Stranded US pilot's three-word message after Trump worried about 'false signals'

 President Donald Trump said he and U.S. officials were concerned Iran was possibly "sending false signals" to try to lure military forces into a trap when they heard the brief message relayed by the stranded service member as he ejected from a downed F-15 on Friday.

After the Iranian military shot down his jet with a shoulder-fired missile, the yet-unnamed weapons system officer delivered an unusual radio message that temporarily puzzled U.S. officials, Trump told Axios in an interview after he announced the successful rescue. "He said: Power be to God," Trump said, before a U.S. defense official later clarified the exact phrase was "God is good," Axios reported.

Though the Pentagon was tracking the officer's location as he hid in a mountain crevice awaiting rescue, Trump said the radio message led some to suspect he was actually in captivity, and that Iranians were using the message to lure troops into an ambush. "What he said on the radio sounded like something a Muslim would say," Trump told Axios. It comes after Iran issued an ominous warning to Trump as the US deadline to reopen the Strait of Hormuz looms.

According to Axios, which was the first to report on the radio message, people who know the officer said he is a religious person, and that the message was not out of character for him to say.

"It was not completely clear early on, but we stuck with it and verified he was alive and not captured. And those who knew him said he is religious," the defense official told Axios.

The officer had been missing since Iran shot down two military planes on Friday, and was recovered after a "heavy firefight," U.S. officials told several news outlets on Saturday.

The officer evaded Iranian capture by hiding on an elevated ridge away from their plane's wreckage and sending out an emergency beacon, U.S. officials and the president confirmed. The complex rescue effort involved around 200 soldiers from special operations units, Trump told Axios.

A defense official said the extraction was performed at night after U.S. forces established a temporary base inside Iran, Axios reporter.

"The two crew members were spread apart by a couple miles. Hundreds of IRGC soldiers were everywhere," the official said.

Trump also said that the Israeli Defense Forces helped the U.S. military "a little bit" during the rescue of both downed service members.

"They have been good partners. They have been great and brave people. We are like a big brother and little brother," Trump told Axios.