The 30 minutes allotted to each candidate made the proceedings feel like the political equivalent of speed-dating – and like speed-dating gone wrong, there was plenty of time for the participants to bury themselves with their words.
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On the Iran nuclear deal, which Clinton took part in as secretary of state, she said the agreement put a lid on the country’s nuclear program, but said she was concerned about its other activities.
Trump has given mixed signals about whether he wants to increase military spending overall.
Here are those and other moments each candidate may come to regret in the days ahead.
She talked about classification “headers” and explained that there was “no evidence” her server had been hacked. For example, she described how she spoke in the tent while overseas to prevent America’s enemies from seeing classified information she was reviewing.
“They know they can count on me to be the kind of commander in chief who will protect our country and our troops, and they know they cannot count on Donald Trump”, Clinton said Tuesday. “Always have, always will”.
Fielding questions from the audience, Clinton insisted that none of the emails she sent or received had a header that clearly marked “top secret”.
Clinton said Trump’s criticism of her support for the Iraq war and intervention in Libya are hypocritical given that he previously supported both.
“And the best thing we can do is set up a court system within the military”. Both candidates believe they have the upper hand.
Given that one of the the three presidential debates will have this same format, she’ll need to raise her game – and fast. While she’s articulated an anti-Islamic State plan that is more aggressive than Obama’s, she’s largely in line with the president on foreign policy.
“Well, I appreciate your concern and also your experience, but let me try to make the distinctions that I think are important for me to answer your question”, she said.
The former first lady said she would do “everything in my power to” prevent attacks on US soil.
“We did not lose a single American in that action”.
Clinton, also asked about the issue, pointed to her recently rolled out mental health policy agenda.
In fact, that’s already started. The showdown came as Clinton and Trump have ramped up attacks against one another’s fitness to lead the world’s most potent military. It would seem to be a questionable move, then, for the Republican nominee to double-down on praise for the Russian president during this high-profile forum. He sure did, however.
“I have great faith in the military, I have faith in certain leaders certainly, but I have no faith in Hillary Clinton or the leadership”, Trump said. “I think that the decision to go to war in Iraq was a mistake”, she said”.
Clinton said a president must have an “absolute rock steadiness mixed with strength to be able to make the hard decisions”.
“We have to defeat ISIS, we have to do it with air power and support for local allies”, Clinton said. He said he would make the government “leaner”, in part by using attrition to shrink the workforce, and said he’d bring in new money by asking countries like Germany, Japan and Saudi Arabia to pay more for the security the USA provides them.
Why, in Mr Trump’s national security speech earlier in the day, had he said as president he would give USA generals 30 days to come up with a plan to defeat the so-called Islamic State. “Look, I have a very substantial chance of winning”, he said.
Providing more nuanced detail than in the broad-brush rallies supporters have become accustomed to, Trump outlined proposals for an active army of around 540,000 troops, an air force of at least 1,200 fighter aircraft, a 36-battalion marine corps and a navy of 350 surface ships and submarines.
By virtue of a coin flip, Clinton took the stage first and quickly found herself responding at length to questions about her years in government.
But Mr Trump’s remarks are not his first on women in the military. NBC’s Matt Lauer asked Trump.
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In response to a question from the audience on military sexual assault, Trump cited his tweet from 2013 in which he suggested that the epidemic was a effect of allowing women to serve in the military. “What did these geniuses expect when they put men and women together?” Trump defended it as “a correct tweet” before saying that there must be more prosecutions and consequences.
