ISTANBUL

The US has secured investments worth $10 trillion as a result of President Donald Trump’s Middle East tour this week, Trump said in a speech at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar on Thursday.

Trump said that Qatar will make $42 billion in military purchases and invest $10 billion to improve the Al Udeid Air Base, which houses members of the US, UK, and Qatari air forces.

Stating that the US military will soon get “bigger, better, stronger and more powerful than ever before,” Trump said the US Air Force will “soon” acquire the world’s first and only sixth-generation fighter jet, the F-47.

"As part of that effort, I signed an order to build the Golden Dome missile defense shield to protect our country from missile attack,” he said.

Touching on the recent celebrations for the anniversary of the WWII victory in France, Trump underlined the then-US role in winning the war.

He announced that there would be “a working holiday” for the celebrations of the WWII victory in the upcoming years in the US.

Drawing attention to conflicts and wars around the world, Trump said the US comes first, but will “take care” of other countries.

“If I were president, Russia would have never gone into Ukraine. All of those things -- it would have never happened,” Trump said. “Russia, Ukraine would have never started. Oct. 7, Israel would have never happened.”

Describing the decision of the US military to withdraw from Afghanistan as “horrible and so embarrassing,” Trump criticized the former Biden administration for giving up the Bagram Air Base.

“We should have kept the airbase,” he said.

Stressing his role in the ceasefire between Pakistan and India, Trump said: “We talked to them about trade instead of the war.”

“Pakistan was very happy with that. And India was very happy with that,” he said.

Trump’s visit to Doha is part of a Gulf tour that began Tuesday in Saudi Arabia and is scheduled to conclude Friday in the United Arab Emirates.

His visit is the first by a US president to Qatar since George W. Bush in 2003.