by Bob Woodward
A staffer who sat in on several calls that Trump made to Gold Star families was struck with how much time and emotional energy Trump devoted to them. He had a copy of material from the deceased service member’s personnel file.
“I’m looking at his picture—such a beautiful boy,” Trump said in one call to family members. Where did he grow up? Where did he go to school? Why did he join the service?
“I’ve got the record here,” Trump said. “There are reports here that say how much he was loved. He was a great leader.”
Some in the Oval Office had copies of the service records. None of what Trump cited was there. He was just making it up. He knew what the families wanted to hear.
* * *
Whether the international order would have a footing in the new Trump administration was tested in the first month.
During the campaign, Trump disparaged the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the 68-year-old alliance with Europe. NATO is often considered the most successful effort to counter the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and a foundation of Western unity. The members pledged collective defense, meaning an attack on one would be considered an attack against all.
Trump had argued that NATO might be obsolete. Much of his criticism had to do with money. NATO’s goal was for each member nation eventually to spend 2 percent of its GDP on defense. The United States spent 3.5 percent of its GDP, while Germany spent only 1.2 percent.
Secretary of Defense Mattis had a speech coming up in Munich, Germany, in mid-February, and the administration’s NATO policy needed to be settled by then. Was Trump in or out?
As a private citizen Mattis had blasted Trump’s anti-NATO ideas as “kooky.” Much of the foreign policy establishment as well as European allies had been unnerved by Trump’s comments.
Priebus arranged a 6:30 p.m. dinner for Wednesday, February 8, in the Red Room of the residence so Trump could hear arguments from Mattis, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Joseph Dunford and several others. He also invited a pillar of the Washington Republican establishment, C. Boyden Gray. Gray, 73, had most recently been the U.S. ambassador to the European Union for two years in the administration of President George W. Bush. He had been legal consigliere to George H. W. Bush during the eight years Bush had been vice president and four years as president.
As they sat down to dinner, Trump wanted to gossip about the news of the day. Senator John McCain, displaying his maverick credentials, had publicly criticized the U.S. military raid in Yemen.
Trump lashed out, suggesting that McCain had taken the coward’s way out of Vietnam as a prisoner of war. He said that as a Navy pilot during the Vietnam War McCain, whose father was Admiral John McCain, the Pacific commander, had been offered and taken early release, leaving other POWs behind.
“No, Mr. President,” Mattis said quickly, “I think you’ve got it reversed.” McCain had turned down early release and been brutally tortured and held five years in the Hanoi Hilton.
“Oh, okay,” Trump said.
Gray, who had served five years in the Marine Corps, was struck that the secretary corrected the president directly, and that Trump, known to bristle when challenged, would be so accepting.
It was not until the dessert course that Priebus finally said, “We’ve really got to deal with the NATO issue.”
Retired Lieutenant General Keith Kellogg, the National Security Council chief of staff, was representing the NSC. A combat veteran of Vietnam with Silver and Bronze Stars and the first Gulf War, Kellogg launched into a critique. Echoing some of Trump’s negative language, he said NATO was “obsolete” and set up after World War II when the United States was richer and facing an aggressive Soviet Union. Now, the cost to the United States was unfair and out of proportion with European allies. The United States was being used.
“Those wouldn’t be my views, Mr. President,” said General Joseph Dunford.
“Oh, really?” Trump interjected. “What would your views be?”
Dunford, the top military man, offered a spirited defense. It’s an alliance that shouldn’t be disbanded, and it would be hard to put it back together, he said. With Eastern European nations such as Poland feeling threatened by Putin’s invasions in Crimea and eastern Ukraine, it was important to maintain solidarity and unity. “It’s terribly important to keep Europe united politically, strategically and economically.” He agreed that the member nations should meet their commitment to 2 percent of their annual GDP.
I think the Germans will make good on their commitment to pay 2 percent of GDP, and they are the most important, Mattis added.
Jared Kushner jumped in. “As a percentage of our own defense budget the shortfall is really small,” he said. “Pennies on the dollar.”
Priebus cautioned that the 2 percent was not an obligation but a recent agreement that all the NATO countries would strive to get there by 2024. This was not a payment to NATO but a commitment to defense spending.
“But it is a political problem when your allies don’t pay their fair share,” Trump said. He would make his case on fairness, and he kept returning to that theme. Why should the United States pay for the European defense?
Priebus realized that the president didn’t care that it was a goal, not an obligation. Trump cared that he could sell it and try to win over public opinion.
“I don’t care if it’s a goal or not,” Trump finally said. “It’s what they should do.”
Boyden Gray pointed out that Europe had lots of economic problems. “Not that we don’t, but theirs are worse.” The countries need to grow their economies more. “Part of the reason they don’t pay is because they’re not growing fast enough.”
“Are you saying they can’t pay?” Trump asked.
“No,” Gray said. But the United States should help Europe with their anemic economic growth rate. European business culture largely avoided taking risks.
“Which is going to be the next country to drop out?” Trump asked. Under the Brexit referendum, approved by British voters, Great Britain had to leave the European Union.
