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      in US Politics

      ‘Lowlife with small brain and big mouth’: Trump hits out at ex-aide Kelly

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      Donald Trump called his former chief of staff John Kelly a “lowlife with a very small brain and a very big mouth” after the former marine general confirmed reports about the ex-president’s derogatory attitude to members of the US armed forces.In posts to his Truth Social platform, days after Kelly spoke to CNN, Trump said his former aide was “by far the dumbest of my military people … incapable of doing a good job” as chief of staff or, before that, homeland security secretary.“It was too much for him, and I couldn’t stand the guy, so I fired him like a ‘dog’,” wrote the former president, who made his name as a reality TV host with the catchphrase “you’re fired” – but who has been widely reported to be averse to confrontation when it comes to letting people go.Kelly left the Trump administration in December 2018. After that, he was widely believed to be a source for stories in reports and books detailing Trump’s dismissive attitude to wounded and dead soldiers and their families.This week, Kelly – whose son, Robert M Kelly, was killed in Afghanistan in November 2010 – went on CNN to discuss such stories on the record.Kelly also called Trump “a person who is not truthful regarding his position on the protection of unborn life, on women, on minorities, on evangelical Christians, on Jews, on working men and women.“A person that has no idea what America stands for and has no idea what America is all about. A person who cavalierly suggests that a selfless warrior who has served his country for 40 years in peacetime and war should lose his life for treason – in expectation that someone will take action.“A person who admires autocrats and murderous dictators. A person that has nothing but contempt for our democratic institutions, our constitution, and the rule of law.“There is nothing more that can be said. God help us.”In response, Trump had plenty more to say.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionKelly, he said, “had no heart or respect for people, so I hit him hard – made no difference to me. He’s already on record defending me all over the place. Nobody loves the military like I do! Now he finally speaks back by making up fake stories, or confirming the made-up stories of the Dem[ocrats] and radical left.“He’s a lowlife with a very small brain and a very big mouth … numerous people are angry and upset because they know they will never be in a new Trump administration, but only for one reason, they’re not nearly good enough. Kelly would be among those at the top of the list!”Despite facing 91 criminal charges (for election subversion, retention of classified information and hush-money payments) and civil threats including a fraud trial and a defamation trial arising from a rape allegation a judge deemed “substantially true”, Trump leads 2024 Republican presidential polling by wide margins. More

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      Aukus could weaken China deterrence,

