US President Donald Trump said Monday the United States shifted bombers from RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire after receiving threats against the base.

The Pentagon confirms US bombers have been withdrawn from the British airbase and returned to home stations in the United States. The aircraft reportedly consisted of a dozen or so B-1 bombers.

Trump told reporters before departing for Nebraska that the decision was made because of a known threat.

“There were some threats,” Trump said, adding that the aircraft had not been moved “accidentally.

Trump did not specify the alleged threat or indicate who was suspected of carrying it out. US authorities knew who made the threat, he said, but gave no further details.

The comments seem to back up reports in US media that a security concern was behind the withdrawal, though the nature of the threat has not been publicly identified.

The move follows a major security incident near RAF Fairford on September 27, when police responded to three suspicious vehicles near the airbase. Counter-terror officers then investigated the incident.

Five men were initially arrested on suspicion of terrorism offenses and subsequently released on bail: Another man, a UK-Iranian national, was later arrested and bailed as well.

British and US officials had differed over how directly that incident was tied to the pullout of the bombers.

US Vice President JD Vance said the aircraft had been relocated for safety reasons. However, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the movement of military assets was not necessarily connected to the incident.

“It’s not unusual to see assets move to different parts of the world,” Rubio said, citing exercises, redeployments, and the rotation of personnel and aircraft.

Rubio also said the United States was still confident about the security of its bases and praised the cooperation of British authorities following the incident.

Trump's comments were more blunt. He said the US had identified threats and had decided it was better to move the aircraft rather than leave them exposed.

In their US media reports, The Wall Street Journal and Axios quoted unnamed officials as saying a possible attack could have targeted the aircraft and personnel at the base. Those accounts have not publicly named the alleged threat or provided independently confirmed evidence of a planned attack.

The sources in Washington speculated that the concern could be about sabotage or an effort to strike the aircraft if hostilities with Iran resume. Those possibilities have not been verified.

A source inside the White House also pointed to Ukraine’s Operation Spiderweb, a 2025 drone campaign targeting Russian military bases, as an example of how an adversary could theoretically hit key military targets far from a traditional battlefield.

Iran has denied any involvement in the incident at RAF Fairford.

Iranian officials have previously warned that the bases used to launch attacks on Iranian territory could be regarded as legitimate military targets. But the connection of that statement with the RAF Fairford incident is still to be established.

RAF Fairford near Whelford in Gloucestershire has been a US Air Force forward operating location for decades. Recently, the base has hosted American B-1 and B-52 bombers, which have been involved in US military operations in the Middle East.

The removal of the bombers could reduce the US ability to quickly deploy aircraft from the UK, said Christoph Bergs, a research analyst at the Royal United Services Institute.

But it’s not yet clear how large or how long any operational impact might be.

The White House and the UK Ministry of Defence have been approached for comment.