“I don’t think there will be another country to drop out,” Gray replied.
Trump said he agreed.
“If you didn’t have NATO, you would have to invent it,” Mattis said. “There’s no way Russia could win a war if they took on NATO.”
By the end of the dinner, Trump seemed to be persuaded. “You can have your NATO,” he told Mattis. The administration would support the alliance, “but you become the rent collector.”
Mattis laughed. And then he nodded.
In his speech in Munich on February 15, Secretary Mattis found middle ground. “America will meet its responsibilities,” he said, but would “moderate” its commitment if the other NATO countries did not meet theirs. Nonetheless he said the alliance was a “fundamental bedrock” of U.S. policy.
At a news conference with the NATO secretary general two months later, Trump said, “I said it was obsolete. It is no longer obsolete.”
When Trump met the European leaders in May in Brussels, he castigated NATO countries for “chronic underpayments.” He said that “23 of the 28 member nations are still not paying what they should be paying and what they’re supposed to be paying for their defense.”
He made it clear that he was addressing the United States domestic audience. “This is not fair to the people and taxpayers of the United States.”
CHAPTER
10
What the hell! Priebus thought as he scanned a February 9 story in The Washington Post reporting that National Security Adviser Michael Flynn had discussed sanctions against Russia with the Russian ambassador before Trump was in office.
In one of his last acts as president, Obama had imposed sanctions on Russia on December 29 in retaliation for Russian meddling in the election. He expelled 35 suspected Russian spies and ordered the closure of two Russian-owned compounds in Maryland and New York believed to be involved in espionage.
Priebus had asked Flynn many t
imes about any discussions. Flynn had firmly denied discussing the sanctions with Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, the convivial man-about-town.
Two weeks earlier, on January 26, Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates had come to the White House. She told White House Counsel Donald McGahn that intercepts showed that Flynn had not been truthful about contacts with Russians and was worried that Flynn could be a blackmail target.
Flynn had denied discussing the sanctions at least 10 times, Priebus calculated.
The Post story, carrying the bylines of three of the paper’s experienced intelligence and national security reporters, stated “Nine current and former officials” were sources for their categorical assertion. Flynn had been interviewed by the reporters and had denied the allegations with a categorical “no” twice before backing away with a more fuzzy response. His spokesman was quoted: Flynn “couldn’t be certain that the topic never came up.”
Priebus tracked down White House Counsel McGahn, 48, who was an expert on campaign finance law and had served five years as a Republican-appointed member of the Federal Election Commission. Priebus asked him if they could get the transcripts of the conversations that Flynn had with the Russian ambassador.
Yes, McGahn said, of course. Soon he had the highly classified transcripts of three communications between Flynn and Kislyak that the FBI had intercepted during the routine monitoring of the Russian ambassador.
McGahn and Priebus were joined by Vice President Pence in the Situation Room to review the transcripts. Pence had backed Flynn’s denial publicly. According to a six-page internal White House Counsel’s Office memo, Flynn said if he and Kislyak discussed sanctions, “It was only because Kislyak brought it up. From the transcripts, Flynn had brought up the issue. McGahn and Priebus agree that Flynn has to be let go.”
In all three transcripts, Flynn and the ambassador discussed the sanctions. In the last call, initiated by Kislyak, the ambassador thanked Flynn for his advice on the sanctions, and said the Russians would follow it.
That nailed the story and it explained Putin’s curiously passive response to the sanctions. Normally the Russian president would be expected to retaliate, expelling some Americans from Russia. But the day after Obama announced the sanctions, Putin announced he would not.
President-elect Trump praised Putin, tweeting, “Great move on delay (by V. Putin)-I always knew he was very smart!”
The sequence suggested that Trump might have known of Flynn’s role. But it was unclear what Flynn had said to the president about his conversations with Kislyak.
Priebus told the president he would have to let Flynn go. Flynn’s security clearance might be pulled. The embarrassment would be significant.
Flynn’s resignation was announced on February 13. The chief reason offered publicly was that Flynn had lied to Vice President Pence. Trump told others in his administration that he let Flynn go because Flynn was not up to the job.
The next nine months were difficult for Flynn. He later pled guilty to one count of lying to the FBI.
Flynn told associates that he didn’t think he lied to the FBI when he was interviewed four days into the administration. The FBI agents had come to talk to him about matters other than Russia and he had not believed it was a formal interview.
Why did Flynn plead guilty? A range of possible offenses were being investigated, including his failure to report income from Turkey, report overseas contacts and to register as a lobbyist prior to joining the Trump administration.
Flynn told associates that his legal bills were astronomical, as were his son’s, who was also being investigated. A one-count guilty plea for lying seemed the only way out. His statement said, “I accept full responsibility for my actions,” and said he now had an “agreement to cooperate.” He denied that he had committed “treason,” an apparent denial that he had colluded with the Russians.
