Today's D Brief: Milley looks ahead; New ‘Anti-China alliance’; US drawing down in Iraq; Havana syndrome latest; And a bit more.
By Ben Watson
September 17, 2021
The D Brief
Joint Chiefs Chairman Army Gen. Mark Milley says there was nothing perilous about those phone calls to his Chinese counterpart in the last days of the Trump administration—calls that were made public this week (see CNN and the Washington Post, e.g.) by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa as they promoted their new book, “Peril.”
Just now catching up? “The new book says Milley, fearful of Trump’s actions late in his term, twice called his Chinese counterpart to assure him that the U.S. was not going to attack China,” the Associated Press reminds us. “One call took place on Oct. 30, four days before the American election. The second call was on Jan. 8, less than two weeks before Biden’s inauguration and two days after the insurrection at the Capitol by supporters of Trump.”
Milley: The calls were “routine” and meant “to reassure both allies and adversaries in this case in order to ensure strategic stability,” the Joint Chiefs Chairman told Lita Baldor of the Associated Press and Gordon Lubold of the Wall Street Journal. He didn’t elaborate a great deal further, but said he certainly expects he will be asked to in an upcoming hearing on Capitol Hill scheduled for Sept. 28.
https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2021/09/the-d-brief-september-17-2021/185421/
