A DRAFT-DODGING PRESIDENT
— The Presidente Demente Donald J. T-RUMP —
CHANGING OF THE GUARD CEREMONY
When our President who is a conniving lowlife DRAFT DODGER and brags about not being in the military I find his attendance at Arlington is a desecration and should not be permitted and we are adamant about protesting if he ever shows up there again after what he said about our soldiers.
He had stepped over the line and everyone kept it a secret because it is was disgusting to hear and this is not a tolerable action by anyone, except a lowlife liar like Donald J. T-RUMP where each and every day he proves when you think he is at the bottom of the barrel, he goes lower. 
With his disgusting, debasing, denigrating commentary for the past four years, forget the barrel, the scumbag has lowered the bar and sunk so low, he should be causing earth quakes popping out in China where they will know what to do with him…
Each day T-RUMPS thinking and distortions got worse and Congress and the Senate just did nothing. And His leadership was questionable from the beginning and conclusive, he is a coward, a Draft Dodger and we have run out of options. He has denigrated our men who wear the uniform voluntarily for our country and worse he has called our fallen heroes names like “ suckers and losers”.
President Donald Trump launched an unprecedented public attack against the leadership of the US military on Monday, accusing them of waging wars to boost the profits of defense manufacturing companies.
"I'm not saying the military's in love with me -- the soldiers are, the top people in the Pentagon probably aren't because they want to do nothing but fight wars so that all of those wonderful companies that make the bombs and make the planes and make everything else stay happy," Trump told reporters at a White House news conference.
Trump's extraordinary comments come as several defense officials tell CNN relations between the President and Pentagon leadership are becoming increasingly strained. They also followed efforts by Trump to convince the public that he had not made a series of reported disparaging remarks about US military personnel and veterans, which were first reported by The Atlantic magazine.
He Referred To Marines - At French Cemetery, in Crude And Derogatory Terms — A former senior administration official confirmed to CNN that Trump referred to fallen US service members at the Aisne-Marne cemetery in crude and derogatory terms during a November 2018 trip to France to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I. Other outlets, including Fox News, have confirmed much of The Atlantic's reporting, which Trump and the White House vehemently deny.
Some have expressed concern that the President’s Monday accusations against the military's top brass could have a corrosive effect. "The President's comments about the motivations of military leaders not only demeans their service and that of those they lead; he lends credence to the very disdain and thoughtlessness he tries to deny," retired US Navy Rear Admiral and CNN analyst John Kirby said.
While Trump has publicly disparaged the service of several high-profile veterans such as the late Sen. John McCain and his former Secretary of Defense, retired Gen. Jim Mattis, Monday’s broadside was on a new level targeting leaders he appointed to carry out his orders. T-RUMP has also repeatedly touted boosting the defense budget as one of his administration's major accomplishments, citing it as evidence of his support for the military, spending that has also benefited defense contractors.
Top Commanders Exhausted And Worried — CNN has previously reported that relations between Trump and his Defense Secretary Mark Esper are tense, with Trump believed to be on the verge of replacing him. But, less than two months from the presidential election, the Pentagon's top commanders are growing increasingly exhausted and worried about their relationship with the President, several defense officials tell CNN.
A critical area of concern is how the Pentagon would respond if Trump invokes the Insurrection Act to put US military troops on the streets to deal with civilian protestors as he continues to stoke divisions across the country in the run up to the election. T-RUMP floated the idea last month and, after he first made the threat in June, Esper publicly broke with him by saying he opposed any such move.
To avoid a new showdown with the White House, for the last several weeks, top military officials -- including General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff -- have been getting regular briefings on civil unrest in major cities across the country. The idea is to be ready with alternative plans for state-activated National Guard and other federal civilian law enforcement rather than have active duty troops potentially clash with protesters, according to several defense officials.
Another issue that could lead to a clash between Trump and military leadership is the $740 billion defense bill that would strip the names of Confederate generals in the face of vocal opposition from Trump who said he'd veto any move.
The entire Joint Chiefs have made it clear they want to eliminate what they see as the divisive symbols of the Confederacy.
Milley did not hold back on the issue in appearance before Congress in July, stating that “ those officers turned their back on their oath," referring to the names on the bases. "It was an act of treason, at the time, against the Union, against the Stars and Stripes, against the US Constitution."