* * *
On Saturday, February 25, after five weeks in office, Mattis called a noon meeting at the secretary of defense’s residence at the Old Naval Observatory near the State Department. Attending were some foreign policy graybeards, retired General Anthony Zinni, several former ambassadors and some Mattis staff. Mattis had almost no furniture. They all sat around what looked like a government-issue dining room table. Mattis said he had showed up with four suitcases.
“You should see the SCIF I have,” he said. The Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility for securely discussing the most sensitive, Top Secret and Special Access Programs was upstairs. “I never have to leave. I can do all the work from here.”
President Trump is a good listener, Mattis said, as long as you don’t hit one of his third rails—immigration and the press are the two big ones. If you hit one, he is liable to go off on a tangent and not come back for a long time. “Secretaries of Defense don’t always get to choose the president they work for.”
Everyone laughed.
The subject of the meeting was the counter-ISIS plan that Trump wanted immediately. Fundamentally, Mattis said, we are doing things backwards. We are trying to devise a counter-ISIS strategy without any larger, broader Middle East strategy. Ideally we’d have the Middle East strategy and the ISIS piece would plug in underneath and support it. But the president’s tasking required ISIS first.
In the end the Combat ISIS strategy was a continuation of the strategy under Obama but with bombing and other authorities granted to the local commanders.
Mattis was worried about Iranian expansion. At one point he later referred to “those idiot raghead mullahs.”
* * *
Early one morning in February, a team of senior intelligence officials came to Priebus’s West Wing office to brief him on how to be alert to those who might seek to influence him improperly. It is a standard warning for those with the highest security clearances.
“Before we leave,” said Deputy FBI director Andrew McCabe, raising his hand, “I need five minutes with you alone in your office.”
What the hell is this? thought Priebus. He only recalled McCabe because he had met him several weeks earlier in the Situation Room.
Trump had raised hell about McCabe’s wife, Jill, a Democrat, during the campaign. She had received $675,288 for an unsuccessful 2015 campaign for the Virginia Senate from Governor Terry McAuliffe’s political action committee and the Virginia Democratic Party. McAuliffe was one of Bill and Hillary Clinton’s closest personal and political friends. He had been the top fundraiser for Bill Clinton’s reelection in 1996.
Trump had described the money as donations from Hillary. He had not let go of the issue, talking and tweeting about it later.
After the security briefing and everyone cleared out, McCabe shut the door to Priebus’s office. This is very weird, thought Priebus, who was standing by his desk.
“You know this story in The New York Times?” Priebus knew it all too well. McCabe was referring to a recent Times story of February 14 that stated, “Phone records and intercepted calls show that members of Donald J. Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and other Trump associates had repeated contacts with senior Russian intelligence officials in the year before the elections, according to four current and former American officials.”
The story was one of the first bombs to go off about alleged Trump-Russian connections after Flynn’s resignation.
“It’s total bullshit,” McCabe said. “It’s not true, and we want you to know that. It’s grossly overstated.”
Oh my God, thought Priebus.
“Andrew,” he said to the FBI deputy, “I’m getting killed.”
The story about Russia and election meddling seemed to be running 24/7 on cable news, driving Trump bananas and therefore driving Priebus bananas.
“This is crazy,” Trump had told Priebus. “We’ve got to stop it. We need to end the story.”
McCabe had just walked in with a big gift, a Valentine’s Day present. I’m going to be the hero of this entire West Wing, Priebus thought.
“Can you help me?” Priebus aske
d. “Could this knockdown of the story be made public?”
“Call me in a couple of hours,” McCabe said. “I will ask around and I’ll let you know. I’ll see what I can do.”
Priebus practically ran to report to Trump the good news that the FBI would soon be shooting down the Times story.
Two hours passed and no call from McCabe. Priebus called him.
“I’m sorry, I can’t,” McCabe said. “There’s nothing I can do about it. I tried, but if we start issuing comments on individual stories, we’ll be doing statements every three days.” The FBI could not become a clearinghouse for the accuracy of news stories. If the FBI tried to debunk certain stories, a failure to comment could be seen as a confirmation.
“Andrew, you’re the one that came to my office to tell me this is a BS story, and now you’re telling me there’s nothing you can do?”
McCabe said that was his position.
“This is insanity,” Priebus said. “What am I supposed to do? Just suffer, bleed out?”
“Give me a couple more hours.”
Nothing happened. No call from the FBI. Priebus tried to explain to Trump, who was waiting for a recanting. It was another reason for Trump to distrust and hate the FBI, a pernicious tease that left them dangling.
About a week later on February 24 CNN reported an exclusive: “FBI Refused White House Request to Knock Down Recent Trump-Russia Story.” Priebus was cast as trying to manipulate the FBI for political purposes.
The White House tried and failed to correct the story and show that McCabe had initiated the matter.
Four months later on June 8, Comey testified under oath publicly that the original New York Times story on the Trump campaign aides’ contacts with senior Russian intelligence officials “in the main was not true.”
CHAPTER
11
Trump needed a new national security adviser, and he wanted to act fast. He said he was getting killed in the media and was convinced a new person would erase the Flynn debacle.
