Qatar is the ultimate frenemy. That is because Qatar has a U.S. Air Force base (Al Udeid Air Base), which is located twenty miles in the desert southwest of the capital of Doha, and is the largest U.S. military base in the Middle East. It is so huge that it can accommodate over 10,000 American airmen and soldiers.
On the other hand, Qatar has allowed the Islamo-Nazi Hamas top leadership, which has included Khalil al-Hayya, Khaled Meshal, Zaher Jabarin, Muhammad Ismail Darwish (as of November 19, 2024) to reside in Qatar. This also includes other Hamas leaders whose net worth has been an estimated at $11 billion to openly reside in Doha within the past six months, thereby receiving sanctuary.
Plus, Qatar has been notorious for funding terrorism throughout the Middle East for almost the past ten years, if not longer. So, it has been the most unprincipled and duplicitous country in the entire Arabian (Persian) Gulf.
Trump himself harshly criticized Qatar on June 17, 2017, stating that Doha was “‘a funder of terrorism at a very high level’.” He later supported a five-nation boycott of Qatar led by Saudi Arabia because of Doha’s financial support of Middle Eastern terrorism.
If Trump accepts the Qatari Boeing 747 as the new Air Force One, which has been for sale since 2020, it would be the height of folly. That is because the airplane would “require billions of dollars of investment and retrofitting to make it into a makeshift Air Force One, and the ‘renovations’ would be impossible to complete before 2028.”
This would make no financial sense since the airplane is only worth $400 million, thereby making it a financial boondoggle and the antithesis of the Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE. Perhaps the common-sense concept of the “total cost of ownership” is alien to Trump’s nearsighted and egotistical thinking?
According to CNN, “it could take up two years [just] to install the necessary security equipment, communications and defensive capabilities for it to be safely used by the commander in chief.”
By that time, Trump’s presidential term will have expired on January 20, 2029 wasting vast amounts of the taxpayers’ money.
However, Trump stated on May 12 to White House reporters, “They’re just giving us a gift” commenting that he would be a “‘stupid person'” if he did not accept it.” Well, Mr. President, a wise person would not accept it.
There is an ancient proverb “beware of Greeks bearing gifts” because it could be a modern-day Trojan horse loaded with possible electronic surveillance or worse. It strongly appears that not accepting the luxury Qatari Boeing 747 is completely impervious to Trump‘s desire for a new Air Force One, regardless of the cost of required renovations to the taxpayers.
The Qatari 747 could literally be loaded with bugs and other electronic surveillance equipment, requiring the U.S. government to literally tear it apart piece by piece. After October 7, 2023, and Qatar’s recent complicity with Hamas, you could not pay me to set foot on that airplane.
That would be similar to trusting Putin’s Russian Federal Security Service, the successor to the KGB, to construct a new U.S. embassy in Moscow without expecting massive electronic surveillance and other eavesdropping.
I fully agree with Senator Ted Cruz (D-TX), who stated on May 13, “I’m not a fan of Qatar. I think they have a really disturbing pattern of funding theocratic lunatics who want to murder us, funding Hamas and Hezbollah. And that’s a real problem.” He further added, “I also think the plane poses significant espionage and surveillance problems.”
Other Congressional Republicans, who agree with Cruz include Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) along with Fox News commentator Mark Levin and former George W. Bush White House press secretary Ari Fleischer.
If President Trump accepts the Qatari luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet, hopefully it will never become Air Force One but merely a museum display in Trump’s future presidential library, and not become the new “Trump Force One” after he leaves the White House.
Robert L. Maronic