Weekly Mind Dump: Trump Returns to Pandora's Box for His National Security Picks

Trump's choices to lead national security could populate a B-grade Halloween horror flick.

c/o Sofia Wellman

Week of 12/8-12/14, 2024:

The old saw that “personnel is policy” couldn’t be more true with the forming Trump administration. Team Trump has again pried open the weighty lid off Pandora’s Box in search of beings to manage our government. Based on his choices to lead national security, you will be well justified in losing sleep over the next four years-plus. Either Trump is making his selections from a list provided by Vladimir Putin aimed at destroying the U.S. national security structure as well as democratic governance, or the president-elect’s runaway paranoia combined with his terminal stupidity is such that he, Nero-like, merely wishes to burn it all down for his own amusement pleasure.

Trump’s Scream Team thus far:

Kash Patel/FBI: if anyone more resembles a noxious character from a B-grade horror flick, it’s Kash Patel with his buggy eyes and madman’s visage. He, of course, is Trump’s choice to lead the FBI, about which he has said this to endear himself to its 30,000 employees: “The biggest problem the FBI has had, has come out of its intel shops. I’d break that component out of it. I’d shut down the FBI Hoover building on day one and reopen it the next day as a museum of the deep state.” He’s also vowed to drive all 7,000 headquarters employees into the hinterland — sort of like Mao Zedong did during his catastrophic Great Leap Forward. These would include special agents who focus on terrorism and foreign espionage, particularly by Russia and China. (See my article, “Is U.S. Counterintelligence Up to the Task of Protecting America’s Secrets?” in the Washington Monthly.)

The House Committee on Homeland Security reports that “from February 2021 to August 2024, there have been over 55 CCP (Chinese Communist Party)-related espionage cases in 20 states including the transmission of sensitive military information, the stealing of trade secrets, the execution of transnational repression schemes, and the obstruction of justice.” According to the FBI, about 80 percent of economic espionage prosecutions are connected with China. FBI Director Wray has testified that the FBI opens new cases to counter Chinese intelligence operations roughly every 12 hours.

While serving in the NSC during Trump’s first term, Patel presented himself, falsely, as a Ukraine expert to the president and fed him disinformation that led to Trump’s impeachment-prompting attempt to extort Ukrainian president Zelensky. He also nearly botched a sensitive hostage rescue raid, according to former defense secretary Mark Esper.

What better measure than to shut down the FBI’s intel shop and reassign its counterintelligence agents to chase bank robbers in Kansas City?

Tulsi Gabbard/DNI: after Donald Trump, the next MAGA wingnut I’d wager was definitely on Putin’s payroll is Gabbard, who blames Biden — not Vladimir Putin — for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and has demanded the United States cut off military aid to Kyiv. She has also falsely declared the U.S. had established biological weapons laboratories in Ukraine — parroting fake Russian propaganda. Her statements eerily copycat the Kremlin’s talking points. Add to this her two unsanctioned visits as a single-term congresswoman to visit now deposed Syrian dictator and Russia ally Bashar al-Assad, whom she praised and denied was guilty of gassing thousands of his people. She has also defended Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, charged with carrying out two of the biggest leaks of intelligence secrets in U.S. history.

“I think she’s a serious threat to our national security,” stated John Bolton, who served as Trump’s national security advisor during his first term. “Her judgment is nonexistent.” Senator Susan Collins said, “That’s a nominee that illustrates the importance of a full background check.”

Gabbard is a real life example of putting the fox in the hen house. Should she be confirmed, Russia’s SVR and GRU intel services would break open their stolen bottles of Ukrainian sparkling wine in celebration. Russian pundits have actually called her “our girlfriend” and “our agent.”

John Ratcliffe/CIA: Ratcliffe briefly served as Trump’s DNI in his first administration. A three-term congressman from eastern Texas and a former federal prosecutor, Ratcliffe was caught having padded his résumé with false achievements of fighting terrorism and rounding up hundreds of undocumented immigrants.

According to former acting CIA director Michael Morell, Ratcliffe possessed “the least national security experience and the most partisan political experience of any previous director of national intelligence.” Ratcliffe propagated the ludicrous conspiracy theory that “there may have been a secret society of folks within the Department of Justice and the FBI” who were working to prevent Trump from becoming president.

Perhaps he gained some respect for the intelligence community and learned something as DNI. I, however, wouldn’t count on it.

