President Trump confirms "Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is dead" 
Trump says he watched most of the special forces raid. Describes an operation where #IS's leader fled into a tunnel with several of his children and detonated his vest. Trump says nonetheless that positive ID was possible.
One doesn't like to demean an occasion like this, but Trump has referred to "Baghadi", who was "running and crying" and whose fighters are a mix of "frightened puppies and hardcore killers".
Trump thanked "Russia, Turkey, Syria, Iraq, and the "Syrian Kurds" (SDF/PKK) for the information that led to #IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's demise.
Trump: IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi "died like a dog"
Trump says #IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has been tracked for several weeks, several raids have been cancelled when ABB changed his plans on where he was supposed to move, and the raid began by punching through the wall of the compound because the front door was booby trapped.
Trump: the operational phase of the raid to kill #IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi began two weeks ago. The information about his location was "based on technology more than anything else".
Trump says one US search dog was wounded in the raid that killed #IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, but no US personnel were killed. By Trump's telling, large numbers of IS jihadists were killed in this operation; he says an exact estimate will be released soon.
Trump says he sent his tweet last night (Something very big has just happened!") after the US troops on their way to kill #IS's leaders had landed in a "very friendly port in a friendly country".
Trump says that some number of #IS fighters surrendered and were taken into US custody in the raid that killed the caliph.
Trump confirms that the US did an on-site DNA test to confirm #IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was dead about 15 minutes after he was killed. ABB had to be dug out of the tunnel, says Trump, and the US soldiers "brought body parts back with them", indeed "substantial pieces".
Trump says that the US forces took surface-to-air fire on the way to get the #IS leader, but he is not sure that this was organised defensive fire. It could have been "random people who don't like helicopters".
Trump says again that #IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was "screaming, crying, and whimpering" as he was killed. "He was scared out of his mind."
Trump: "I don't have a Syria pullout, I just don't want to guard Turkey and Syria for the rest of our lives. It's very expensive, very dangerous, they've been fighting for centuries. ... Now, I will secure the oil ... but that's tremendous money".
Trump says that #Iraq discriminates against American companies on oil contracts, "That's what I heard", and Trump says this is a terrible mistake. He says he was always opposed to the Iraq invasion [he wasn't] but once the US was in they should "keep the oil".
Trump says that he wrote a book before 9/11, "a really very successful book", where he predicted that Usama bin Ladin was "big trouble" and should be captured and killed. "I don't get any credit for this, but that's okay, I never do".
Trump continues: he constantly is assailed by people who are "amazed" that he saw the danger of Usama bin Ladin before 9/11, but nobody in the government paid attention. "If they would have listened to me, a lot of things would have been different."
Trump concludes with what Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi did to Kayla Mueller. "He was an animal, and he was a gutless animal".
That presser was a strange piece of business; utterly surreal to have a Trumpian commentary on #IS's leader being killed.
Still, all credit to Trump: he would get the blame if it went wrong, he gets the credit now it's gone right. A great day for America and her allies.
Still, all credit to Trump: he would get the blame if it went wrong, he gets the credit now it's gone right. A great day for America and her allies.
