This article appears in the October 18, 2019 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.
In His Own Words:
President Trump Fights for Peace
[Print version of this article]
As President Trump is almost uniformly attacked in the nation’s legacy news media for his refusal to continue the Bush/Obama policy of “endless war,” he has now taken this vital question directly to the American people. Over the last five days the President has issued a series of unprecedented statements and tweets emphasizing his determination to “bring the troops home,”—to bring to an end the now 18-year-long regime of “permanent war,” as he had promised in the 2016 election. In both his actions and his statements, the President has directly challenged the geo-political designs of the British oligarchy and its intention to keep the world in a “crisis management” mode; and to pit the United States against both Russia and China.
These are momentous actions the President is taking. We present here a selection from among the President’s recent utterances.
On October 7, the President sent a Twitter message containing this statement:
The United States was supposed to be in Syria for 30 days, that was many years ago. We stayed and got deeper and deeper into battle with no aim in sight. When I arrived in Washington, ISIS was running rampant in the area. We quickly defeated 100 percent of the ISIS Caliphate, including capturing thousands of ISIS fighters, mostly from Europe. But Europe did not want them back; they said you keep them, USA! I said “NO, we did you a great favor and now you want us to hold them in U.S. prisons at tremendous cost. They are yours for trials.” They again said “NO,” thinking, as usual, that the U.S. is always the “sucker,” on NATO, on Trade, on everything. The Kurds fought with us, but were paid massive amounts of money and equipment to do so. They have been fighting Turkey for decades. I held off this fight for almost 3 years, but it is time for us to get out of these ridiculous Endless Wars, many of them tribal, and bring our soldiers home.
Then on October 9, during a press briefing and dialogue with reporters, President Trump stated:
Now, if we go on the theory that some of the folks in Washington go by—who all do very well with the military-industrial complex—I mean, you know, the military-industrial complex. Take a look at Dwight Eisenhower; he had it figured right many years ago. It’s got tremendous power. They like fighting. They make a lot of money when they fight.
But it was time to bring our soldiers back home. So I see— and I will tell you: The hardest thing I have to do, by far, much harder than the witch hunt, is signing letters to parents of soldiers that have been killed. And it’s not only that—in areas where there’s not a lot of upside, if there’s any upside at all, and in many cases, it’s only downside.
And especially when that soldier was killed in a Blue-on-Green attack. You know what that is, right? That’s where a soldier being trained or whatever turns his gun on an American soldier. “Here, son. Take your gun. You know how to use it.” And he takes the gun and he turns it. And he shoots one—we have many of them in Afghanistan—in particular, in Afghanistan. The hardest thing I have to do is signing those letters. That’s the hardest thing I have to do. And each letter is different. We make each letter different.
The Hardest Thing I Have to Do
And last week, I signed one of them for Afghanistan; one in Iraq; one in Syria, from two weeks ago. And sometimes I call the parents. Sometimes I see the parents. I go to Dover [Air Force Base], when I can, but it’s—it’s so devastating for the parents that—you know. It’s so devastating when they bring that boy or young woman out of the back of those big, powerful planes in a coffin, and the parents are there.
You know, we have people that do that. That’s what they do. They—they work that. They accommodate everybody. That’s what they do. They do an incredible job. And they said—I said, “The parents seemed to be okay. I’ll get there early. The parents seemed to be okay.” “Well, actually, sir, they aren’t.” “No, no. The way they’re talking. They’re really okay, aren’t they?” “Sir, you never know until the back of that massive cargo plane opens up.” And they walk down holding a coffin with four or five great soldiers on each side of it, representing our various Forces. That you never know.
And then I see it. And I see people that were smiling, “Oh, Mr. President, thank you for being here. Thank you for being here.” And I think they’re doing great. And then, twenty minutes later, we’ll be outside when that big plane pulls up and that door comes down, and they are walking the coffin with their boy inside this coffin with an American flag over the top. And they’re walking that coffin down this ramp. And I’ve seen people that I thought were really incredible the way they were taking—I didn’t even understand how they could take it so well—scream, like I’ve never seen anything before. Sometimes they’ll run to the coffin. They’ll break through military barriers. They’ll run to the coffin and jump on top of the coffin—crying mothers and wives, crying desperately.
