Sigh. I suppose I have to post this report from NBC News. Apparently our commander-in-chief was upset to learn that America’s nuclear force is smaller than it was in the 60s:
Trump indicated he wanted a bigger stockpile, not the bottom position on that downward-sloping curve….Officials briefly explained the legal and practical impediments to a nuclear buildup and how the current military posture is stronger than it was at the height of the build-up. In interviews, they told NBC News that no such expansion is planned.
The July 20 meeting was described as a lengthy and sometimes tense review of worldwide U.S. forces and operations. It was soon after the meeting broke up that officials who remained behind heard Tillerson say that Trump is a “moron.”
….[Trump’s] comments raised questions about his familiarity with the nuclear posture and other issues, officials said.
How dangerous is it to have a president with no clue about how the military works? He doesn’t know what the nuclear triad is. He doesn’t realize that we’ve been negotiating down nuclear stockpiles for decades. He casually threatens nuclear war against North Korea. He thinks the army should have “surrounded” Iraq’s oil. He kept turning down the Pentagon’s ISIS plans because he couldn’t stand the thought of doing pretty much the same thing as Barack Obama.
Tillerson actually called Trump a “fucking moron.” This is a case where I think truncating the quote produces a real loss of fidelity to the truth.