Richard Grenell/“Presidential Envoy for Special Missions”: After Patel, Grenell probably epitomizes more than others full-on MAGA madness. His Trumpist antics as U.S. ambassador to Germany during Trump 1.0 made him a pariah in Berlin. He so offended Germans with his abrasive behavior and interference in German internal politics that there was a move in the Bundestag to get him expelled from the country.

During his very brief stint as Trump’s acting DNI, Grennell took on Kash Patel as “senior advisor.” Grennell also dismissed solid veteran intel professionals, continuing Trump’s purge of qualified and experienced IC officials.

As the president’s special envoy, foreign officials will either run for the exits before his arrival in their capitals, or take copious amounts of Xanax in preparation.

Mike Huckabee/Ambassador to Israel: Asked about Israel’s policies toward the Palestinians, the former Arkansas governor replied, “There’s no such thing as a settlement. They’re communities, they’re neighborhoods, they’re cities. There’s no such thing as an occupation.” And “I think Israel has title deed to Judea and Samaria,” using the biblical terms for the West Bank. “We’re not dealing with an issue that is political, social, economic, or geographical,” Huckabee said on a trip to Israel last year. “We’re dealing with an issue that is spiritual.” You see, Huckabee is a Christian fundamentalist. To them the Holy Land is central to their own spiritual destiny for they believe that if there is no Israel, the metaphysical feng shui is not in place for the return of Christ and the “rapture.”

History, of course, has shown that nothing works better for a nation’s foreign policy than to base it all on one party’s holy book (viz. Iran). Oh, did I fail to mention that the former governor has zero diplomatic experience? What could go wrong in the most volatile corner of the globe?

The Others: There are other shining lights Trump is appointing, e.g., Amaryllis Fox Kennedy, RFK, Jr.’s daughter-in-law whom Trump wants to make deputy director of the CIA. She actually served in the agency — for all of eight years, claiming to have been a NOC (non-official cover) officer. In keeping with Trump insanity, Fox Kennedy has charged U.S. “war hawks and bankers” with supporting Ukraine in order to plunder $11 billion worth of minerals buried beneath Donbas. RFK Jr. has been telling people that Fox Kennedy would help get to the bottom of the JFK assassination, which RFK Jr. believes was carried out by the CIA. Another is Massad Boulos as Middle East envoy. Boulos is a small-time truck salesman and father-in-law of Tiffany Trump. His qualifications: a Christian from northern Lebanon who emigrated to Texas as a teenager. And, not least, Trump’s choice to be the next U.S. ambassador to NATO ally Greece, Kimberly Guilfoyle — Don Jr.’s ex-girlfriend, who once described the Greeks as “freeloaders” who should be punished after rejecting a bailout from the EU. She also likes to cavort in the nude and show photos of the genitalia of men she’s had sex with. Charles Kushner, Jared’s father, a convicted felon sentenced to two years in prison on 18 counts as U.S. ambassador to France. Adam Boehler, Jared Kushner’s college roommate as special presidential envoy for hostage affairs (right again! he possesses no relevant experience).

More of Trump’s “best people.”

Senator Marco Rubio has plenty of relevant political and foreign policy experience to be secretary of state. Trouble is, he checked his manhood at the door, along with his pride and dignity, years ago after being publicly humiliated by Trump. Just how much initiative, vision and trust can he project in an administration manned by cranks and dimwits pursuing Daliesque policies? Not to mention with plummeting morale among career diplomats who are scorned and marginalized by the MAGA mob.

And, of course, there’s the honorable Pete Hegseth to be defense secretary. What more can be said of an alcoholic Fox host hack credibly charged with sexual assault with precious little relevant work experience and having bankrupted two veterans non-profits?

Personnel is indeed policy. And when the stakes — in this case, U.S. national security — are extremely high, expect the worst as the shots are called by people who wouldn’t qualify for a security clearance were they ordinary job applicants, whose mental states are questionable and who lack any sense of ethics and moral behavior.

I wrote about the consequences years ago in POLITICO Magazine — see: “Why Does America Send So Many Stupid, Unqualified Hacks Overseas?” and “Russian Diplomats Are Eating America’s Lunch,” which compared Russia’s nearly 100 percent career diplomat ambassadors with ours, heavily populated with unqualified campaign donors and political cronies. The prestigious Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO) was so impressed with it that they printed it in Russian translation in their premier journal. I didn’t know whether to be flattered or embarrassed.

In any case, idiotic choices to run our national security will yield only idiotic outcomes. And the whole country will suffer for it.

The opinions and characterizations in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily represent official positions of the U.S. government.