HALLOWED GROUND - A FEW GOOD MEN NEEDED —
The Battle of Belleau Woods (1–26 June 1918) occurred during the German Spring Offensive in World War I, near the Marne River in France. The battle was fought between the US 2nd (under the command of Major General Omar Bundy) and 3rd Divisions along with French and British forces against an assortment of German units including elements from the 237th, 10th, 197th, 87th, and 28th Divisions. The battle has become a key component of the lore of the United States Marine Corps.
He also didn’t understand the significance of the battle and asked his advisers,
“Who were the good guys in this war?" according to The Atlantic.
A White House official condemned The Atlantic’s report and said these “ Accusations” were “ False." Hopefully that individual, a Sh*t House Official doesn’t drop into a local bar with a couple Marines and tell them it’s false…. Most of the counter comments came from the usual T-RUMP acolytes Mnuchin, Barr, Sarah Sanders, Mike Pompeo and other scumbags not known for their truth either…
Less than two months from Election Day, President Donald T-RUMP is navigating the fallout of explosive allegations that he disparaged US service members killed in battle. A former senior administration official confirmed to CNN that T-RUMP had referred to fallen US service members at the Aisne-Marne cemetery in crude and derogatory terms during a November 2018 trip to France to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I.
People are realizing how important his removal is to this country and when you sh*t in your pants like he did out of ignorance and stupidity, you change your pants so expect a lot of “ dis and mis” miss-diction to cover this colossal F*ck-up.
The former official, who declined to be named, largely confirmed reporting from Jeffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic magazine, which cited sources who said T-RUMP rejected the idea of a cemetery visit and proceeded to refer to the fallen soldiers as "losers" and "suckers." The New York Times, Washington Post, Fox News and the Associated Press have all corroborated parts of The Atlantic’s reporting.
Forceful denial. Speaking to reporters hours after The Atlantic report was published, the President said the report was “ disgraceful situation." "To think that I would make statements negative to our military when nobody has done what I've done, with the budgets and the military budget. We're getting pay raises for the military. It is a disgraceful situation, by a magazine that is a terrible magazine, I don’t read it," he said.
Attack mode. T-RUMP is now going after Laurene Powell Jobs, the philanthropist billionaire who owns a majority stake in The Atlantic.
VA secretary backs Trump. Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert Wilkie, a highly regarded T-RUMP enthusiast and certified T-RUMP ass-kisser told CNN’s Dana Bash today on “ State of the Union” that he has “absolutely not” heard the President make disparaging comments about US service members "And I would be offended too if I thought it was true." Try listening schmuck… and get offended, it’s T-RUMPS proven MO.
THE FUHRER HITLER KNOWS MORE THAN HIS GENERALS
Victims of the Night of the Long Knives - Adolf Hitler, Ernst Röhm, Gregor Strasser and Hermann Göring pictured in 1932… Hitler is the one on the left, not smiling. Maybe he knew something…
Röhm and Strasser would be killed in the Night of the Long Knives, which in large part was provoked by evidence fabricated by Göring ( thats the fat bastard on the right mit lederhausen ) and Heinrich Himmler purporting to show that Röhm was planning a coup and for them to get closer to the top of the regime. this is how Hitler took over, he killed people, T-RUMP fires or denigrates people.
Victims of the Night of the Long Knives numbered at least 85 people murdered. It took place in Germany between June 30 and July 2, 1934.
T-RUMP Thought he Could Bully The Generals…
T-RUMP came into office and his adoration was over the top when supported by some fine military commanders on the highest level. Obviously that didn’t last when they soon realized they were not working in the best interests of our great nation and basically the President was a complete frickin idiot and moron. Most stayed on to protect the country from Trump if he decided for example to nuke Puerto Rico or Brooklyn…
The following agreed, that he is unfit for the job and basically unfit as a human being. We have all their documents on file. They either resigned or were “Fired” but to a man, they held back on T-RUMP in a high regard… there is a code whereby Military personnel do not comment on politics, some ( actually many) suggested the high regard should have a rope attached to a high tree with a ladder or horse underneath and hang him at high noon.
THE GENERALS T-RUMP WOULD NOT LISTEN TO…
☆☆☆☆ Defense Secretary And Honored Gen. James Mattis
T-RUMPS former Defense Secretary, James Mattis — who had avoided criticizing Trump since resigning 17 months ago — issued a stinging condemnation of the Trump administration’s response to the protests. “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people — does not even pretend to try,” Mattis told The Atlantic. “Instead he tries to divide us.”
