proposal for the sovereign wealth fund and——

The President. That we're planning on doing?

Q. Yes, and with your Secretaries here. What——

The President. Well, look, I'm——

Q. Which assets might be in——

The President. Howard likes the idea. I'm less—I want to really make a lot of money, pay off debt, and just get it—and then you do a fund, you know. These people have no debt. [Laughter] It's nice to have a fund.

I say to Howard, we're a little early, because we have debt. And really, it sounds like a lot, but relative to the kind of income and everything that we have, it's not really that much. But it's still a lot. And I'd rather pay the debt off and then do the fund after the debt is paid off.

And you know, to me, the fund is just pay off debt. We're making a lot of money.

We had a situation. Six months ago, we were losing $5 billion a day on trade. Now we're making money on trade. Don't forget, we were losing a trillion dollars to China. So we essentially went cold turkey with China for a period of a month. Therefore, we weren't losing a trillion dollars.

You know, I think that's pretty simple, Scott, right? Scott did a great job over there. They made a deal. They have great relationships with China. You might want to speak about that while the press is here for a second, Scott, the relationship we have with China.

Secretary of the Treasury Scott K.H. Bessent. We have a very—it was a very important step the—in establishing a working relationship below the two heads of state. So, with—with the tariff program, we had a plan, we have a process, and now we have a mechanism with our Chinese counterparts to prevent an escalation again.

We're going to go into a series of negotiations. They're going to be fulsome, and we have a lot to talk about. But I think, over the next 90 days, we can accomplish a lot.

The President. We're going to be—I think I can mention—I'm not sure if the press will understand this, but we've devoted—I've devoted—I find it—number one, I find it fascinating. If you don't like things, you're not going to do well, but I do. I find it amazing. I—so, I'm so looking forward to watching some of the power that they purchased at great price, but you'll see some jets today.

Some of the reporters were in the plane. Were you in the plane as we were surrounded by eight F–15s? You saw that? Were you concerned at all? It was a little bit spooky, right? [Laughter] It was a little bit different. When I'm reading the name of the pilot from my—I'm looking, I'm saying the name: Rigraw. I look at that—you know, his helmet, and he's got his name, and he's waving to us. And he's like—you know, he's like, where you are. And so it's—I'm not sure I feel great about it. [Laughter] But we certainly had a lot of firepower surrounding and—as we were coming in. It was beautiful.

And then just before we landed, boom, they took off. And nobody's ever seen anything like—you know, they're circled the plane. Eight of them. And we're landing, so now we're there, "pshh." And it was really a display of beauty.

And we heard it too. We were in the plane. I said, "What is that?" Because they stepped on the gas, because it's hard for them to only go 500 miles an hour. That's called very slow. It's not—that—those planes aren't—they're not meant to go 500 miles an hour, but it's really good. Great pilots, great—great display. So we're going to see that.

But one of the things—for the people that are interested in the military—that I asked to look into: the F–35. We're doing an upgrade—a simple upgrade—but we're also doing an F–55. I'm going to call it an F–55. And that's going to be a substantial upgrade, but it's going to be also with two engines, because an F–35 has a single engine. I don't like single engines.

Even this man, he's the best in the world at engines. But on occasion—I know you won't admit this—if an engine goes out, it's nice to have two, three, or four. [Laughter] That's why I like the 747s. It's got four. And—but today, they're getting very big, and it's a little more cost saving to have two very, very big ones.

But no matter how good—you know, they tell me, Larry, "That engine will never go out." Well, I think it goes out on occasion. Very rarely.

And we're do—we're going to do an F–55, and—I think, if we get the right price; we have to get the right price—and that will be two engines and a super upgrade on the F–35.

And then we're going to do the F–22. I think the most beautiful fighter jet in the world is the F–22, but we're going to do an F–22 Super, and it'll be a very modern version of the F–22 fighter jet. And I don't know if you know it, but you know who copied it? China. They copied it. I said—I'm looking. They said, "That's the F–22." They copied our design. But they won't be able to copy our engines too quickly or anything else.

So we're going to be doing an F–22 Super. And this will be a plane like no o-—to me, it's the most beautiful fighter jet ever made. And so, I want to do that.

And sometimes, you know, stealth—they do stealth. I'm not a huge believer in stealth, because stealth is basically—a lot of it's the design and the shape. And I'm—you know, I'm sure you maybe think—but also, if that's the case, they're going to figure it out pretty fast, I think. So you're going to design an ugly plane for stealth reasons, and then 6 months later, they're going to figure out this, then you're stuck with a plane.

