A former longtime CIA officer who served for decades, including in the Middle East with the clandestine service, says that Donald Trump knew about Russia paying the Taliban to kill American soldiers and did nothing.
Trump has yet to condemn Russia for paying the bounties, choosing to ignore this serious attack upon our military and violation of our national security in favor of whining about his critics and threatening schools if they don’t reopen instead.
In fact, rather than condemn Russia, Trump has spent his time appeasing Putin by inviting him to the G-7 summit and ordering a troop withdrawal from Germany. Of course, Trump has repeatedly denied that he was ever briefed on the bounties, but former intelligence officials and a former State Department official have stated otherwise.
Douglas London is a former CIA senior operations officer who left the agency in 2018, and he also concurs that Trump likely knew.
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“Yes, he was most certainly aware of Russian assistance to the Taliban. Despite that knowledge, he chose to do nothing,” London wrote in a recent op-ed in the New York Times.
London explained that intelligence briefings would not use the word “bounties,” which is why Trump is claiming that he hasn’t been briefed on bounties. But the briefing would likely use terms like “payments” and “financial incentives” which mean basically the same thing. Either way, Trump likely knew based on a briefing back in February, as London explained during an interview on MSNBC.
“I wouldn’t necessarily expect the president to be forthcoming,” London began. “It’s not really something he’s demonstrated particularly in terms of intelligence.”
“It’s without doubt that the president was kept informed,” London continued. “He was regularly briefed on these issues and if you recall, the president had to make a consequential decision in February to allow Secretary of State Pompeo to sign the February 29th agreement with the Taliban concerning withdrawal. Now, according to the press, the president’s daily brief that contained information which specifically spoke to Russia giving incentives and financing to the Taliban for the purpose of operations against US Forces was in that brief on February 27th. So, it has been integrated in his information on Afghanistan and our path forward.”
Here’s the video:
There’s no way Trump would not have known about these bounties unless he completely failed to read the briefings or refused to let anyone brief him verbally. So, he’s either incompetent and reckless, or he absolutely knew and just did not give a damn that Russia has been paying the Taliban to kill our men and women in uniform. Either way, it’s scandalous and should sink his re-election chances. Because Americans want a president who will defend our troops, not one who lets them die to please a foreign dictator.
Featured image via Flickr/Gage Skidmore, under Creative Commons license 2.0
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