During President Trump’s first day on the new job, he fired Mark Milley from the National Infrastructure Advisory Council, among others, for “not being aligned with our vision to Make America Great Again.” Milley’s nonalignment was egregious and a threat to national security.
General Mark Milley may have done a grave disservice to his country with his disloyalty and probably should have been court martialed for treason, not pardoned by Biden. Treason, the highest of all crimes, is intentionally betraying one’s allegiance by levying war against the government or giving aid and comfort to its enemies.
Mark Alexander Milley (67) is a retired Army general who served as the 20th chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCOS) from October 1, 2019 to September 30, 2023. He had previously served as the 39th chief of staff of the Army from August 14, 2015 to August 9, 2019 and held multiple command and staff positions. He was an ROTC Armor officer who graduated from Princeton University with a BA in politics and received a master’s degree in international Affairs from Columbia University.
On December 8, 2018, after an interview with Milley, Trump announced that he would nominate Milley to serve as chairman of JCOS, against the wishes of Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis and then-chairman of the JSOC General Joseph Dunford. He was confirmed by the Senate 89–1 on July 25, 2019, and sworn in on September 30, 2019. In his capacity as chairman of JCOS under Trump, Milley may have given aid and comfort to China, in violation of the U.S. Constitution.
enemy, at least on the economic front, and potentially on the battlefield should China attack Tiawan or other interests vital to the USA. The Constitution defines an enemy as the “subjects of a foreign power in a state in open hostility with us.” Senator Marco Rubio considers China as the “biggest threat” to American prosperity in the 21st Century. In 2020, Rubio, a vocal critic of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) human rights record, was targeted by retaliatory sanctions, after the U.S. imposed human rights sanctions on officials in Xinjiang, China. In 2018, the Trump administration sanctioned a Chinese aerospace expert for allegedly buying Russian weapons.
Did Milley give China aid and comfort as defined by the Constitution? Per the Yale Law Journal: “(b) Communication of intelligence. Aid and comfort may be furnished to the enemy by giving intelligence, either oral or written, to aid him in his acts of hostility.”
General Mark Milley called Chinese General Li Zuocheng on Oct. 30, 2020 — four days before the election — and again on Jan. 8, two days after Trump supporters marched peacefully to the U.S. Capitol. According to a report based on Bob Woodwards book Peril, in the calls, “Milley sought to assure Li the U.S. was stable and not going to attack and, if there were to be an attack, he would alert his counterpart ahead of time.”
Trump said that if the story was true “Milley should be tried for treason.”
Where was Milley’s good judgement when he called China? The answer lies with his opinion of Trump’s leadership abilities. Milley called Trump the “most dangerous person ever” and said that Trump was a “fascist to the core.” Should Milley’s hatred of the commander-in-chief be justification for a treasonous act against the U.S.?
If it is proven that Milley provided aid and comfort to China by promising to alert his counterpart in China of a potential U.S. military attack, whether sanctioned by higher ups or otherwise, it raises the question: has a treasonous act been committed? Many on the Left say no there was no wrongdoing and many on the Right opine that aid and comfort was afforded to our enemy. If Milley acted without authorization he alone is culpable and if he had authorization, then several may be culpable.
No rational person would have done what Milley did. And since Milley knew that what he was doing, whether “justified” by personal animosity or whatever concerns he had about President Trump, was at least suspect, there were legal pathways for voicing the concerns. The path Milley, and possibly others, took instead, warrants an immediate and thorough investigation by the Congress, DoJ, and DoD to ferret out the facts. No suspected act of treason should go uninvestigated.
“I do not need to tell of you the dangers posed by senior military officers leaking classified information on U.S. military operations, but I will underscore that such subversion undermines the President’s ability to negotiate and leverage one of this nation’s instruments of national power in his interactions with foreign nations,” Rubio said in a letter to Biden.
He received no meaningful answer. Fortunately, we don’t have that problem any longer.
Hank Vanderbeek served the Country during the Vietnam War as a Signal Corps officer. Hankbeek@aol.com
Image: AT via Magic Studio
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