Peril

by Bob Woodward

The Chinese already were on high alert about U.S. intentions. On October 30, four days before the presidential election, sensitive intelligence showed that the Chinese believed the U.S. was plotting to secretly attack them. The Chinese thought that Trump in desperation would create a crisis, present himself as the savior, and use the gambit to win reelection.

Milley knew the Chinese assertion that the U.S. was planning a secret strike was preposterous. He had then called General Li on the same back channel to persuade the Chinese to cool down.

Milley had witnessed up close how Trump was routinely impulsive and unpredictable. Making matters even more dire, Milley was certain Trump had gone into a serious mental decline in the aftermath of the election, with Trump now all but manic, screaming at officials and constructing his own alternate reality about endless election conspiracies.

China was, by far, the most sensitive and dangerous relationship in American foreign policy. But U.S. intelligence showed the January 6 riot had not only stirred up China but caused Russia, Iran, as well as other nations to go on high alert to monitor the American military and political events in the United States.

“Half the world was friggin nervous,” Milley said. Many countries were ramping up their military operating tempo and cueing spy satellites. The Chinese already had their Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) satellites looking intently to see if the U.S. was doing anything erratic or unusual or preparing to conduct any kind of military operation.

“Aggressively watch everything, 360,” Milley said to Haspel. “Take nothing for granted right now. I just want to get through to the 20th at noon”—the inauguration of Joe Biden as president. Whatever happened, Milley was overseeing the mobilization of America’s national security state without the knowledge of the American people or the rest of the world.

Milley had misled General Li when he claimed that the United States was “100 percent steady” and the January 6 riot was just an example of a “sloppy” democracy. To the contrary, Milley believed January 6 was a planned, coordinated, synchronized attack on the very heart of American democracy, designed to overthrow the government to prevent the constitutional certification of a legitimate election won by Joe Biden.

It was indeed a coup attempt and nothing less than “treason,” he said, and Trump might still be looking for what Milley called a “Reichstag moment.” In 1933, Adolf Hitler had cemented absolute power for himself and the Nazi Party amid street terror and the burning of the Reichstag parliamentary building. Milley could not rule out that the January 6 assault, so unimagined and savage, could be a dress rehearsal for something larger as Trump publicly and privately clung to his belief that the election had b...

Unexpectedly, Milley’s executive officer came into the office and passed him a handwritten note: “Speaker Pelosi would like to speak to you ASAP. Topic: Succession. Twenty-fifth amendment.” Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, was second in line to succeed the president after the vice president and received detailed briefings on the command and control of U.S. nuclear weapons. The 34-year House veteran was steeped in all national security, military and intelligence matters.

“What precautions are available,” Pelosi asked, “to prevent an unstable president from initiating military hostilities or from accessing the launch codes and ordering a nuclear strike? “This situation of this unhinged president could not be more dangerous. We must do everything that we can to protect the American people from his unbalanced assault on our country and our democracy.”

“I can tell you that we have a lot of checks in the system,” Milley said. “And I can guarantee you, you can take it to the bank, that there’ll be, that the nuclear triggers are secure and we’re not going to do—we’re not going to allow anything crazy, illegal, immoral or unethical to happen.” “And how are you going to do that? Going to take the football away from him or whatever it is?” she asked.

“Well,” Milley said, “we have procedures. There are launch codes and procedures that are required to do that. And I can assure you, as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, I can assure you that will not happen.”

“The precautions are procedures that we have in place,” he said, “which require authentication, certification, and any instructions have to come from a competent authority and they have to be legal. And there has to be a logical rationale for any kind of use of nuclear weapon. Not just nuclear weapons, use of force. “So I can assure you that we have rock solid systems in place. That there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell this president, or any president can launch nuclear weapons illegally, immorally, unethically without proper certification from…” “And you said not only nuclear, but also use of force?” she asked. “Absolutely,” Milley said. “A lot of people are concerned about, and rightly so, concerned about a potential incident in say Iran. I’m watching

“This is one of those moments, Madam Speaker, where you’re going to have to trust me on this. I guarantee it. I’m giving you my word. I can’t say any of this publicly because I really don’t have the authorities and it would be misconstrued in 50 different directions, but I can assure you that the United States military is steady as a rock and we’re not going to do anything illegal, immoral or unethical with the use of force. We will not do it.”

Pelosi interjected. “But he just did something illegal, immoral and unethical and nobody stopped him. Nobody. Nobody at the White House. This escalated in the way it did because of the intent of the president. The president incited it and nobody in the White House did anything about it.

