OPINION:
National Security Adviser John R. Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are patriots.
But unlike President Trump, they are way too disposed to deploying American soldiers, guns and bombs to make the world over in our image.
There is a case to be made for the explicitly anti-interventionist Mr. Trump surrounding himself with compulsive pugilists. Remember when he said he had opposed our going to war with Iraq as the stupid mistake that it in truth was.
There’s one upside of Mr. Trump’s putting in key positions men whose mindset is to bomb anything that moves and anything that doesn’t move.
It has the potential to instill something in the strongmen leaders of foreign governments that treat citizens’ dissent as a capital crime. that something is caution about threatening the United States military.
These foreign tough guys see a need to tweak Uncle Sam’s mustache (OK, I don’t actually remember if he has one) to show off to their own beard-and-mustache homeboys.
It’s a constituency that’s forever rooster-proud yet insecure about its masculinity.
There are also clustered around Mr. Trump trusted aides those who are as skeptical of military intervention and regime change as their boss is.
These trusted aides are acutely aware that the United States, despite its unmatched military might, hasn’t won a war since 1945. If these Trump aides don’t do daily battle with the Bolton-Pompeo interventionist mindset, then they’re not doing their job.
And it’s the president’s job to pretend there’s no such internecine warfare inside his castle.
“There is no infighting whatsoever,” Mr. Trump said in a Wednesday tweet. “Different opinions are expressed, and I make a decisive and simple decision — it’s a very simple process. All sides, views, and policies are covered.”
So far so good, Mr. President
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