Joe Kent, one of the United States’ top counterterrorism officials, announced his immediate resignation on Tuesday, arguing that President Donald Trump had been led into an unnecessary war with Iran — in part by undue influence from Israel.
In a letter addressed to the president and posted to social media, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center claimed that the Islamic Republic “posed no imminent threat to our nation.”
“It is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” Kent said.
Kent described what he characterized as a “misinformation campaign” driven by high-ranking Israeli officials and echoed by the American media — a campaign that he said undermined Trump’s “America First platform and sowed pro-war sentiments to encourage a war with Iran.”
“This echo chamber was used to deceive you [Trump] into believing that Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States,” he continued, adding, “This was a lie and is the same tactic the Israelis used to draw us into the disastrous Iraq war.”
Kent — a retired U.S. Army Green Beret — also invoked a deep personal loss. His wife, Senior Chief Petty Officer Shannon Kent, a military cryptologist, was killed in 2019 by a suicide bomber in Manbij, Syria, along with three other Americans.
“As a veteran who deployed to combat 11 times and as a Gold Star husband who lost my beloved wife Shannon in a war manufactured by Israel, I cannot support sending the next generation off to fight and die in a war that serves no benefit to the American people nor justifies the cost of the American lives,” he wrote.
At least 13 U.S. service members have been killed in the current conflict with Iran, and more than 200 have been wounded, according to the Pentagon.
Asked about Kent’s resignation, Trump replied, “I always thought he was a nice guy, but I always thought he was weak on security.”
“When I read his statement, I realized that it’s a good thing that he’s out because he said that Iran was not a threat,” the president told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday, insisting that “Iran was a threat.”
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence did not immediately respond to request for comment on Kent’s resignation.
Tanya Noury is a reporter for Military Times and Defense News, with coverage focusing on the White House and Pentagon.