And this is on these endless wars that just never stop. And there’s a time and there’s a place, but it’s time to stop.
And just to finish, last Friday, I went to Walter Reed. And I gave out five Purple Hearts to incredible young men—in this case, all men. And they took a beating, beautiful people. They took a beating. One couldn’t be there because the beating was so great that he was at a totally different part of the world. He lost a leg. He lost an arm. Ryan. He had tremendous damage, beyond even what these young folks went through.
But I’ll tell you what: For me, it’s very hard when I see that. It’s very hard. It’s easy to talk tough. You know, tough guys, all of these tough guys: “Let’s keep fighting. Let’s keep fighting.” If they had to go to Walter Reed—where they do unbelievable work—I have to tell you, these doctors are unbelievable. You know, it’s easy to say, “Oh, they’re not the. . .” They’re the best in the world. I’ve never seen anything like it.
One young man, last week, had his nose rebuilt. And they said it was in a thousand pieces. And, I said, “So, where were you hurt?” He said, “My face, sir, was almost obliterated.” I said, “You have a better face than I do.” [Laughter] And he said, “Sir, I had a doctor who was unbelievable, and they put it together.” They said—he said “a thousand fragments.” Now, I don’t know if that’s even possible. But a thousand fragments. And they put it together.
And his father, who was crying, came up to me and said, “You’re not going to believe this, but my son didn’t have a great-looking nose and now his nose is better.” [Laughter]
Okay? It’s an amazing thing.
But when you see these—and the Purple Hearts—you see this kind of thing—and I see a lot of it at Walter Reed. And, again, the job those doctors and the people do at Walter Reed, it’s something to be commended.
Thank you all very much. Thank you. [Applause.]
No More Endless Wars
At the same press briefing, in response to a reporter’s question about his decision to pull U.S. troops back from Syria’s border with Turkey, the President responded:
I don’t want to stay there for the next 40 years. It’s not going to do anything. . . . I campaigned on the fact that I was going to bring our soldiers home, and bring them home as rapidly as possible. . . . We interject ourselves into wars, and we interject ourselves into tribal wars and revolutions and all of these things that are very—they’re not the kind of thing that you settle the way we’d like to see it settled. It just doesn’t work that way. . . . And it’s time to come back home.
From the first day I entered the political arena, I made it clear that I did not want to fight these endless, senseless wars—especially those that don’t benefit the United States.
Then, later in the same day, President Trump further emphasized his explicit break with the Bush/Obama war policy:
The United States has spent EIGHT TRILLION DOLLARS fighting and policing in the Middle East. Thousands of our Great Soldiers have died or been badly wounded. Millions of people have died on the other side. GOING INTO THE MIDDLE EAST IS THE WORST DECISION EVER MADE IN THE HISTORY OF OUR COUNTRY! We went to war under a false & now disproven premise, WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION. There were NONE! Now we are slowly & carefully bringing our great soldiers and military home. Our focus is on the BIG PICTURE! The U.S.A. is GREATER THAN EVER BEFORE!
The great irony in this situation is that the loudest protests against President Trump’s peace initiative are coming, not from right-wing Republicans, but from the pro-impeachment Democratic Party Presidential candidates, as well as the Congressional Democrats who are now leading the impeachment drive. At least three Democratic candidates have condemned Trump’s announcement of the pull-back in Syria. Bernie Sanders called Trump’s decision “extremely irresponsible” while Elizabeth Warren said that Trump’s decision was “reckless and unplanned.” These are the same “liberal Dems” who earlier hysterically attacked Trump for firing war-monger John Bolton. It seems that 18 years of open-ended “permanent war” is not enough for them.
Where have all the liberals gone? Gone to Wall Street every one.
