It is proper to commemorate the fallen, just as it was appropriate for the Bush administration to note the sacrifices of Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman. But in their cases, as in the case of Owens, honoring the injured or dead must include an honest inquiry and a forthright account of what went wrong and what was learned as a result.

Instead, Americans are being fed propaganda.

White House press secretary Sean Spicer called the raid a “successful operation by all standards.”

Meanwhile, a commander in chief who campaigned on the proposition that he is uniquely able to help America win against terrorists failed to take any responsibility for the costs of the raid, telling Fox News that the military is to blame. “This was something that was, you know, just they wanted to do,” he said, as if that is reason enough for a president to sign off. “And they came to see me and they explained what they wanted to do, the generals, who are very respected. My generals are the most respected that we've had in many decades, I believe. And they lost Ryan.”

That’s an evasion of responsibility worthy of James Taggart.

The message to the American military: the buck stops elsewhere. The Trump administration will take credit for military successes and blame the military for any failures.

Trump is likely to keep bumbling in this realm partly because the nature of military sacrifice seems to elude his understanding. During the 2016 campaign, he infamously declared that Senator John McCain’s status as a war hero was undeserved because he was captured in Vietnam. In Tuesday’s speech, the president took care to assert the spectacular success of the raid where Owens died, declaring that “I just spoke to General Mattis, who reconfirmed that, and I quote, ‘Ryan was a part of a highly successful raid that generated large amounts of vital intelligence that will lead to many more victories in the future against our enemies.’"

The veracity of that assessment is questionable. Senior government officials told NBC that the raid yielded no significant intelligence. Another source said Trump was goaded into approving the mission by advisers who told him that President Obama would not have been bold enough to approve it. Congress should probe the truth. In any case, Trump is wrong to imply that the intelligence yield bears on whether Owen is a hero. The sacrifice of troops ordered into an ill-conceived mission is no less profound; the Americans on whose behalf they fight owe them as much gratitude.

It is nevertheless politically convenient for Trump to conflate the success of the raid with esteem for Owens. Doing so makes it much less likely that the public will dare reach the conclusion that would most damage the president—that a raid he ordered cost a Navy SEAL his life, cost taxpayers tens of millions, killed multiple young children, and yielded neither significant intelligence nor any terrorist leaders.