OPINION
GUEST ESSAY
The Deeper Problem Behind General Milley’s
‘Secret Phone Calls’
Sept. 18,
2021
By Kori
Schake
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/18/opinion/politics/general-milley-woodward.html
Ms. Schake,
a foreign policy expert who worked for the National Security Council and the
State Department during George W. Bush’s administration, is the director of
foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute.
A new book
reports that Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
improperly restricted the president of the United States’ ability to use
military force and committed to warning China, an American adversary, of any
impending U.S. military action against it. If the book, “Peril,” by Bob
Woodward and Robert Costa, accurately recounts General Milley’s behavior, his
actions could be an egregious series of violations of the norms that govern
civil-military relations in the United States.
The context
surrounding General Milley’s actions is unclear and may be exculpating. For
example, while The Washington Post’s description of “a pair of secret phone
calls” suggests furtive behavior, Jennifer Griffin, a Fox News correspondent,
reports that there were 15 people on the calls, including State Department
representatives. It’s possible the calls were not secret from his civilian
superiors, but carried that classification because any conversation with a
foreign counterpart would. And the authors of “Peril” are unlikely to know
whether the Chinese general “took the chairman at his word,” although they
assert it.
There are
also other potential explanations for General Milley’s actions less salacious
than the Woodward and Costa telling accounts for. But the problem runs deeper
than the specifics of General Milley’s actions and signals trouble for the
relationship between our military and the civilians it is intended to serve.
A phone
call between General Milley and Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House, was
reported several months ago as General Milley explaining to the person second
in the line of succession to the presidency the legal procedures for the
president to initiate nuclear war, something valuable to reaffirm.
Though the
president is commander in chief, Congress also provides civilian control of the
military and requires every two-star general and above to commit to inform it
of concerns they have about executive branch actions. So General Milley
discussing the president’s soundness with the speaker of the House, while
unseemly, could be understood as fulfilling his constitutional responsibilities.
It is also
true that the U.S.-China military relationship is not well established, so it
would be sensible to minimize miscalculation by the Chinese military, which
probably poorly understands the American political process, in the confusion
following the events of Jan. 6.
Yet General
Milley’s actions apparently came as a surprise to at least some Trump
administration national security officials. Whether that’s indicative of a
clandestine move by the chairman or simply the routine dysfunction of an
administration that wasn’t well managed is difficult to assess. We may never
find out the full story: It’s unlikely that General Milley or other military
leaders would publicly rebut the account, since that would draw them further
into the glare of civilian politics.
But even if
the Woodward and Costa account sensationalizes General Milley’s actions, his
choices are problematic for civil-military relations. Account after account of
the Trump administration is rife with General Milley’s friends and colleagues
describing his conversations and ascribing the noblest of motives to him.
Either General Milley has the most indiscreet circle of acquaintances in
Washington or he’s authorizing it to reshape his image.
One can
sympathize with the general’s frustration of having as his legacy the image of
him striding through Lafayette Square in combat fatigues alongside a president
who is threatening to use the military against American citizens and still
think it’s unbecoming for the president’s senior military adviser to be so
actively working to cast himself as the savior of the Republic.
Nor is the
problem just optics. As Carrie Lee rightly assesses in The Washington Post,
General Milley talking up his role both damages the trust civilians have in the
military and encourages further politicization of the military itself.
Presidents believing the military is working against them or is incapable of
maintaining confidentiality will discredit the military’s advice. And future
military leaders with less noble motives will be less confined by the civil-military
norms that General Milley’s choices are weakening.
In 1974,
Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger instructed military leaders to check
with him or Secretary of State Henry Kissinger before executing a nuclear
launch order from President Nixon. The Costa and Woodward book compares General
Milley’s actions to that. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is not in
the chain of command, but in General Milley’s case, most of the civilian
control in the Pentagon was at that point unconfirmed — and probably
unconfirmable — by Congress.
Some argue
that military leaders interposing themselves between the president and a
politically motivated war is the least bad choice. Even in the extreme
circumstances of a wildly erratic president attempting to use the military to
prevent the succession of power, it’s dangerous to have military leaders
subvert civilian control of the military in the way a chairman of the Joint
Chiefs “pulling a Schlesinger” implies. An unsound president is a danger to
democracy, but a military that considers itself the arbiter of elected leaders’
lawful authorities is also a danger to democracy.
America’s
uniformed leaders did an outstanding job ensuring that our military kept out of
politics during and after a contested election. They deserve enormous credit
for that professionalism and service to the nation. They’d deserve even more
credit if they’d stop publicizing it.
Kori Schake
is the director of foreign and defense policy studies at the American
Enterprise Institute.
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