'Unhinged' Trump threat could've gotten a Pentagon official charged: ex-spokeswoman

President Donald Trump warned that U.S. forces were preparing to take control of Kharg Island in a major escalation of the war in Iran, and a national security expert denounced his statements as "unhinged" and unnecessarily risky.

The 79-year-old president posted on Truth Social that U.S. forces would be "hitting Iran ... very hard tonight" and seizing the country's oil and gas markets on the Persian Gulf island.

Former Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh told CNN's "The Situation Room" that his statements were reckless.

"This post is incredibly unhinged and incredibly dangerous," said Singh, the former deputy press secretary for the Defense Department. "It is previewing U.S. military action before it actually takes place, which puts the lives of our pilots at risk, our Navy and Marines, our sailors and Marines who are operating in that area of responsibility just outside of Iran. So previewing military action before it's actually happened, one, you're losing the element of surprise, and two, you're putting our troops at risk."

"You'll remember just a few weeks ago, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the war has concluded," she added. "This is clearly not the case, as we're seeing the ceasefire is not holding – we're back at kinetic action. So, I think, you know, to say that the war is even concluded back then was was a silly statement, and now it's proven so even more so."

Singh suggested the president didn't appreciate what a massive undertaking the operation would be.

"Taking Kharg Island would require so many capabilities and resources that the U.S. is continuing to draw down every single day, including long-range capabilities, and it's not just taking Kharg Island, which we know is the crown jewel of Iran's oil hub and exporting. It's also holding Kharg Island. Essentially, our military would have to hold that, and it would require an incredible ground force that would basically be sitting ducks for Iran to target if they have to. For how long? For however long they have to hold that island."

The president is allowed under the law to declassify information as he sees fit, but Singh said Trump's statements would have been problematic for anyone else in government to make.

"I would have probably been fired," the former Pentagon official said. "I think, you know, we would always have issues when it came to, you know, media outlets reporting on actions that hadn't been taken, even though we were, you know, leaning in that direction. It's incredibly dangerous to signal to the enemy that one when you're going to conduct strikes and potential targets, and so the fact that it's the president of the United States doing that not only just puts our men and women in uniform at risk. It is just so unprecedented. I could not imagine Secretary [Lloyd] Austin or President [Joe] Biden doing something like this and not having just such tremendous bipartisan blowback, and I'm not really seeing that today from the Republican Party right now."

In fact, Singh said, she would have probably faced criminal charges for making the same statements as Trump.

"I would have faced charges," she said. "Yeah, definitely."

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