What President Trump seems to value most is sycophantic loyalty not to the nation but to himself, a quality that's the most essential aspect of any cult of personality. Which means one thing: outright dissent of any real sort inside the administration is a thing of the past (an autocratic mood that could, sooner or later, spread to the larger society). What did McMaster and Tillerson ultimately have in common? Simply put, both attempted to restrain Trump's more extreme impulses and neither truly clicked with the president on a personal level. Big mistake. What this president wants above all else isn't critical thinking or informed debate on crucial issues but total allegiance.
The defining characteristics of this White House are nepotism and sycophancy. John Bolton is never going to temper Trump's most bellicose instincts and Pompeo is already a Trump sycophant. When defending Pompeo's appointment, Trump's two main arguments were that he was a West Point graduate and that they are "always on the same wavelength." It's been widely reported that the two men have hit it off on a personal and professional level, as Pompeo personally delivered daily oral CIA intel briefs in the Oval Office (since Trump loathes reading). Pompeo grasped just how to get what he wanted in such a situation: stay in the boss's good graces. Mind-melding with the president is the path to promotion in this administration.
As America enters the second spring of the Trump era, it's creeping ever closer to yet more war. McMaster and Mattis may have written the National Defense Strategy that over-hyped the threats on this planet, but Bolton and Pompeo will have the opportunity to address these inflated threats in the worst way possible: by force of arms.
Trump finally has the minions he wants: devoted and fervently militaristic.
And while the public remains focused on the man's outlandish shenanigans, his team will be cooking up something far worse: a new war to put all the others to shame.
Major Danny Sjursen, a TomDispatch regular, is a U.S. Army officer and former history instructor at West Point. He served tours with reconnaissance units in Iraq and Afghanistan. He has written a memoir and critical analysis of the Iraq War, Ghost Riders of Baghdad: Soldiers, Civilians, and the Myth of the Surge. He lives with his wife and four sons in Lawrence, Kansas. Follow him on Twitter at @SkepticalVet and check out his new podcast Fortress on a Hill, co-hosted with fellow vet Chris 'Henri' Henriksen.
[The views expressed in this article are those of the author, expressed in an unofficial capacity, and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.]
Follow TomDispatch on Twitter and join us on Facebook. Check out the newest Dispatch Book, Alfred McCoy's In the Shadows of the American Century: The Rise and Decline of U.S. Global Power, as well as John Dower's The Violent American Century: War and Terror Since World War II, John Feffer's dystopian novel Splinterlands, Nick Turse's Next Time They'll Come to Count the Dead, and Tom Engelhardt's Shadow Government: Surveillance, Secret Wars, and a Global Security State in a Single-Superpower World.
Copyright 2018 Danny Sjursen
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
1
1
1