Mattis suggested that Trump had made “a mockery of our Constitution” by using the military to break up a peaceful protest so he could stage “a bizarre photo op.” Mattis was echoing criticism from other former military leaders who have also rebuked T-RUMP.
THIRD GRADE COMMENT FROM T-RUMP:
T-RUMP responded on Twitter by calling Mattis, “ The world’s most overrated General ”. “He further said I didn’t like his leadership style or much else about him, and many others agree”. I’m Glad he is gone!
COLLEGE EDITOR COMMENT:
A) And as usual the Fuehrer did not state who these other folks were who agreed with him, because there aren’t any, just another lie and more of T-RUMPS invisible made up friends, he doesn’t have friends… only those who fear him because he is a psycho.
B) I have met General Mattis on many occasions and he has more American Hero in him than the draft dodging moron, his family and his cabinet of losers combined adding all his ex-members of the T-RUMP club in jail to the mix and his communist friends and murderers.
C) T-RUMP is about the most divisive human being on this earth and quite mentally impaired. Don’t tell me how successful he is when 120,000 Americans died during his tenure from gun shots and 205,000 have died from COVID-19. The presidents job is to protect the United Staes and it’s Constitution, he has failed miserably, the worst in history. He has enriched himself, he has no honor and not worthy of commenting on anyone.
☆☆☆☆ Gen. John Allen, And Former Chief Of Staff
Now president of the Brookings Institution, also focused his criticism on the president’s threat on Monday to deploy the US military against protesters, and his use of force against a peaceful demonstration outside the White House so that he could be photographed holding a Bible in front of a church.
“The slide of the United States into illiberalism may well have begun on 1 June 2020. Remember the date. It may well signal the beginning of the end of the American experiment,” Allen wrote on the Foreign Policy website.
His commentary followed a similarly stinging denunciation on Wednesday from Trump’s first defense secretary, James Mattis, who described the actions taken on Monday in front of the White House as an “abuse of executive authority” and suggested that Trump and other officials should be held to account for making “a mockery of our constitution”.
A retired four-star Marine general on Wednesday excoriated President Donald Trump’s threats to use the military on protesters and his controversial church photo op on Monday, writing that his actions “ may well signal the beginning of the end of the American experiment.”
Gen. John Allen, the former commander of American forces in Afghanistan and former special presidential envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIS under the Obama administration, wrote in an op-ed for Foreign Policy that “to even the casual observer, Monday was awful for the United States and its democracy."
"Donald Trump isn't religious, has no need of religion, and doesn't care about the devout, except insofar as they serve his political needs. The President failed to project any of the higher emotions or leadership desperately needed in every quarter of this nation during this dire moment,” Allen wrote. I never believed that the Constitution was under threat until recently. And I have concerns about that. We should all be attentive right now to how the rule of law is being administered in this country.
☆☆☆☆ Gen. Mark A. Milley — Chairman Of The Joint Chiefs
And Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, reminded commanders that members of the armed forces had sworn an oath to Constitution, which “gives Americans the right to freedom of speech and peaceful assembly.”
Trump has been the target of harsh criticism from political elites before, and it has never shaken his solid support among Republican voters. I have called the rock solid Bundt party members of the GOP as dumb as the Hitler fans of the late thirties and that war which cost 60 million people to die. But Trump does seem to be losing the support, at least temporarily, of swing voters.
NOTE: Esper and Milley accompanied Trump to the church along with other officials. Neither had any indications of what the president had planned with the bible and the Church, they thought he was going to have a prayer call. I believe both of them and others were not told what to expect.
As the area was being cleared, Trump gave an address at the White House where he threatened to send the military to cities that did not control protests. Military equipment was all over Washington, D.C., for much of last week, including a Lakota helicopter videoed flying low above protesters. There was a false statement by the AFL-CIO thats Milley and ESper knew what was going on. Not True
☆☆☆☆ Gen. Colin Powell Former Secretary Of State
Former Republican Secretary of State Colin Powell said Sunday that President Donald Trump has "drifted away" from the Constitution, adding to a growing list of former top military officials who have strongly criticized the President's response to the nationwide protests surrounding the police killing of George Floyd. "We have a Constitution. And we have to follow that Constitution. And the President has drifted away from it," Powell, a retired general who served under President George W. Bush, told CNN's Jake Tapper on "State of the Union."
