Sen. Mark Kelly, an Arizona Democrat and Navy combat veteran, said it “is a mistake” for President Donald Trump “to once again think that he can bomb a country into submission” and that “That’s not going to work on the Iranians,” arguing that “Air power is part of a bigger campaign to achieve an objective” and “It’s not the whole plan,” during an interview on On Sunday with Jack Cocchiarella as he listed dead Americans, injured Americans, and war costs at home.
Kelly said voters he meets put the Iran fight high on their list after affordability. After that pocketbook pressure, he said, comes “taking our country to war against the Iranians without a well-defined goal. Really without a good reason. And people understand that.”
On escalating strikes, Kelly said, “It is a mistake for this president to once again think that he can bomb a country into submission. That’s not going to work on the Iranians.” Drawing on his flying career, he said, “I flew 39 combat missions. This was like my life and my world and the early part of my career. You know, I flew combat missions into Iraq and Kuwait.” He added, “Air power is part of a bigger campaign to achieve an objective. It’s part of a plan. It’s not the whole plan.”
Kelly said Trump “thinks he knows more than the admirals and generals about the military,” that Trump “says he knows more about everything than everybody,” and that “he doesn’t know what he’s doing and he’s flailing.” “And if he thinks going back in there and just dropping more munitions is going to get him the outcome he wants,” Kelly said, “somebody needs to, you know, sit them down and really explain to him, Hey, that this is not how this works.”
Kelly then listed what he called the results of the war as he framed them. “And by the way, Jack, the result is dead Americans, a lot of dead Iranians, 800 injured Americans, tens of billions of dollars wasted,” he said. “And what did the American people get out of this? They got high, they got higher prices and now they can’t afford to put gas in their car. And half of the country is having a hard time affording food because the president and the secretary of defense are clueless, have no idea what they’re doing and now they’re stuck.”
The White House and War Department have stated defined military objectives for Operation Epic Fury. In an April 8, 2026, White House release on Operation Epic Fury, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine is quoted saying that on Feb. 28 the president ordered the joint force “to accomplish three distinct military objectives: destroy Iran’s ballistic missile and drone capabilities, destroy the Iranian navy, and destroy their defense industrial base to ensure that Iran cannot reconstitute the ability to project power outside their borders,” and that over 38 days of major combat those objectives “as defined by the President” were achieved. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt is quoted in the same release saying Trump “stated this would be a four-to-six-week military operation to dismantle the military threat posed by the radical Islamic Iranian regime.”
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth is quoted in that release saying Iran “begged for this ceasefire” after what he called a “decisive military victory” in Epic Fury, linking the campaign to earlier strikes including Operation Midnight Hammer on Iranian nuclear sites. The administration’s framing is that the objectives were clear, timed, and met; Kelly’s On Sunday framing is that voters see the war as “without a well-defined goal” and “without a good reason,” and that air power alone fails to produce the outcome Trump wants.
On U.S. deaths in the Iran operations Kelly referenced, the Defense Casualty Analysis System, as of Nov. 2, 2026, reported 15 military deaths under Operation Epic Fury and eight deaths on the 2026 Overseas Operations monthly table, for 23 U.S. deaths across those DCAS series as of that date.
On wounded, DCAS listed 417 wounded in action under Operation Epic Fury as of Nov. 2, and the Overseas Operations monthly summary showed 448 wounded in action in the 2026 Overseas Operations total. Combined, those two DCAS wounded series exceed 800. Kelly’s “800 injured Americans” line is his own rounding; the Epic Fury wounded table alone stands at 417 hostile WIA on that date.
Fuel prices Kelly tied to the war appear in the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s weekly Gasoline and Diesel Fuel Update.
Kelly’s “That’s not going to work on the Iranians,” “not the whole plan,” “without a well-defined goal,” “800 injured Americans,” and “clueless” language is his own from the On Sunday interview. The White House release quotes Caine, Leavitt, and Hegseth on Epic Fury’s stated objectives and claimed accomplishment. DCAS tables show 23 U.S. deaths across Operation Epic Fury and Overseas Operations as of Nov. 2. EIA publishes gasoline and diesel averages. Whether those deaths, prices, and food-cost pressures prove Kelly’s “without a well-defined goal” critique, or that the administration’s three stated objectives settle that critique, is a judgment the interview and the White House release each state and leave open against the other.