Peril

I knew that Bob Woodward's Peril would be a great read even though there have already been several excerpts in the media. It was. I had two profound thoughts after finishing the book but let me first state that the time period covered was the last six months of Trump's presidency and the first six months of Biden's presidency.

What struck me the most was how long the military had been controlling Trump's ability to begin a war. Military officers got together before scheduled meetings in the Oval Office to decide beforehand who would say what in the meetings. One person would be selected to take the heat from Trump, i.e., tell him the truth. Telling Trump the truth always resulted in him screaming obscenities at them. This was true from Trump's initial days in Office until he left Office. When the 2020 election was nearing, military officials were even more hands on because Trump was saying privately that he wanted military action against several other nations. It has been reported in the news that the Chinese were worried that the U.S. would attack them. This worry was true for the entire 2020 calendar year not just near the election date. In fact, the Chinese military was on high alert for an attack all year as were the Russians and Iranians. The American military had several discussions with the Chinese to advise that the U S. would not attack them and in so many words say they were in control of the nuclear weapons, not Trump. 

With such extraordinary efforts being made to avert wars why did no one remove Trump from Office? The military took some measures that were illegal. While I am glad they did so the fact remains that their actions were illegal. My latest reading of the U.S. Constitution shows that the vice president is the only person who can call a cabinet meeting to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove Trump.  In my mind Pence is just as guilty of illegal acts by failing to do his job. I guess the military did what they could given that Pence refused to do his duty. Former Joint Chief's Chairman General Milley was quoted in the book as saying that the military only has an obligation to the Constitution, not the Commander in Chief.  He upheld his duty to the Constitution by preventing Trump from starting a war, one that would also be illegal under the Constitution. We have former Vice President Pence to thank for the mess. I was not aware how much he contributed to it before reading the book. The only reason that this mess occurred is because he failed to uphold his own constitutional duties. Note, though, that the authors did not discuss Pence. These are my thoughts.

The book begins with Biden's inaugural address where he mentions that we are in a winter of peril. The book ends with the author's statement "peril remains." I agree with their assessment but most of the time I push that thought from my mind. It's just too upsetting. Peril should be required reading. I am rating it 5 out of 5 stars.