Nobody in the White House did anything to stop him.” “I’m not going to disagree with you,” Milley replied. “So you’re saying you’re going to make sure it doesn’t happen?” the speaker asked. “It already did happen. An assault on our democracy happened and nobody said, you can’t do that. Nobody.” “Well, Madam Speaker, the launching of nuclear weapons and the incitement of a riot…” “I know they’re different. Thank you very much. What I’m saying to you is that if they couldn’t even stop him from an assault on the Capitol, who even kn...

She continued, “Is there any reason to think that somebody, some voice of reason, could have weighed in with him? So for this, we are very, very affected by this. This is not an accident. This is not something that you go, well, now that’s done, let’s go from there. Let’s move on. It ain’t that. This is deep what he did. He traumatized the staff. He assaulted the Capitol and th...

“They put up this fraudulent—this uh—‘he says he doesn’t have anything to do with it’ video yesterday because they know they’re in trouble. This is bad, but who knows what he might do. He’s crazy. You know he’s crazy. He’s been crazy for a long time. So don’t say you don’t know what his state of mind is. He’s crazy and what he did yesterday is further evidence of his craziness. But anyway, I appreciate what you said.” “Madam Speaker,” Milley said. “I agree with you on everything.” “What can I tell my colleagues who are demanding answers about what is happening to deter him from engaging in launching any kind of initiation of hostilities in any way, in any way, and including taking his hand off that power?

“And the only way to do that is to get rid of him because there’s nobody around with any courage to stop him from storming the Capitol and inflaming, inciting an insurrection. And there he is, the president of the United States in there. And you’ve answered my question. Thank you, General. Thank you.” Pelosi paused and asked, “Is that fool at the Department of Defense, the acting Secretary, does he have any power in this regard? Is it worth any second even to call him?” “I agree 100 percent with everything you’ve said,” Milley replied. “The one thing I can guarantee is that as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, I want you to know that—I want you to know this in your heart of hearts, I can guarantee you 110 percent that the military, use of military power, whether it’s nuclear or a strike in a foreign country of any kind, we’re not going to do anything illegal or crazy.

“Well,” Pelosi asked, “what do you mean, illegal or crazy? Illegal by whose judgments of illegal? He already did a...

“Well,” she said, “I hope you can prevail in the insane snake pit of the Oval Office and the crazy family as well. You’d think there’d been an intervention by now. The Republicans have blood on their hands and everybody who enables him to do what he does has blood on their hands and the traumatic effect for our country. “And our young people who are idealistic and who work here, I will tell you the people on both sides of the aisle have been traumatized to the nth degree because this man is a nut and everybody knows it and nobody will act upon it. So we’ll just keep pushing for the 25th Amendment and for some Republican leadership to replace the president. “But it is a sad state of affairs for our country that we’ve been taken over by a dictator who used force against another branch of government. And he’s still sitting there. He should have

been arrested. He should have been arrested on the spot. He had a coup d’état against us so he can stay in office. There should be some way to remove him. But anyway, it’s no use wasting your time on this. I appreciate that. Thank you, General. Thank you.” “Madam Speaker, you have to take my word for it. I know the system and we’re okay. The president alone can order the use of nuclear weapons. But he doesn’t make the decision alone. One person can order it, several people have to launch it. “Thank you, Madam Speaker.”

Pelosi had a case, Milley realized. Her profound worries were well founded. Since the dawn of the nuclear age, the procedures, techniques, even the means and equipment, of controlling the possible use of the n...

As a practical matter, if a president was determined to use them, it is unlikely a team of lawyers or military officers would be able to stop him.

“Once in office, a president gains the absolute authority to start a nuclear war. Within minutes, Trump can unleash hundreds of atomic bombs, or just one. He does not need a second opinion.” Now, with Pelosi’s challenge and the clear alarm from China, Milley wanted to find a way to inject, if not require, that second opinion. He developed a phrase, what he called “the absolute darkest moment of theoretical possibility.”

There was a dark and theoretical possibility that President Trump could go rogue and order military action or the use of nuclear weapons, without going through the required procedures.

“Pentagon Kept Tight Rein in Last Days of Nixon Rule.” Schlesinger and General Brown feared Nixon might go around the chain of command and independently contact officers or a military unit to order a strike, putting the country and the world in jeopardy. They had been unwilling to take the risk. Milley saw alarming parallels between Nixon and Trump. In 1974, Nixon had grown increasingly irrational and isolated, drinking heavily, and, in despair, pounding the carpet in prayer with then Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

“If you get calls,” Milley said, “no matter who they’re from, there’s a process here, there’s a procedure. No matter what you’re told, you do the procedure. You do the process. And I’m part of that procedure. You’ve got to make sure that the right people are on the net.”

