WASHINGTON — Joseph Kent, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, resigned on Tuesday in protest of the US-Israeli war on Iran, stating that the Islamic Republic posed no imminent threat to the United States. Kent, a former Green Beret who served multiple combat tours, is the first senior US official to leave the Trump administration over the conflict.
In his resignation letter to President Donald Trump, Kent accused Israeli officials and pro-war elements in the US media of creating a “misinformation campaign” to draw America into war. He warned that the conflict serves neither US interests nor justifies further loss of American lives, likening the situation to the tactics that led to the Iraq War.
Kent emphasized he could not, “in good conscience,” support a war that endangers the next generation of American soldiers without clear benefit to the nation.
