September 3, 2020

Trump: Soldiers Who Die in Battle Are “Losers”

White House chief of staff John Kelly was at the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery in 2018 to commemorate the end of World War I, but Donald Trump wasn't. He didn't want to risk getting his hair wet.White House/ZUMA

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Jeffrey Goldberg has a stunning story today about President Trump’s attitude toward the military. In a nutshell, he’s contemptuous of anyone who served, anyone who was captured on the battlefield, or anyone who died. Goldberg’s piece starts with a description of Trump’s canceled visit to Aisne-Marne American Cemetery near Paris in 2018:

In a conversation with senior staff members on the morning of the scheduled visit, Trump said, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” In a separate conversation on the same trip, Trump referred to the more than 1,800 marines who lost their lives at Belleau Wood as “suckers” for getting killed.

…According to sources with knowledge of the president’s views, he seems to genuinely not understand why Americans treat former prisoners of war with respect. Nor does he understand why pilots who are shot down in combat are honored by the military.

…On Memorial Day 2017, Trump visited Arlington National Cemetery, a short drive from the White House. He was accompanied on this visit by John Kelly, who was then the secretary of homeland security….Trump was meant, on this visit, to join John Kelly in paying respects at his son’s grave, and to comfort the families of other fallen service members. But according to sources with knowledge of this visit, Trump, while standing by Robert Kelly’s grave, turned directly to his father and said, “I don’t get it. What was in it for them?” Kelly (who declined to comment for this story) initially believed, people close to him said, that Trump was making a ham-handed reference to the selflessness of America’s all-volunteer force. But later he came to realize that Trump simply does not understand non-transactional life choices.

I think Stalin had approximately the same view of the soldiers under his command. But then again, Stalin was a psychopath.

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