Secretary of Defense Mark Esper said Sunday he "didn't see" specific evidence that Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani was plotting attacks on four U.S. embassies.
In an interview on CBS News’ “Face The Nation,” Esper, however, defended President Donald Trump’s assertions about the four targets, and believes attacks would have occurred.
"The president didn't cite a specific piece of evidence. What he said was he believed," Esper said. “I didn't see one, with regard to four embassies. What I'm saying is that I shared the president's view that probably — my expectation was they were going to go after our embassies. The embassy is the most prominent display of American presence in a country."
Esper added that Trump “believed that it probably and could've been attacks against additional embassies,” and that he wasn’t alone in that belief.
"I shared that view,” he said. “I know other members of the national security team shared that view. That's why I deployed thousands of American paratroopers to the Middle East to reinforce our embassy in Baghdad and other sites throughout the region."
In a separate interview on CNN’s State of the Union, Esper also said it was his “hunch” that a Ukrainian plane was accidentally shot down, killing 176 people — a tragedy Iran finally admitted to.
"I think they did the right thing by admitting it,” he said. “Now they need to allow the investigators in and take responsibility.”
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