Powell said he’s "proud" of what a number of former generals, admirals and diplomats have said about Trump's response last week to the widespread protests, adding that he hadn't released a public statement denouncing Trump's response because he felt he had demonstrated his displeasure with Trump in 2016 when he voted against him.
The President's former Chief of Staff General Kelly said he agreed with Mattis. Retired General John Allen says the president's threat to deploy US military against American citizens -- quote -- "may well signal the beginning of the end of the American experiment."
I'm very happy with what General Allen said and all the other generals, admirals are saying and diplomats are saying. We have a Constitution. And we have to follow that Constitution. And the President has drifted away from it. I’m so proud of what these generals and admirals have done and others have done.
And former Defense Secretary General Mattis said -- quote -- "Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people, does not even pretend to try. Instead, he tries to divide us.”
We are in turning points. I mean, the Republican Party, the President, thought they were sort of immune; they can go say anything they wanted. And even more troubling, the Congress would just sit there and not in any way resist what the president is doing.
And the one word I have to use with respect to what he's been doing for the last several years is a word I would never have used before, I never would have used with any of the four presidents I have worked for: He lies. He lies about things. And he gets away with it, because people will not hold him accountable.
And so, while we're watching him, we need to watch our Congress. I watched the senators heading into the chamber the other day after all this broke, with the reporters saying, what do you have to say, what do you to say? They had nothing to say. They would not react.
I assume, based on the fact that you approved Joe Biden when Senator -- then Senator Obama picked him to be his running mate in 2008, I assume you're going to be voting for Joe Biden? POWELL: I'm very close to Joe Biden in a social matter and on a political matter. I have worked with him for 35, 40 years.
And he is now the candidate, and I will be voting for him.
☆☆☆☆ Retired Adm. William McRaven
William Harry McRaven is a retired United States Navy four-star admiral who last served as the ninth commander of the United States Special Operations Command from August 8, 2011, to August 28, 2014. From 2015 to 2018, he was the chancellor of The University of Texas System. I met him at Socom.
THE DRAFT DODGING COWARD - PRESIDENTE DEMENTE T-RUMP
Donald T-RUMP derided retired Adm. Bill McRaven — the Navy SEAL who led the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden — calling him a "Hillary Clinton fan" during an interview with Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday." He also said bin Laden should have been captured much sooner, though he did not explain how the Obama administration should have done so.
The president made the comments after Wallace asked him about McRaven’s criticism of Trump's attacks on the press. Last year, McRaven, who did not make an endorsement in the 2016 presidential election, called Trump's lambasting of the news media possibly "the greatest threat to democracy in my lifetime" during a speech at the University of Texas. A four-star admiral who retired from the Navy in 2014, McRaven also wrote an August op-ed article calling on Trump to revoke his security clearance after the president pulled former CIA Director John Brennan's clearance.
President Donald Trump needs to step up and provide America with the leadership it needs — or else someone better suited should take over as commander in chief, according to retired Adm. William McRaven.
McRaven, who oversaw the Navy SEAL raid that killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in 2011, said the rhetoric and acts he witnessed at a change of command ceremony at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, and an annual gala for the Office of Strategic Services Society reminded him “why our future may be in peril.”
“What struck me was the stark contrast between the words and deeds heralded at those events — and the words and deeds emanating from the White House,” McRaven wrote in an op-ed Thursday published in the New York Times.
The change of command ceremony, between two generals McRaven said he served with for 20 years, portray solid character and understand the gravity of their responsibility leading their soldiers and had confidence in American values they have defended during their careers.
“They had faith that these values were worth sacrificing everything for — including, if necessary, their lives,” said McRaven, a SEAL who led Joint Special Operations Command before becoming the commander of U.S. Special Operations Command in 2011. He retired in 2014.Retired Adm. William McRaven said there is “nothing morally right” about clearing peaceful protesters amid national unrest following George Floyd’s death in police custody.
“Trust me, every man and woman in uniform recognizes that we are all Americans and that the last thing they want to do as military men and women is to stand in the way of a peaceful protest,” McRaven, who oversaw the Navy SEAL raid that killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in 2011, said in an interview with MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Friday.