No, we're doing—we're doing a super F–22, and we're going to be going with it pretty—pretty quickly. And then I—as I told you, we're going to be doing a tremendous variety of drones from—lots of very inexpensive drones.

And on the F–55 and on the F–35, but much more on the F–55. And on your plane that you're doing, which he calls the F–47.

Mr. Ortberg. F–47, yes.

The President. F–47. I said: "How'd you come up with 47? That's an interesting"—[laughter]—it was very nice, actually.

But you said there's a tremendous capability for—it travels with many, many—potentially hundreds of drones, right? Do you want to talk about that, because it's very interesting to people?

Mr. Ortberg. Well, the F–47 is the first sixth-generation fighter—

The President. Right.

Mr. Ortberg. —–in the world. We're very excited to be developing that, and we'll be bringing that into production in the near future. There's not much I can say——

The President. Yes. Right. That's right.

Mr. Ortberg. ——about that for—for security reasons, but we're very pleased to be in the development process of that airplane.

The President. Yes, it's going to be great. It's got beautiful—a beautiful weapon—[inaudible]—as you say.

We're also doing very heavy on submarines. We have a lead on submarines that I don't think—unless you have a really, really stupid group of people, including the President, I don't think anybody can catch us on submarines.

We have sub—more submarine—in particular, the late—the late model this—we're 15 years advanced on the submarine. Nobody can even come close. It can stay underwater for 30 years. Think of it. The only reason it has to come up is for food. It doesn't need water because they have—you know, they have their system of water, which is—they can stay forever. The only reason it has to come up is for food. Can you imagine? It could stay underground for—underwater for years, going at fast speeds too—very fast speeds. But it has to come up once every couple of months for food. There's something about that. I don't know if we're going to be able to solve that problem, but hopefully it's not going to be a problem we have to worry about.

But the submarine—we are so far advanced in the submarine. So we're very proud of it.

And we've taken a country that was scoffed at, and we're the hottest country in the world right now. We're going to keep it that way.

And just in finalizing that, the military was having, 6 months ago—and you wrote about it, Jennifer. You—I saw an article. But the military was having a very hard time recruiting people—our military—and they were not able to meet any—even come close to their goals. That was only 6 months ago. And now, as you also have written, we have a military that it—we have so many people want to get in. We've never had anything—they say 30-years plus, because they—they only go back—but probably ever. We have never had such excitement to join the military.

So we went with a military that couldn't recruit very easily and was really way, way behind, to a military where we're actually picking the people we want, and it's very hard to get in. It's actually hard to get in.

And that goes for the police force and the firefighters. I always mention the firefighters. They are incredible. But the police force and the firefighters.

We're having a very hard time getting people to become policemen like we have never had before. That was 6 months ago—Biden—because the country had no spirit. It was, like, just a—had no heart. It was a dead heart. Now we have the liveliest heart you've ever seen.

So I just think it's such a great contrast to think 6 months ago you couldn't get, and now we're setting records. Who would think that could have happened?

Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Gaza, Palestinian Territories/Hamas Attacks of October 7, 2023, on Israel

Q. Sir, on Gaza. On Gaza, do you think that Israel is blocking a possible deal on peace in Gaza?

The President. Well, we're working very hard on Gaza, and Gaza has been a territory of death and destruction for many years. And you know, I have concepts for Gaza that I think are very good. Make it a freedom zone. Let the United States get involved and make it just a freedom zone. Have a real freedom zone.

Because it seems that Gaza, every time—you know, every 10 years, it happens—and more than that; it really happens all throughout. They've never solved the Gaza problem.

And if you look at it, I have aerial shots where—I mean, there's practically no buildings standing. It's not like, you know, you're trying to save some. There's no building. People are living under the rubble of buildings that collapsed, which is not a—not acceptable. It's—it's tremendous death, and I want to see that be a freedom zone.

And if it's necessary, I think I'd be proud to have the United States have it, take it, make it a freedom zone. Let some good things happen. Put people in homes where they can be safe. And Hamas is going to have to be dealt with.

You got to remember, October 7 was one of the worst days in the history of the world, I think—not just—not just local to this region. It was one of the worst, most atrocious attacks anyone has ever seen.

But now we're dealing with Hamas, and we're dealing with Iran, and we're dealing with a lot of other things. We're dealing with the Houthis. And that was, I think, very successful, but maybe tomorrow an attack will be made, in which case we go back on the offensive.

So it's good. It's good.

We have a lot of things happening—a lot of very positive things happening.

Okay? Thank you. We'll take care of the Gaza situation.