Milley noticed the news crawl on the television in his office tuned to CNN with the sound off: PELOSI SAYS SHE SPOKE TO JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN ON PREVENTING TRUMP FROM “INITIATING MILITARY HOSTILITIES” OR “ORDERING A NUCLEAR STRIKE.”

Milley was not going to allow an unstable commander in chief, who he believed had engaged in a treasonous violation of his oath, to use the military improperly.

Nearly four years earlier, Joe Biden was knocking around his beach house in Rehoboth, Delaware, the weekend of August 12, 2017, when he caught snatches of President Trump on television. The president was insisting the violent brawls between marching white supremacists and counter-protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia, were the fault of both sides.

Speaking before four American flags at his New Jersey golf club, Trump declared there was “hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides, on many sides.”

“What’s different about this moment in history is that the American people are going to have to stand up and defend the country’s values and the Constitution because they don’t have a president who is going to do it.” Biden had never seen anything like Trump’s response, maybe in his lifetime. The president of the United States had given moral equivalency to those who stand against hate and the haters—safe harbor for white supremacists and Nazis who were willing to come out in the open.

“Unprecedented,” he said, using one of his favorite words. “Trump is breathing life into kind of the darkest, worst impulses in the country.”

“They didn’t even bother to cover their faces!” Biden exclaimed. “The reasons they felt they could do it there was because they believed they had the presi...

Biden issued a tweet at 6:18 p.m. that Saturday: “There is only one side.” It was classic Biden—declarative and righteous. And it picked up some traction on social media. But it was hardly a sensation. A former vice president was a fading brand. Trump would not let go. On August 15, during a press conference at Trump Tower in New York, he maintained “there is blame on both sides” and there were “very fine people on both sides.”

Ryan’s main takeaway: Do not humiliate Trump in public. Humiliating a narcissist risked real danger, a frantic lashing out if he felt threatened or criticized.

“You’re the president of the United States. You have a moral leadership obligation to get this right and not declare there is a moral equivalency here.” “These people love me. These are my people,” Trump shot back. “I can’t backstab the people who support me.” There were white supremacists and Nazis in Charlottesville, Ryan said. “Well, yeah, there’s some bad people,” Trump said. “I get that. I’m not for that. I’m against all that. But there’s some of those people who are for me. Some of them are good people.”

Biden’s 2008 failure offered a consolation prize: then Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, soon to be the nation’s first Black president, picked him to be his running mate. He gave Biden important roles in foreign policy and budget negotiations, seemingly setting up Biden for his clearest shot at making another run for the presidency.

Trump had weathered a real threat to his presidency. He told Woodward in a taped interview, “The beautiful thing is, it all evaporated. It ended in a whimper. It was pretty amazing. It ended in dust.”

“If we give Donald Trump eight years in the White House, he will forever and fundamentally alter the character of this nation. Who we are. And I cannot stand by and watch that happen.”

“Welcome to the race Sleepy Joe,” Trump said on Twitter. “I only hope you have the intelligence, long in doubt, to wage a successful primary campaign. It will be nasty—you will be dealing with people who truly have some very sick & demented ideas. But if you make it, I will see you at the Starting Gate!”

“Just be yourself,” Speaker Pelosi told him at the funeral service for Maryland congressman Elijah Cummings in October. “Do so in a way that shows your authenticity. After all is said and done, that’s what people want to see. The sincerity. The genuineness.”

“You know,” Pelosi added, “these young people now, they have a smaller attention span. So, we all have to be briefer in how we speak.”

“I’ll be honest with you, I think it’s a terrible group of candidates,” Trump said. “It’s an embarrassment. I’m embarrassed by the Democratic candidates. I may have to run against one, and who knows? It’s an election. And I’m looking pretty good right now.”

That January, news of a virulent virus emerged from China. On January 23, China locked down Wuhan, one of its most populated cities, and restricted its population of 11 million people to their homes to control the outbreak. Blinken told Biden a global health emergency could explode, perhaps into a pandemic. He urged Biden to speak out on it.

It ran on January 27. The headline: “Trump Is Worst Possible Leader to Deal with Coronavirus Outbreak.” Biden blasted Trump for tweeting “it will all work out well” and for proposing “draconian cuts” to the CDC and the National Institutes of Health. He pledged, if

Cut off travel from China to the United States. A major health crisis was coming, Pottinger said, that could resemble the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 that killed an estimated 675,000 Americans.

Three days later, Trump curtailed travel with China, but the president remained distracted. There was the upcoming Super Bowl, the Democratic presidential field, his State of the Union address—and his Senate impeachment trial.

At the heart of the trial was Trump’s angst about Biden. Trump publicly dismissed Biden, but he and his senior advisers knew Biden, unlike Hillary Clinton, ...