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      Doubts about Australia’s willingness to join forces with the US in a war against China are being cited by congressional researchers as a potential obstacle to the Aukus nuclear-powered submarine deal.A new research paper looks at the US plan to sell Australia between three and five Virginia-class submarines in the 2030s but suggests the idea “could weaken deterrence of potential Chinese aggression”.That stage of the deal aims to help Canberra bridge a “capability gap” before Australian-built nuclear-powered submarines begin to enter into service in the 2040s.The paper, prepared by the Congressional Research Service, aims to provide members of the US congress with a neutral summary of key arguments likely to be raised by supporters and sceptics of the plan.It lists six “potential arguments from sceptics”, including that the sale could weaken deterrence “if China were to find reason to believe, correctly or not, that Australia might use its Virginia-class boats less effectively than the US Navy would use them”.That weakening of deterrence could also be the case if Beijing were to conclude “that Australia might not involve its military, including its Virginia-class boats, in US-China crises or conflicts that Australia viewed as not engaging important Australian interests”.The report cited comments by the Australian defence minister, Richard Marles, in March that the Aukus deal did not include any pre-commitments to the US regarding involvement in a potential future conflict over Taiwan.
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      The report added: “Virginia-class boats are less certain to be used in a US-China conflict over Taiwan, or less certain to be used in such a conflict in the way that the United States might prefer, if they are sold to Australia rather than retained in US Navy service.”In another argument that may embolden Republican critics of the submarine sale, the paper noted “the challenges that the US submarine industrial base is experiencing in achieving a desired construction rate of two Virginia-class boats per year”.The ability of the US to build replacement submarines for Virginia-class boats sold to Australia was “uncertain”, according to the paper first reported by the Australian Financial Review.The paper also suggested that the costs for Australia to acquire, operate and maintain Virginia-class submarines “could reduce, perhaps significantly, funding within Australia’s military budget for other Australian military capabilities” – especially if the figures “turn out to be higher than expected”.“If this were to occur, there could be a net negative impact on Australia’s overall military capabilities for deterring potential Chinese aggression.”The Australian government has repeatedly argued it will retain sovereign control of the submarines, despite arguments from the former prime ministers Malcolm Turnbull and Paul Keating that the multi-decade arrangement relies on US support and reduces Australia’s room to move.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut the new paper suggested it might be “more cost-effective to pursue a US-Australian division of labor” under which US submarines would perform both American and Australian missions “while Australia invests in other types of military forces”. It pointed to such arrangements between the US and its Nato allies.The paper also mentioned concerns about the impact of a potential accident, even though it said the Australian navy was “a fully professional force that would operate and maintain its Virginia-class boats in a manner fully adhering to the US Navy’s strict and exacting safety, quality-control, and accountability standards”.It said the sale “would unavoidably make another country responsible for preventing an accident” with a US-made submarine and any significant problem “might call into question for third-party observers the safety of all US Navy nuclear-powered ships”.On the other side of the ledger, the paper said supporters could argue that the Aukus deal “would substantially enhance deterrence of potential Chinese aggression by sending a strong signal to China of the collective determination of the United States and Australia, along with the UK, to counter China’s military modernization effort”.“The fact that the United States has never before sold a complete SSN [nuclear-powered submarine] to another country – not even the UK – would underscore the depth of this determination, and thus the strength of the deterrent signal it would send.”Instead of waiting for Australia to build its own submarines, the interim sale of Virginia-class submarines in the 2030s “would substantially accelerate the creation of an Australian force” of nuclear-powered submarines.That would “present China much sooner with a second allied decision-making center” for submarine operations in the Indo-Pacific region, “which would enhance deterrence of potential Chinese aggression by complicating Chinese military planning”. More

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      Pete Buttigieg condemns Trump’s reported remarks about wounded veteran

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      Pete Buttigieg, the US transport secretary and a military veteran, has criticized Donald Trump after a report that he sought to bar a severely wounded veteran from public appearances during his presidency.In an interview with the Atlantic, Mark Milley, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said Trump had been irritated after Luis Avila – who lost a leg and suffered brain damage after an IED attack in Afghanistan – sang at Milley’s 2019 welcome ceremony.“Why do you bring people like that here? No one wants to see that, the wounded,” Milley said Trump told him after the ceremony.Milley told the Atlantic that Trump said Avila should never appear in public again.On Sunday, Buttigieg – who was a lieutenant in the US navy reserve and served a tour of duty in Afghanistan in 2014 – told CNN that Trump’s alleged order was “just the latest in a pattern of outrageous attacks [by Trump] on people who keep this country safe”.Military members wounded in combat, Buttigieg said, “deserve respect and a hell of a lot more than that from every American, and definitely from every American president”.Buttigieg also said: “The idea that an American president, the person to whom service members look as a commander in chief, the person who sets the tone for this entire country, could think that way or act that way or talk that way about anyone in uniform, and certainly about those who put their bodies on the line and sacrificed in ways that most Americans will never understand … I guess wounded veterans make president Trump feel uncomfortable.”Trump has a previously attacked members of the military. In 2020, the Atlantic reported that Trump had said the Aisne-Marne American cemetery – where more than 2,000 American military members who died in France are buried – was “filled with suckers”.The Atlantic reported that Trump had also said the more than 1,800 marines who died at Belleau Wood, the site of a key battle in the first world war, were “suckers” for getting killed.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTrump denied the report, but he has a history of criticizing service members. In 2015 he referred to John McCain, the late US senator and navy veteran who spent nearly six years in a Vietnamese prisoner-of-war camp, as a “loser”.Trump added: “He’s not a war hero. He’s a war hero because he was captured. I like people that weren’t captured.” More

