I suggest the general get quickly unconfused, or resign.”General Milley, his friends say, has agonized over the events of the past week. I think it’s about as far as they can go in uniform without resignations.”David Lapan, a former spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security in the Trump administration, called General Milley’s letter pro forma.In the hours after the photo op, General Milley, still in his combat fatigues, walked the streets of downtown Washington, talking to National Guard troops and protesters. But shortly after, he was right in the middle of a different war — the kind of political war where the military does not belong.Defense Department officials say General Milley believed that he was accompanying Mr. Trump and his entourage to review National Guard troops and other law enforcement personnel outside Lafayette Park; that he did not know the park had just been cleared of peaceful protests by security forces using tear gas; that an Australian news crew had just been beaten by baton-wielding police on live TV; that frightened teenagers were sobbing two blocks away.One Defense Department official on Friday likened General Milley’s walk across the park to walking through hell wearing gasoline underwear.Whatever the case, the video, broadcast repeatedly, shows Mr. Trump, flanked by General Milley in the combat fatigues he wears every day to work, and a group of mostly white men crossing a park that had just been cleared of people protesting the killing of a black man after a white police officer knelt on his neck for close to nine minutes.Once Mr. Trump arrived at St. John’s Church, holding a Bible, and it became clear that the moment was only a photo op, General Milley disappeared from view.
He argued that the scattered fires and looting in some places were dwarfed by peaceful protests, and should be handled by the states, which command local law enforcement and the National Guard.General Milley won the immediate battle in the Oval Office meeting on Monday. “You know, he went to Princeton,” Mr. Trump said. It must not be used in violation of those limits, and I see little evidence that President Trump understands this fundamental premise,” Smith wrote.“I remain gravely concerned about President Trump’s seemingly autocratic rule and how it affects the judgement of our military leadership,” he added, calling on Esper and Milley to testify before the Armed Services Committee “to explain this domestic engagement to the American people.”Rep. I’m not sure — was that a good thing or a bad? )General Milley has told associates that when he deals one on one with Mr. Trump, the president listens and is attentive. You keep peace by holding people down,” Mjumbe said. - Part of a letter to Gen. Mark Milley '80 from over 20 Senators “The inappropriate use of U.S. federal military personnel in this context could result in irrevocable damage to our nation,” the Senators added. After this news broke, Former Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey, who held the position Milley now occupies from 2011 to 2015, tweeted that “America is not a battleground” and “Our fellow citizens are not the enemy.”BREAKING: "If a city or state refuses to take the actions that are necessary to defend the life and property of their residents, then I will deploy the United States military and quickly solve the problem for them," Pres. Trump says. But when the president is in a large group meeting, General Milley has told people that the atmosphere can be more tense and the performer in Mr. Trump emerges.General Milley, who turns 62 this month, has a cordial relationship with Mr. Esper, 56, but officials who have attended meetings with the two say General Milley, a four-star general who has earned both Ranger and Army Special Forces tabs and commanded troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, sometimes treats Mr. Esper like the junior Army officer he once was.On Monday, after Mr. Trump said General Milley was “in charge” of the protest response, Representative Ruben Gallego, Democrat of Arizona and a former enlisted Marine who saw heavy combat in Iraq, sent General Milley a In the tumultuous hours and days since the walk across the park, General Milley has taken pains to mitigate the damage.It actually was General Goldfein of the Air Force who was the first of any senior Pentagon leader to break an Esper-imposed silence and comment on the extraordinary events around the killing of Mr. Floyd.On Wednesday, General Milley released his own letter that forcefully reminded the troops that their military is supposed to protect the right to freedom of speech. The military that Gen. Mark A. Milley represents is facing what could be the worst schism with the American public since the fractious Vietnam War years.Defense Secretary Jim Mattis had sent him to the White House in late 2018 to interview for the top American military post across the Atlantic, with its grand title: supreme allied commander Europe. Rationales for militarization--lowering crime, making police safer--are not supported by the data. “The inappropriate use of U.S. federal military personnel in this context could result in irrevocable damage to our nation,” the Senators added.Rep. Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, discussed resigning amid criticism over his participation in President Donald Trump's church photo op.
Since the May 25 killing of George Floyd by a Minnesota police officer, there have been demonstrations against police brutality The Monday statement about Milley came as part of a “The sooner that you mass and dominate the battlespace, the quicker this dissipates and we can get back to the right normal,” Esper Later on Monday, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany A spokesperson for the Joint Chiefs did not respond to a request for comment from The Daily Princetonian.The potential for military involvement in the protest response prompted outrage from multiple current and former public officials. Making sure that Princeton’s Title IX system keeps survivors’ best interests at heart is necessary. “But when we make peace, it means we all come together.”