A GREEN Beret shot himself before he exploded a device in a Tesla Cybertruck outside the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas, authorities have said.

The explosion caused minor injuries to seven people and only minimal damage to the hotel. 

US special forces serviceman Matthew Livelsberger probably planned a more damaging attack but the blast was mostly limited to the interior of the vehicle because the explosion “vented out and up” and didn’t hit the hotel doors just a few feet away, Clark County Sheriff Kevin McMahill said on Thursday.

Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives special agent Kenny Cooper said: “The level of sophistication is not what we would expect from an individual with this type of military experience.”

The motive remains unknown.

“It’s not lost on us that it’s in front of the Trump building, that it’s a Tesla vehicle, but we don’t have information at this point that definitively tells us or suggests it was because of this particular ideology,” said Las Vegas FBI special agent Spencer Evans.

Mr Livelsberger had recently returned from an assignment in Germany and was on approved leave when he died, according to a US official.