Via The Saker,
The Pentagon’s more aggressive military approach
Here is a short timeline of the Pentagon taking the presidential commander-in-chief power from Trump.
The ultimatums came on March 1.
On March 1, 2017 the Atlantic’s article “Trump and the Generals”
announced that Trump’s military leaders “increasingly sound like they’re working for a different president altogether.”
They complained about the lack of funding, even after Trump pledged to give them additional $54 billion that were cut from the budget of non-military agencies. Right after the budget announcement, it became immediately obvious that the Pentagon considered this sum to be ridiculously small for their ambitions.
They also balked at Trump’s election promise to fire many “Obama’s generals.”
One of those generals openly voicing their opposition to Trump’s policies is General Tony Thomas of U.S. Special Operations Command. He reportedly said that “he wanted Americans to understand those elite counterterrorism operations are occurring nightly.” Meaning that they not just need more money, but more independence to operate.
As per the Atlantic, the “generals don’t much like to talk about “winning” against terrorism. They understand and tell the public and congress that the United States is in a 10-, 30-, 100- year battle against a multi-generational ideological war of ideas that goes far beyond the military battlefield.”
The article links to the Center for a New American Security’s publication: Virtual Caliphate – Defeating ISIL on the Physical Battlefield Is Not Enough.
The same article in the Atlantic also went on listing some other problems that the Generals had with Trump.
“Over and over, Trump has heard his generals, then gone to the microphone or Twitter and ignored them—a pattern he began on the campaign trail. In September, Trump said he’d likely place new generals in charge of the ISIS war and that the ones in charge had been “embarrassing” under Obama, who he said had marginalized them.”
They complained about his “unpredictability” and even threaten that some of them will resign in protests.
"In the next few months, Trump will either order a way forward against ISIS that U.S. military leaders offer up (and likely is not much different from the war underway), or he’ll order some radical departure from what he’s offered this week, which may require that some generals resign their commissions.”
“Either he’ll slash money from the State Department and pull back America’s diplomatic and development presence abroad—including money related to counter-terrorism—or he’ll expand it to help end this fight and prevent further conflict, as so many generals have suggested.”
“Either he’ll tone down the anti-Muslim rhetoric, like McMaster wants, or he’ll keep it up.”
“Either he’ll proclaim to the world the importance of a free and adversarial press to democracy, exemplified nowhere better than in America, or he won’t.”
“Americans can pick their own metric, but one place to watch is Eastern Europe. In the last year, former President Barack Obama and NATO moved thousands of American troops to Russia’s border, with more tanks, aircraft, ships, and missiles. If Trump really wants to make nice with Putin, he could pull all of that back, or cut the U.S. nuclear arsenal.”
“What “the generals” say matters, and what Trump says about them and their advice is confusing.”
If that sounded like an ultimatum, it was, because it was accompanied with an open threat of disobedience delivered via the Daily Beast.
On the same day, March 1, the Daily Beast published an article written by Kimberly Dozier, Generals May Launch New ISIS Raids Without Trump’s OK.
This article was published with updates and comments from Central Command, with the following statements:
“The White House is considering delegating more authority to the Pentagon”
“President Donald Trump has signaled that he wants his defense secretary, retired Marine Gen. Jim Mattis, to have a freer hand to launch time-sensitive missions quickly, ending what U.S. officials say could be a long approval process under President Barack Obama that critics claimed stalled some missions by hours or days.”
As you have noticed the link to 2016 material titled “CALL OF DUTY: The Secret Movement to Draft General James Mattis for President"
Gen. James Mattis doesn’t necessarily want to be president—but that’s not stopping a group of billionaire donors from hatching a plan to get him there.”
It’s reminded us that Jim Mattis was endorsed by some ” anonymous group of conservative billionaires” to run in the presidential race “to confront Donald Trump.”
“Mattis, who is also nicknamed the “warrior monk” for his contemplative devotion to the military arts, would be a fallback option for anti-Trump forces.”
Now, this anti-Trump force man has taken an unelected position of the secretary of Defense. Let’s keep this very important detail in mind.
The article says that the Pentagon may start launching operations without the Presidential approval in “areas outside of the declared war zones.”
“In declared war zones, U.S. commanders have the authority to make such calls, but outside such war zones, …. it can take permissions all the way up to the Oval Office to launch a drone strike or a special-operations team.”
“Despite the controversy, Trump has signaled that he wants to operate more like the CEO he was in the private sector in such matters, and delegate even more power to Mattis, which may mean rewriting one of President Barack Obama’s classified Presidential Policy Directives on potentially lethal operations in countries where the U.S. is not officially involved in combat.”
“Trump officials believe loosening the permissions process can help turn up the heat against ISIS—and counterterrorist-focused agencies like the military’s Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) are lining up new targets in anticipation of more numerous and more rapid approvals.”
The new model of command is “pre-delegating authority to Mattis, that authority could be pushed much further down the chain of command—all the way down to the three-star general who runs JSOC.” The result will be “the elite force will be able to move into action, informing the national-security apparatus of the operation but not having to wait for permission.”
Cutting through this heavy bureaucratic American doublespeak, the White House will be informed, but would have no commanding authority over the US military.
News in Brief
March 14th, the US National Nuclear Security Administration field tested the modernized B61-12 gravity nuclear bomb in Nevada.
