Admiral William McRaven, leader of the Bin Laden raid and scourge of the Taliban, quit the Defense Innovation Board, according to Defense News. The job is less important than the signal sent.
McRaven took the action last month, four days after he blasted President Trump in a caustic Washington Post Op-Ed entitled “Revoke my security clearance too, Mr. President.”
Like CIA director John Brennan, McRaven is targeting President Trump’s character, not just his policies.
This fraught choice is fueling the incipient national security policymakers rebellion against Trump. If the issue were simply about the direction of U.S. policy, I suspect many signatories would not have added their names. Brennan says the issue is bigger than policy.
“What I decided to do is not just limit my criticism to his policy choices,” Brennan told Adam Entous of the New Yorker. “The former C.I.A. director wanted to zero in on what he saw as Trump’s “lack of character,” adding, of his choice, “I really have taken great offense at his personal demeanor, his lack of integrity and his dishonesty.”
McRaven is following the same path. Unlike some former U.S. intelligence officials who fault the Brennan for abandoning the profession’s allegedly apolitical approach, McRaven seems to be going all in on Trump’s authoritarianism. His Post piece concluded;
If you think for a moment that your McCarthy-era tactics will suppress the voices of criticism, you are sadly mistaken. The criticism will continue until you become the leader we prayed you would be.
Key takeaway: “The criticism will continue.”
The big picture: Trump is alienating national security policymakers who prefer to stay out of politics. In defense of their agencies and livelihoods, former CIA, Pentagon, and State officials are going public. This is not the first time disputes in the deep state agencies have gone public. In 2015, more than 50 intelligence analysts complained that their reports on ISIS and al-Qaeda were being altered by senior officials in order to support Obama’s policies. But those critics did not question Obama’s fitness for office. Brennan and McRaven do.
Postscript: Listen to McRaven’s advice to the University of Texas Class of 2014. This is a man who wants things done by the book. The president does not. It may be that simple.