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      in Elections

      Active-duty US marine sentenced for participation in January 6 Capitol attack

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      One of three active-duty US marines who stormed the nation’s Capitol together was sentenced on Monday to probation and 279 hours of community service – one hour for every marine who was killed or wounded fighting in the American civil war.The US district judge Ana Reyes said she could not fathom why Dodge Hellonen violated his oath to protect the constitution “against all enemies, foreign and domestic” – and risked his career – by joining the 6 January 2021 riot that disrupted Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election.“I really urge you to think about why it happened so you can address it and ensure it never happens again,” Reyes said.Dodge Hellonen, now 24, was the first of the three marines to be punished for participating in the Capitol attack. Reyes also is scheduled to sentence his co-defendants Micah Coomer on Tuesday and Joshua Abate on Wednesday.The three marines – friends from the same unit – drove together from a military post in Virginia to Washington DC on 6 January, when then president Donald Trump spoke at his “Save America” rally near the White House. They joined the crowd that stormed the Capitol after Trump urged his supporters to “fight like hell”.Before imposing Hellonen’s sentence, Reyes described how marines fought and died in some of the fiercest battles in American history. She recited the number of casualties from some of the bloodiest wars.Prosecutors recommended short terms of incarceration – 30 days for Coomer and 21 days for Hellonen and Abate – along with 60 hours of community service.A prosecutor wrote in a court filing that their military service, while laudable, makes their conduct “all the more troubling”.Reyes said she agreed with prosecutors that Hellonen’s status as an active-duty marine did not weigh in favor of a more lenient sentence. But she ultimately decided to spare him from a prison term, sentencing him to four years of probation.Reyes said it “carried a great deal of weight” to learn that Hellonen maintained a positive attitude and stellar work ethic when he was effectively demoted after the January 6 attack. He went from working as a signals analyst to a job that few marines want, inventorying military gear.“The only person who can give you a second chance is yourself,” she told him.“I take full responsibility for my actions and I’ll carry this with me for the rest of my life,” Hellonen told the judge.Hellonen, Coomer and Abate pleaded guilty earlier this year to parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building, a misdemeanor punishable by a maximum of six months behind bars. Hundreds of Capitol rioters have pleaded guilty to the same charge, which is akin to trespassing.More than 600 people have been sentenced for Capitol riot-related federal crimes. Over 100 of them have served in the US military, according to an Associated Press review of court records. Only a few were active-duty military or law enforcement personnel on January 6.As of Friday, all three marines were still on active-duty status, according to the Marine Corps. But all three could be separated from the Marine Corps “on less than honorable conditions”, prosecutors said. More

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      in US Politics

      Republican senator will ‘burn the military down’ over abortion policy, says Democrat

