#90- Perspective Lost: McMaster Out, Bolton In

On February 21, 2017, the day after President Trump announced the selection of Army Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster as his National Security Advisor, and less than one month into the Age of Trump, I said it was a win for all of us. 

I made that statement based on two early data points which had come out in the news. First, McMaster was well respected by individuals on both sides of the aisle, and second, because he had written a book for taking the military to task for aspects of its public posture during the Vietnam War, which, for those of us who grew up in the sixties, offered an honest perspective of history and with it, the hope they we might learn from our mistakes.

McMaster's work concluded that the Joint Chiefs had been so focused on their own self interests of their different services, that they never properly pressed their opposition to the gradual escalation strategy favored by President Johnson and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara.

Retired general David Petraeus would later bring the book to General Hugh H. Shelton when he was chairman of the Joint Chiefs in 1997. Shelton said “It is a valuable resource for leaders of any organization,’’ and made it required reading for all of his staff.
There are two take-a-ways here, the first that McMaster was thoughtful enough to study history and come to a different conclusion than the prevailing wisdom at the time.  The second was that others in our military understand the grave importance of learning from the mistakes of the past, so those mistakes are never repeated.

“Focused on their own self interests”.  Does that remind you of anyone?

Neither of these concepts appear to be part of the repertoire of John Bolton, Trump’s new replacement for National Security Adviser, fresh off another stint as a Fox News Commentator.

We don’t have to go back too far in time to recall that Bolton was a key part of the worst piece of calculus ever formulated in the history of our imperfect democracy.  No one was a louder proponent in the promotion of the invasion of Iraq under the biggest fake news story of the century, the search for the mythical Weapons of Mass Destruction.  Along with Cheney, and Rumsfeld, he concocted the story line that the Iraqis would welcome us with open arms and that US military involvement would be quick and easy.   Right, that worked out well, didn’t it?

It’s mind boggling to me that Bolton and men like him who effortlessly create false narratives to convince the masses and are then proven wrong, aren’t immediately relegated to the trash heap of time, but somehow, the imperfections in our democracy allow them to keep creeping back in.

No, the horrific choice of the Iraq invasion has not seemed to slow down Bolton in the least. Less than a month ago, Bolton made a case in the Wall Street Journal, for a pre-emptive attack on North Korea when he said that “it is perfectly legitimate for the United States to respond to the current ‘necessity’ posed by North Korea’s nuclear weapons by striking first.”  Even more noteworthy is that Bolton told Fox News earlier this month that (Trump’s) talks with North Korea would be worthless, and he has called South Korean leaders “putty in North Korea’s hands.”

The real problem is that a case for pre-emptive strike cannot be completely eliminated as a viable option, but when it’s the singular perspective of the boy who cried wolf one too many times and that boy is the National Security Advisor, we are left in a quandary.  We can never feel comfortable listening to this man. 

When Trump selected H.R McMaster to be his National Security Advisor a year ago, I said it was imperative that he listen to McMaster’s advice and I concluded with a warning, that It won't do anyone, any good, on any side of the aisle, if McMaster leaves the administration early and ends up going on to write a sequel to his first book, which was appropriately titled "Dereliction of Duty".

Now sadly, with McMaster’s early departure and the selection of Bolton as National Security Advisor, the odds for war and very possibly, nuclear war, have increased dramatically overnight.  Layer in Trump’s increasingly erratic behavior and his singular self-interest to be perceived as a “winner”, using any means necessary, and at any cost, and I now worry that my greatest fear will come to pass. 

The complete loss of perspective of our own President will lead to catastrophic losses for us all, not just in the United States, but around the world, and the, yet to be published, “Dereliction of Duty of Donald J. Trump” by HR McMaster will become the best read book of the new millennium, for those of us who are still around to read it.