“You’re not going to use, whether it’s the military, or the National Guard, or law enforcement, to clear peaceful American citizens for the president of the United States to do a photo op,” McRaven said. “There is nothing morally right about that.”
McRaven’s comments come as the Trump administration has taken heat after federal troops forcefully cleared protesters in Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C. so President Donald Trump could visit St. John’s church for a photo with a Bible on Monday.
The United States Park Police denied that they used tear gas and instead, claimed that they used “smoke canisters” and “pepper balls” after protesters “became more combative.”
Although pepper balls have different ingredients than tear gas, both are designed to irritate the eyes and respiratory systems and the CDC designates both of them as "riot control agents.” Media on the scene also reported witnessing only peaceful behavior from protesters.
T-RUMPS Deferment - Fake Bone Spurs Were A Fake Diagnosis By A Doctor —
And had the nerve to make Inflammatory Vietnam War comments, too. T-RUMP has repeatedly questioned why Americans who served in Vietnam went to war, according to someone who has heard him make the remarks.
The President, who received five draft deferments for FAKE Bone Spurs NEVER SAW A DOCTOR, HIS DAD WAS RENTING THE DOCTOR HIS OFFICE, IT WAS A TRADE. His new nickname Captain Bone Spurs has suggested in those conversations that Vietnam veterans didn’t know how to exploit the system to get out of serving.
Daddy Warbucks planned all this. Donald’s Father. ( AKA - The elder bastard) Thats where all the real scum is. You will not find much from his recent doctors who gave him fake rave reviews. Both have dropped off the maps since they lied about him. One blown out by a Congress who would not vet him, the tipsy drug issuing Admiral and the other whose practice might not appeal to everyone. Now he wants to promote the Admiral, AKA ADMIRAL Dr. Feelgood, the liberal pill pusher in the WhiteHouse.
Breaking news WASHINGTON – Two daughters of a New York podiatrist say that 50 years ago their father diagnosed President Donald T-RUMP with bone spurs in his heels as a favor to the doctor’s landlord, Fred T-RUMP, The New York Times reported Wednesday:
Trump received five deferments from the draft for military service during the Vietnam War. He received four education deferments while he was a college student and a fifth deferment in 1968 for a medical exemption after he graduated.
Questions about Trump’s deferments have dogged him at least since 2011 when The Smoking Gun published an extract of his draft record. Unfortunately the doctor diagnose T-RUMP with Bone Spurs via the fax machine while Donald held his foot up to a lightbulb…
Critics have noted that T-RUMP was an athlete who enjoyed playing football, baseball, squash, tennis and golf in the years before his medical deferment. "I was the best baseball player in New York when I was young," Trump told interviewer Michael D'Antonio in 2014. "I was always the best at sports."
"It was a long time ago," Trump told reporters at a July 2015 campaign rally in Iowa. "I had student deferments and then ultimately had a medical deferment because of my feet. I had a bone spur.” Singular, now it is A bone spur…
When asked which foot had the problem, Trump – who has claimed to have "one of the greatest memories of all time" – told reporters that he could not remember. His campaign later released a statement saying the spurs affected both feet.
John McCain Calls The Draft Dodger Out —
The late Sen. John McCain, a Vietnam veteran whom Trump said was not a war hero because he got captured, took a veiled shot at the president's medical deferment during an October 2017 C-SPAN interview.
"One aspect of the conflict, by the way, that I will never ever countenance is that we drafted the lowest-income level of America, and the highest-income level found a doctor that would say that they had a bone spur. That is wrong. That is wrong. If we are going to ask every American to serve, every American should serve,” McCain said.
Words Of A Draft Dodging Coward Scumbag —
The fake lieing president has repeatedly disparaged the intelligence of service members, and asked that wounded veterans be kept out of military parades, multiple sources tell the Atlantic
In 2016, Army veteran David Weissman was an “unapologetic, red-hat wearing” Donald Trump supporter. The Palm Bay, Fla., resident would regularly join social media mobs attacking liberals, he later wrote, seeking to defend a candidate who he said rightfully prioritized the armed forces.
Four years later, Weissman — who served two tours in Afghanistan — has now sparked a Twitter campaign of former service members against President Trump, over reports that he derided fallen U.S. soldiers as “losers” and “suckers.”
“I recommend all veterans to use their Military pics as a profile pic,” Weissman wrote on Twitter on Thursday evening, “to let Trump know how many people he has offended.”
