The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir

by John Bolton

Dunford further explained the need to maintain a counterterrorism presence for the broader region. As he launched into his charts and slides to show how our ongoing Afghan operations would be staffed and costed, Trump said, “There are still a lot of people there,” but fortunately he went on to say, “Having no one is dangerous, because they [the terrorists] tend to form there and knock down buildings,” which was exactly the point. Trump repeated one of his hobbyhorses, namely that it was cheaper to rebuild the World Trade Center than to fight in Afghanistan, inconveniently ignoring the loss of life in the 9/11 attacks, not just the cost of rebuilding. It also ignored the reality that a Trump withdrawal, followed by a terrorist attack, would be devastating politically. Dunford pressed on, saying our military pressure kept the terrorists from reconstituting and was like an insurance policy. He had no precise timetable in mind, but the Pentagon would allow the diplomatic reconciliation process to set the timing. I thought we were approaching dangerous ground here, again opening the question of whether we should be in Afghanistan at all. The discussion meandered around for a while, with Trump asking me why we were fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan but not Venezuela, which at least showed everyone else in the room what he really wanted to do.