Peril

by Bob Woodward

making the president the commander in chief of the military, a tremendous concentration of power in one person, the Constitution gave the president the authority single-handedly to employ the armed forces as he chose.

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.

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.

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

“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.”

“The president’s going crazy. He thinks he made a mistake picking you because of what you’ve been saying. You said nice things about Bob Mueller.” At the White House, First Lady Melania Trump offered a contrary opinion to the president. “Are you crazy?” she asked her husband. “This guy’s right out of central casting. Look,” she pointed at Barr, “that’s an attorney general.” The contrast with the mousy Sessions was clear. Now Melania was speaking the language of the president, who put a premium on appearance. Barr, six feet and with an extraordinarily large belly, came across as the sober, knowledgeable lawyer, she said. Trump later told Barr of his wife’s remarks and how important they were to him. “You do come out of central casting.” He seemed to excuse Barr’s otherwise slothful appearance. Barr knew he came across as Big, with a powerful, confident voice. Trump, who was on the chunky side himself, said to Barr about his weight, “You hold it well, Bill. You carry it well. Be careful because if you lose too much weight, your skin is going to start becoming saggy.”

Longtime Biden aides like Secretary of State Blinken and chief of staff Klain knew Biden was determined to bring all the troops home. He had wanted out, ever since 2009 when he believed the military and then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had boxed in and overwhelmed President Obama in his first year. They insisted that Obama add tens of thousands of U.S. troops to the Afghanistan mission. Their resistance to any other option was so great, and often public, that Obama, who had little foreign policy or military experience, almost had no other choice. Robert Gates, President George W. Bush’s defense secretary whom Obama unexpectedly had asked to stay on, had hinted he might resign if Obama failed to approve more troops. Obama believed he could not afford to lose such an established national security figure. Blinken even had heard Biden privately say in 2009 that the United States had to accept a brutal civil war if U.S. troops withdrew. “How bad can that be?” Biden had asked. Pressed on whether a civil war would break out among the ethnic Pashtuns, who make up nearly half the Afghanistan population, Biden had almost jumped in his chair. “Bingo. Bingo, bingo, bingo!” he said confidently, grimly repeating one of his favorite expressions. Biden had made his opposition known at the time to Obama, as well as his disenchantment with how he believed the military had manipulated the president. Biden told others privately in 2009, “The military doesn’t fuck around with me,” more ...

Thus began, over the next two months, an extraordinary series of 25 NSC meetings, large group and small group, one-on-one meetings with Biden, and meetings with his top advisers and cabinet members. Separate meetings of the NSC deputies and principals also were held without Biden. It was one of the most wide-ranging policy reviews ever held. Emotional and contentious at times, the president seemed to want more certainty and clearer solutions than could be offered. Biden could be prickly and impatient. One top adviser found him almost impossible to work with, as Biden pressed for more detail and intelligence estimates. Others thought the review was a textbook example of how foreign policy decisions should be made. Biden’s primary argument, the one that

Milley spoke to the Joint Chiefs in the Tank about the issue of the president’s authority to make the final national security decisions. “Here’s some thoughts for us to think about as the senior leaders of the military,” Milley said. “You’re dealing with a president who was the vice president under Obama and the guys like Blinken and Sullivan and all these other guys. These guys were all in the second and third tier positions in the Obama administration. And all of them have a searing memory of the first year of Obama.” That was when the military and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton strong-armed Obama to send 30,000 more U.S. troops to the Afghanistan War. “I was a colonel at the time and Mullen was the chairman and I was in the basement. I was a witness to some of this. Admiral Mullen, McChrystal and Petraeus, the uniform guys, had tried to box in a president, a new, young president from Chicago that maybe, I can’t read minds, they thought they could take advantage of and box him in on a surge in Afghanistan. “Here’s what I take from that as Colonel Milley. Here’s a couple of rules of the road here that we’re going to follow. One is you never, ever ever box in a president of the United States. You always give him decision space. Number two, you don’t play cute and you don’t give your advice on the front page of The Washington Post. And you don’t, you damn sure don’t give it in speeches. You just don’t do that. You give candid, honest advice. You give it in private and y...

Five years ago, on March 31, 2016, when Trump was on the verge of winning the Republican presidential nomination, we worked together for the first time and interviewed Trump at his then unfinished Trump International Hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. That day, we recognized he was an extraordinary political force, in many ways right out of the American playbook. An outsider. Anti-establishment. A businessman. A builder. Bombastic. Confident. A fast-talking scrapper. But we also saw darkness. He could be petty. Cruel. Bored by American history and dismissive of governing traditions that had long guided elected leaders. Tantalized by the prospect of power. Eager to use fear to get his way. “Real power is—I don’t even want to use the word—fear,” Trump told us. “I bring rage out. I do bring rage out. I always have. I don’t know if that’s an asset or a liability, but whatever it is, I do.” Could Trump work his will again? Were there any limits to what he and his supporters might do to put him back in power? Peril remains.