Weissman’s online call to arms underscored the outpouring of anger that erupted from military veterans and their families overnight against T-RUMP, following a bombshell article in the Atlantic that Trump and several top aides have vehemently denied.
T-RUMP said U.S. soldiers injured and killed in war were ‘losers,’ magazine reports In a video on Twitter, retired Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton, who has spoken out against T-RUMP before, described how his father was shot down while delivering air support to troops on the ground in Vietnam. “I am stunned that anybody in the United States military would consider you anything but a loser or a sucker,” Eaton said, addressing Trump and urging viewers to vote against him in November. “You’re no patriot.”
As first reported by the Atlantic and later confirmed in part by other media outlets, including The Washington Post, T-RUMP said wounded veterans should not march in a military parade and canceled his visit to a French cemetery for American Marines killed in World War I because he had no interest in honoring his country’s war dead.
The president — who received a NOW EXPOSED AS FAKE MEDICAL deferment from the Vietnam War — also repeatedly questioned why anyone would join the armed forces, notably in comments to his then-chief of staff, John F. Kelly, according to the Atlantic. “I don’t get it. What was in it for them?” he asked on Me.
Excepts from Mark Bowden — The Atlantic
MARK BOWDEN is a contributing writer at The Atlantic and the author of Black Hawk Down, Huế 1968, andThe Finish: The Killing of Osama Bin Laden…
Military officers are sworn to serve whomever voters send to the White House. Cognizant of the special authority they hold, high-level officers epitomize respect for the chain of command, and are extremely reticent about criticizing their civilian overseers. That those I spoke with made an exception in Trump’s case is telling, and much of what they told me is deeply disturbing.
In 20 years of writing about the military, I have never heard officers in high positions express such alarm about a president. Trump’s pronouncements and orders have already risked catastrophic and unnecessary wars in the Middle East and Asia, and have created severe problems for field commanders engaged in combat operations. Frequently caught unawares by Trump’s statements, senior military officers have scrambled, in their aftermath, to steer the country away from tragedy. How many times can they successfully do that before faltering?
Amid threats spanning the globe, from nuclear proliferation to mined tankers in the Persian Gulf to terrorist attacks and cyber warfare, those in command positions monitor the president’s Twitter feed like field officers scanning the horizon for enemy troop movements.
A new front line in national defense has become the White House Situation Room, where the military struggles to accommodate a commander in chief who is both ignorant and capricious.
In May, after months of threatening Iran, Trump ordered the carrier group led by the USS Abraham Lincoln to shift from the Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf. On June 20, after an American drone was downed there, he ordered a retaliatory attack—and then called it off minutes before it was to be launched. The next day he said he was “not looking for war” and wanted to talk with Iran’s leaders, while also promising them “obliteration like you’ve never seen before” if they crossed him.
He threatened North Korea with “fire and fury” and dispatched a three-aircraft-carrier flotilla to waters off the Korean peninsula — then he pivoted to friendly summits with Kim Jong Un, with whom he announced he was “in love”; canceled long-standing US military exercises with South Korea; and dangled the possibility of withdrawing American forces from the country altogether. While the lovefest continues for the cameras, the US has quietly uncanceled the canceled military exercises, and dropped any mention of a troop withdrawal.
Such rudderless captaincy creates the headlines Trump craves. He revels when his tweets take off. (“Boom!” he says. “Like a rocket!”) Out in the field, where combat is more than wordplay, his tweets have consequences. He is not a president who thinks through consequences—and this, the generals stressed, is not the way serious nations behave.
Though he disdains expert advice, Trump reveres—perhaps fetishizes—the military. He began his presidency by stacking his administration with generals: Mattis, McMaster, Kelly, and, briefly, Michael Flynn, his first national security adviser. Appointing them so soon after their retirement from the military was a mistake, according to Don Bolduc, a retired brigadier general who is currently running as a Republican for the US Senate in New Hampshire.
Early on, the biggest difference Bolduc saw between the Trump administration and its predecessors, and one he felt was “going to be disruptive in the long term,” was “the significant reliance, in the Pentagon at least, on senior military leadership overriding and making less relevant our civilian oversight. That was going to be a huge problem.
The secretary of defense pretty much surrounded himself with his former Marine comrades, and there was, at least from that group, a distrust of civilians that really negatively affected the Pentagon in terms of policy and strategy in Afghanistan,
