SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
from the the-enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend dept.
Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
The view among the national security officials was unanimous: Military aid to Ukraine should not be stopped. But the White House's acting chief of staff thought otherwise.
That was the testimony of Laura Cooper, a Defense Department official, whose deposition was released Monday in the House impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump.
"My sense is that all of the senior leaders of the US national security departments and agencies were all unified in their - in their view that this assistance was essential," she said. "And they were trying to find ways to engage the president on this."
Cooper's testimony was among several hundred pages of transcripts released Monday, along with those of State Department officials Catherine Croft and Christopher Anderson.
Cooper told investigators that, in a series of July meetings at the White House, she came to understand that Trump's acting chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, was holding up the military aid for the US ally.
[...] When she and others tried to get an explanation, they found none.
[...] She said it was "unusual" to have congressional funds suddenly halted that way, and aides raised concerns about the legality of it. The Pentagon was "concerned" about the hold-up of funds and "any signal that we would send to Ukraine about a wavering in our commitment", she said.
Cooper told investigators that she was visited in August by Kurt Volker, the US special envoy to Ukraine, who explained there was a "statement" that the Ukraine government could make to get the security money flowing.
[...] "Somehow, an effort that he was engaged in to see if there was a statement that the government of Ukraine would make," said Cooper, an assistant defence secretary, "that would somehow disavow any interference in US elections and would commit to the prosecution of any individuals involved in election interference."
For a handy reference to the documents that have been released concerning this, npr has posted Trump Impeachment Inquiry: A Guide To Key People, Facts And Documents:
Written words are central to the Ukraine affair. The significance of the whistleblower's original complaint and the White House's record of its call with Ukraine are debated, but the text is public. Here are the documents to refer to as the inquiry proceeds:
Texts and memos
- Call:The White House memorandum (Sept. 25)
- Aid:The Pentagon letter on military aid to Ukraine (Sept. 25)
- Complaint:The whistleblower complaint (Sept. 26)
- Texts:Batch of texts between diplomats released by House Democrats (Oct. 4)
The whistleblower's complaint has largely been corroborated by witness testimony, public statements and media reports. See how the document checks out — with a detailed annotation of the text.
Testimony released by Congress following closed depositions
- Christopher Anderson, former special adviser for Ukraine negotiations
- Laura Cooper,deputy defense secretary
- Catherine Croft, former Ukraine adviser on the National Security Council
- Fiona Hill, former White House adviser on Russia
- George Kent, deputy assistant secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs
- Michael McKinley, former State Department adviser
- Gordon Sondland,U.S. ambassador to EU
- William Taylor, acting U.S. ambassador to Ukraine
- Alexander Vindman, top Ukraine expert on the National Security Council
- Kurt Volker, former Ukraine envoy
- Marie Yovanovitch, ex-U.S. ambassador to Ukraine
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 13 2019, @01:33PM (2 children)
I've also noted that the last two times we elected an R, we lost face in the international arena.
Its almost like Rs suck an international policy.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 13 2019, @02:15PM
I think you could leave it at every time we've elected a president in the past 4 decades or so we've lost face in the international arena. I think you're probably being overly influenced by media partisanship. Just look at Obama's presidency:
- North Korea became for more threatening, hostile, and capable.
- Bombed more nations than any president since WW2
- Started a new pointless proxy war, which we're losing, in Syria
- Fostered the emergence of ISIS and then flailed uselessly against them.
- Promised to shut down Guantanamo. It's still open. [If he want to believe he wasn't capable of acting, then he should not make promises he cannot possibly keep - same issue.]
- Passed laws regressing human and civil rights in America by decades. For instance his administration lobbed to ensure an indefinite detention law [wikipedia.org] (without charge, trial, or lawyer) could also be assayed upon US citizens.
- His "landmark environmental treaty" (as framed by the media) with China essentially said 'Feel free to pollute as you much until 2030, but then try to town it down.'
- Not only chose not to pursue justice against international bankers who crashed the world economy, but would then go on to accept $400k for 30 minute speeches from them after his presidency, repeatedly.
- And much much more. This isn't some copy paste list - this is just stuff off the top of my head in about 30 seconds of thought.
Obama is not a good person and was not a good president. The big difference between him and other presidents is that he is also unbelievably charismatic and has an incredible gift for speech. Beyond that charisma he was also the first democratic president to win the presidency since the media started becoming, defacto, little more than a branch of the DNC. Both of this combined together to create a situation where his image and charisma were given far more weight than his actual outcomes.
No need to compare him to e.g. Bush. I'd fully agree that Bush was also awful, as well as Clinton. My point is that all of our representatives have become crap. The only issue is that the ~25% of the country that votes democrats puts on the blinders for a D while the other ~25% put on their blinders for an R.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 13 2019, @09:27PM
If you don't "lose face", you're almost certainly screwing up.
The objective is to win, putting America first. That is fundamentally incompatible with your emasculated notion of what it means to lose face.