A Praetorian Guard?

Abstract:  This week President Trump announced he was returning troops from Syria.  Immediately following this announcement Secretary of Defense James Mattis announced his resignation in protest.  To the anti-Trump left (read:  Never-Trump Republicans, Democrats, and the media), Mattis is a hero.  Is a retired four-star general—US Marine, no less--serving as a political appointee demonstrating courage through such an action?  Or does his action demonstrate that unelected political forces can trump (pun intended) the essence of our Constitution?  Does Shakespeare’s line --“The lady doth protest too much, methinks"--from Hamlet (Act 3, Scene 2) apply to the current situation? This conversation between AM, IM, and Old Gadfly addresses these questions.

    

            Old Gadfly:  Gentlemen, do you recall Rome’s Praetorian Guard?

            AM:  Yes.  During the Roman Republic, Praetorians were elite military members from the Roman Imperial Army that provided security for the emperor, generals, and high-ranking officials.  Constantine the Great ultimately disbanded the Praetorian Guard when it began to interfere in Roman politics.

            IM:  Why is this relevant several centuries later?

            Old Gadfly:  Secretary of Defense James Mattis, a retired four-star general, announced his resignation in protest of the President’s decision to withdraw troops from Syria.

            IM:    Mattis disagreed with the decision and seems to be doing the honorable thing by vacating his position for another Secretary who is more aligned with the President’s views.

            Old Gadfly:  Trump’s views on Syria were well known before he was elected.  Let me emphasize “before he was elected.”  Mattis was invited by the President to serve in a “political appointment,” who’s loyalty is to the Constitution of the United States.  According to the Constitution, the President is the Commander-in-Chief and ultimately empowered with national security policy decisions.  Had the President advanced a policy that was illegal or unethical, Mattis would have justification for an honorable resignation but only insofar as he also made any illegal or unethical breach known in the process.  It is about time that we have an elected official in office that has the courage to make a decision that is not dictated to him by the Praetorian Guard.

            IM:    Your assessment seems harsh.  Trump’s expertise is in business, specifically property development.  Mattis spent over 40 years in national security.

            AM:   Don’t kid yourself, IM.  Mattis’ experience has been directing subordinates in a highly hierarchical organization with highly developed doctrines.  Trump operated in a highly competitive, non-hierarchical environment that required vision; pragmatic assessments of highly complex bureaucratic regulation, the competition, and resourcing; and highly developed negotiation skills to bring all the elements together to create things, not to destroy them.

            Old Gadfly:    Further, keep in mind Lieutenant General J. R. McMaster was the national security advisor during a time of extensive leaking to the press.  Since his departure, the pattern has ceased.

            AM:   Our last discussion, “Not Their First Rodeo,” talked about some of the political activity going on in the D.C. swamp.  Yet, it is amazing to learn even more from books like Secret Agenda:  Watergate, Deep Throat, and the CIA, by investigative journalist Jim Hougan; and Silent Coup:  The Removal of a President, by investigative journalists Len Colodny and Robert Gettlin.  For example, “Deep Throat” a major source of leaked information to The Washington Post’s Bob Woodward, was derived from numerous interviews to be General Alexander Haig after he had replaced H. R. Haldeman as the Chief of Staff to President Nixon—a position from which four-star General Kelly will be leaving at the end of this year.  Ironically, buried by most historical accounts, Bob Woodward was a former Navy Lieutenant with a connection to Brigadier General Haig, when Haig was the Deputy National Security Advisor under Dr. Henry Kissinger.  This Woodward-Haig connection was directly related to what the authors of Silent Coup discovered as a military spy ring on behalf of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Thomas H. Moorer that was “spying” on the Nixon Administration.  To really drive home the relevancy of the Praetorian Guard notion is that one of the issues driving the “spying” was to manage Nixon’s intent to withdraw from Vietnam.  Other issues related to other foreign policy matters such as Nixon’s desire to open channels between China and the U.S.  If Moorer represented the prevailing sentiment among senior military officers, they had a different perspective on China and were posturing to surreptitiously influence policy making.  Sound familiar?

            IM:  Mattis did include his contrarian view on foreign alliances in his resignation letter.

            AM:  What we do not know is to what extent Trump has consulted with the leaders of Israel and Saudi Arabia in reaching his decision.  The calculus here might be pointing to an emerging alliance between Israel and Saudi Arabia as the center of gravity for security in the region to address issues on their terms.

            Old Gadfly:  So, perhaps what we see happening is the Praetorian Guard protecting the unelected political elite with whom they align.  Trump appears to recognize this and for now will stand firm on his instincts in loyalty to the Constitution and its expectations for presidential leadership.