Retired Gen. Mark Milley is afraid of retribution.
The former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a four-star Army general made no bones about his feelings about former President Donald Trump in the lead-up to the presidential election.
And he was equally clear about his own fears.
In a book “War” by The Washington Post’s Bob Woodward, Milley told Woodward he could be recalled to duty in the event of a Trump win to face a court-martial “for disloyalty,” the Post reported in October.
Now, what could make him think that?
Maybe because he told Woodward in a previous book, according to a Post report from September 2021, that he’d engaged in secret talks with his counterpart in the Chinese military — People’s Liberation Army Gen. Li Zuocheng — both immediately before and after the 2020 election.
“In the book’s account, Milley went so far as to pledge he would alert his counterpart in the event of a U.S. attack, stressing the rapport they’d established through a backchannel,” the Post reported.
Trump’s reaction was explosive.
In a statement, he called Milley a “dumba**” and said if the story is true “then I assume he would be tried for TREASON in that he would have been dealing with his Chinese counterpart behind the President’s back and telling China that he would be giving them notification ‘of an attack.’”
WARNING: The following post contains language that may offend some readers.
Trump reacts by calling Gen. Milley a “dumbass,” suggests action “be taken immediately” against the chairman of the joint chiefs and denies ever planning to attack #China. pic.twitter.com/UwO87IYBvJ
— Steve Herman (@W7VOA) September 15, 2021
The book also recounted how, in the final months of the Trump administration, Milley had set up an informal chain of command, essentially subverting the Constitution and its civilian control over the military.
In Woodward’s latest book, according to the Post, Milley also called Trump “fascist to the core” and “the most dangerous person to this country.”
Should Mark Milley be court-martialed?
All that proves is that Milley’s political judgment is as bad as the military record he established during the Biden administration, when he was in charge of the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.
This is the same military mind that assured American lawmakers in February 2022 that the Russian military could invade and defeat Ukraine “in 72 hours.”
That meant he thought it would be over in three days. Careful readers might note that almost three years later, the Russian military has definitely not conquered Ukraine.
Yet he fears a court-martial “for disloyalty”? Maybe incompetence, ineptitude and colossally poor judgment might be easier to prove. (Trump has made his feelings about Milley’s professional abilities abundantly clear.)
Still, the odds of the general being recalled to duty to face a court-martial are low. Reporting on Woodward’s book, The Guardian reported that is has “only been done a few times in American history and for very serious crimes.”
But there’s a very real retribution Milley should be worried about, and that’s the judgment of history.
Overseeing the most humiliating American moment on the world stage since the fall of Saigon — a moment that inspired the United States’ worst enemies — will leave a stain on his memory.
And in bringing Trump back to office in the Nov. 5 election, American voters have rendered their judgment about the present.
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