TRUMP CONTINUES TO PUT OUR TROOPS IN SERIOUS JEOPARDY

…The president in Iraq.

As usual, Trump showed the leaders of Iraq a lack of respect.

It was amazing how afraid our president was when he and the First Lady visited the US Troops in Iraq.  They visited the Al-Asad Air Base, which is located northwest of Ramadi, a city that the Islamic State captured before US-backed Iraqi forces retook the area.

After 2 years, this was the president’s visit to any deployed troops, anywhere.  As is the custom, these trips are shrouded in secrecy.  This followed months of public pressure for him to spend time with troops deployed to conflicts in the Middle East and Central Asia and it also occurred during the biggest week of turmoil that the Pentagon has faced during his presidency.

Trump was also scheduled to meet with Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi, but the meeting was canceled for some unknown reason.  This was the first time a visiting US president to a nation at war, that the president didn’t meet with the nation’s leaders.  It totally showed a lack of respect for that nation’s leadership.

Per Trump, on arriving at night in Iraq said: “I had concerns,” he told reporters. “Not for myself personally. I had concerns for the first lady, I will tell you. But if you would have seen what we had to go through in the darkened plane with all windows closed, with no lights anywhere. Pitch black. I’ve been on many airplanes. All types and shapes and sizes.”

“So did I have a concern?” he continued. “Yes, I had a concern.”

Yes, he was scared. 

Trump’s Defense Secretary Mattis had resigned in the wake of the Syria withdrawal decision, writing in his resignation letter that he and Trump disagree in their worldview and that the president’s policies threaten the alliance structure the United States helped construct in the aftermath of World War II.

Trump was furious with media coverage of Mattis’s resignation, aides said, and especially the notion of the defense secretary was serving as a human guard-rail protecting the country from the president’s impulses.

In response, Trump moved Sunday to remove him ahead of schedule, by the end of the year.  Of course, the gut-less president directed the Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to deliver the news to Mattis because the “You’re fired!” president never has the nerve to actually fire anyone himself. 

As usual with the president, in Iraq, he seemed to be more personally concerned, just for his own person than anyone else.

Obama had visited Afghanistan four times as president, most recently in 2014, and he had made a trip to Iraq shortly after his 2009 inauguration.

George W. Bush had made a surprise Thanksgiving visit to troops in Iraq after the invasion in 2003 and he traveled back three additional times as president.  

Bill Clinton visited troops in Bosnia in 1996 and spent Thanksgiving with troops in Kosovo in 1999, while George H.W. Bush spent Thanksgiving with service members in Saudi Arabia during Operation Desert Shield in 1990 and New Year’s with troops in Somalia in 1993.

In Iraq, the Trumps visited the uniformed service members at a base dining facility that was decorated for Christmas with foil balls, twinkling lights and snowmen made of stacked tires painted white.

Of course, the president stopped to sign several “Make America Great Again” hats that service members brought, and at one point he autographed an embroidered patch that read “TRUMP 2020.”

Trump stopped to talk football with a soldier from Georgia, discussing the Atlanta Falcons’ recent losses, and posed to take selfies with many troops. Kyu Lee said that after telling Trump that he was the chaplain for SEAL Team Five, the president responded strangely with: “Hey, in that case, let’s take a picture.”

Trump’s visit comes at a moment of pitched tension with the Defense Department that was very different from the feel-good atmosphere on base in Iraq.

Mattis had tendered his resignation over Trump’s decision to withdraw troops from Syria and for drawing down numbers in Afghanistan, but there were many other differences.

Mattis and other top advisers had cautioned Trump not to order a precipitous withdrawal from Syria, where the 2,000 U.S. troops enabled a Kurdish-led militia to roll back the self-declared caliphate of the Islamic State.

Despite declaring victory over ISIS, Trump later tweeted that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “very strongly informed me that he will eradicate whatever is left of ISIS in Syria.”  Trump always believes any statements from other strong national dictators.

The United States is currently engaged in peace talks with the hope of ending a long-running stalemate between a resurgent Taliban and Afghan government forces, which Washington backs.

But at the same time, Trump has also directed the Defense Department to withdraw nearly half of the more than 14,000 troops deployed to Afghanistan, US officials said last week, despite warnings from many of his senior advisers and military officials that the move would invite chaos and terrorism in the middle of the peace talks…?

Trump has described the US involvement in Afghanistan as a “complete waste” and vowed to bring home American troops. Top US officials have warned that absent a peace deal with the Taliban, Afghanistan could collapse and descend into further turmoil after a precipitous US withdrawal.

The Afghanistan withdrawal order came alongside Trump’s abrupt announcement that he would pull all of the 2,000 US troops from Syria.  This was another decision made against the counsel of his top advisers and without warning allies in the fight there against the Islamic State.

The president said, “We’re no longer the suckers, folks,” and warned that he was committed to drawing down the US military presence around the globe, even in instances in which his administration’s experts object.

At this time, Trump’s knee-jerk decision are putting our US troops in serious jeopardy, while he can just take his First Lady and Air Force One back to Washington DC.

Copyright G.Ater  2018