April 7, Liberty Passion, loaded with US military vehicles, moored at Aqaba Main Port, Jordan
On April 7th the Pentagon US bombed Syria’s main command center in fight against terrorists
April 10, United States Deploying Forces At Syrian-Jordanian Border
April 11, The US Air Force might start forcing pilots to stay in the service against their will, according to the chief of the military unit’s Air Mobility Command.
April 12, President Donald Trump has signed the US approval for Montenegro to join NATO
April 13, NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg announced the alliance’s increased deployment in Eastern Europe
On April 13th, the Pentagon bombed Afghanistan. The US military has bombed Afghanistan with its GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast Bomb (MOAB)
April 13, the US-led coalition bombed the IS munitions and chemical weapons depot in Deir ez-Zor killing hundreds of people
April 14, The Arleigh Burke-class, guided-missile destroyer USS Stethem (DDG 63) has been deployed to the South China Sea
April 14, the US sent F-35 jets to Europe
April 14, Washington failed to attend the latest international conference hosted by Moscow, where 11 nations discussed ways of bringing peace to Afghanistan. The US branded it a “unilateral Russian attempt to assert influence in the region.”
April14, the US has positioned two destroyers armed with Tomahawk cruise missiles close enough to the North Korean nuclear test site to act preemptively
On April 16th, the US army makes largest deployment of troops to Somalia since the 90s.
On Saturday April 15, FoxNews posted an article titled, Trump gives generals more freedom to make decisions in ISIS fight, Trump reiterates confidence in US troops after MOAB strike.
It’s important to realize that this Trump’s decision to give more freedom to the US generals to decide where to start a war, or as it’s been dubbed “the New Approach” had come after the fact that was “on display this week in Afghanistan, where Gen. John Nicholson, head of the U.S.-led coalition there, decided to use one of the military’s biggest nonnuclear bombs—a Massive Ordnance Air Blast bomb, or MOAB.”
After the MOAB was dropped, repeating without the presidential approval, the Media came out heralding this bombing of Afghanistan as “America’s top military commanders are implementing the vision articulated by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis: U.S. military commanders to make more battlefield decisions on their own.”
“A senior administration official said Mr. Trump didn’t know about the weapon’s use until it had been dropped.”
“Mr. Mattis “is telling them, ‘It’s not the same as it was, you don’t have to ask us before you drop a MOAB,’” the senior defense official said. “Technically there’s no piece of paper that says you have to ask the president to drop a MOAB. But last year this time, the way [things were] meant, ‘I’m going to drop a MOAB, better let the White House know.’”
“There’s nothing formal, but it is beginning to take shape,” a senior U.S. defense official said Friday. “There is a sense among these commanders that they are able to do a bit more—and so they are.”
“While military commanders complained about White House micromanagement under former President Barack Obama, they are now being told they have more freedom to make decisions without consulting Mr. Trump. Military commanders around the world are being encouraged to stretch the limits of their existing authorities when needed, but to think seriously about the consequences of their decisions.”
“The more muscular military approach is expanding…”
“Mr. Mattis has sketched out such a global plan, but the administration has yet to agree on it. While the political debate continues, the military is being encouraged to take more aggressive steps … around the world.”
In conclusion:
While the situation is taking its shape, I encourage you to research and to think over the following questions.
This incoming information sounds like a proof of what I have been suspecting all along that the US military has been run by the groups of non-governmental private organizations. My suspicions were confirmed by Rosa Brooks‘ book “How Everything Became War and the Military Became Everything.”
It also helped when in February of this year the Washington Post posted her opinion about an ongoing military coup. “A former Defense Department official under the Obama administration has raised the specter of a military coup to remove President Donald Trump from power.
“In an editorial penned for Foreign Policy, senior Pentagon policy official Rosa Brooks publicly suggested a military insurrection against the Trump administration may be the only option to oust one of the most divisive presidents in American history.”
If memory serves me right, in 2011 was a distinct threat issued by Steve Pieczenik on YouTube to Obama and his administration that the military and intelligence stopped considering the presidential power to be legitimate and went on making themselves to be the real government.
This tells me that no matter who takes the presidency, the US armed forces and the intelligence community refuse to recognize the country’s civilian government.
What does this actually mean for the rest of us?
It means that any negotiations and agreements with the US president and the Secretary of State are useless. That would explain the complete lack on interest of Putin to talk to any of them. The Kremlin didn’t even release a statement about Putin’s meeting with Tillerson, and there are rumors that it was nothing, but an exchange of strong language on both sides.
So, the US military takes hostage an entire planet by positioning themselves near China, NK and Russia in the Far East, and near Russia in Europe and threatening to start a nuclear conflict with many nuclear countries at once, if they don’t get something.
What do they actually want, and from whom? Do they blackmail Russia and China? Do they also blackmail the EU? Or, do they blackmail someone in the US? Are they looking for money? Are they looking for gold? Do they want the official dejure recognition of the military government? Or, are they demanding the write off the US debt?
How are they going to get away with this?
Two days ago the Wall Street Journal made an announcement that the Pentagon was granted the “freedom of initiative.”
This announcement was noticed in Russia.
If the US armed forces went rogue and the wsj just announced this, would it be the legal reason for the UN members to neutralize their bases around the world?
Who are now in control of NATO?
Are they keeping Trump hostage and not allowing him to leave the territory of the US?
What about “neuchtenka” like the PMCs, the Special Forces, (GRS)/OGA, SADs, and others?
Does this mean that the US has no civilian government, and that’s why they are going to shut the government down at the end of April?