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      The Alabama Republican senator Tommy Tuberville is “prepared to burn the military down” with his block on promotions in protest of Pentagon policy on abortion, the Connecticut Democratic senator Chris Murphy said.“I think everybody’s been hoping that Senator Tuberville would back down,” Murphy told reporters at the Capitol on Tuesday.“And I think we have to come to the conclusion that that is not happening and that he is prepared to burn the military down.“Maybe Republicans were hopeful that leading up to the August break he would relent. He didn’t, and we now have to adjust our strategy.”Last year, the conservative-dominated US supreme court removed the federal right to abortion. Since February, Tuberville has been protesting Pentagon policy that allows service members to travel for abortion care if their state does not provide it.His method is to place a hold on all promotions to senior ranks that are subject to Senate confirmation, usually a pro forma process carried out with unanimous consent.Senior military leadership is increasingly severely affected, the US Marine Corps and US Army without permanent leaders and the joint chiefs of staff facing a similar predicament when the current chair, Gen Mark Milley, steps down next month.Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina now running for the Republican presidential nomination, also said Tuberville should back down.“We do not have a chief of staff of the army for a first time in 200 years,” Haley told the conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt. “More than 300 vacancies. It’s a mess.”Haley said Hewitt should call Tuberville “and ask him to stop screwing up the military, because we’re on the brink of a conflict with China and we cannot have this”.Joe Biden has called for Tuberville to step down. So have hundreds of military spouses. Tuberville has refused. Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the Senate, has said he does not support Tuberville’s protest but has not moved to stop it. Senate rules give individuals the ability to hold up proceedings. Furthermore, Tuberville retains support among his own party, in both chambers of Congress.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionOn Tuesday, Murphy said Republicans should support a temporary change to Senate rules, in order to process promotions that are now held up.“I just think we have to start thinking creatively about breaking this logjam,” he said. “There is no world in which we can use floor time for these nominations. It’s logistically impossible.”Murphy also said Tuberville, a former football coach and now a prominent Trump supporter, “is not going to back down” because “he thinks he’s become a celebrity folk hero in the fringe right.“He’s having the time of his life. If you want the military to function, you’re going to have to find a creative way to get around this guy.” More

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      in US Politics

      US dispatches warships after China and Russia send naval patrol near Alaska

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      The US dispatched four navy warships as well as a reconnaissance airplane after multiple Chinese and Russian military vessels carried out a joint naval patrol near Alaska last week.The combined naval patrol, which the Wall Street Journal first reported, appeared to be the largest such flotilla to approach US territory, according to experts that spoke to the outlet.“It’s a historical first,” Brent Sadler, a retired Navy captain and senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told the Journal.He also said the flotilla’s proximity to Alaska was a “highly provocative” maneuver given Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine and political tensions between the US and China over Taiwan. The flotilla has since left.The US Northern Command confirmed the combined Chinese and Russian naval patrol, telling the Journal: “Air and maritime assets under our commands conducted operations to assure the defense of the United States and Canada. The patrol remained in international waters and was not considered a threat.”The command did not specify the number of vessels which made up the patrol or their exact location. But US senators from Alaska said the flotilla in question was made up of 11 Chinese and Russian warships working in concert near the Aleutian Islands.Four destroyers and a Poseidon P-8 patrol airplane made up the US response to the Chinese and Russian flotilla.In a statement to the Journal, the spokesperson of the Chinese embassy in Washington DC, Liu Pengyu, said that the patrol “is not targeted at any third party”.“According to the annual cooperation plan between the Chinese and Russian militaries, naval vessels of the two countries have recently conducted joint maritime patrols in relevant waters in the western and northern Pacific ocean,” Pengyu said. “This action is not targeted at any third party and has nothing to do with the current international and regional situation.”The Journal reported that the US destroyers sent to track the flotilla were the USS John S McCain, the USS Benfold, the USS John Finn and the USS Chung-Hoon.Alaska senators Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan have since responded to the joint Chinese and Russian patrol that came close to the Aleutian Islands by saying they are monitoring the situation closely for their constituents.Murkowski said: “We have been in close contact with leadership … for several days now and received detailed classified briefings about the foreign vessels that are transiting US waters in the Aleutians.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“This is a stark reminder of Alaska’s proximity to both China and Russia, as well as the essential role our state plays in our national defense and territorial sovereignty.”Sullivan echoed the sentiments of his fellow Republican Murkowski, saying: “The incursion by 11 Chinese and Russian warships operating together – off the coast of Alaska – is yet another reminder that we have entered a new era of authoritarian aggression led by the dictators in Beijing and Moscow.”He went on to compare the situation to one last September, when a single US coast guard cutter spotted a total of seven Chinese and Russian naval ships near Alaska.“Last summer the Chinese and Russian navies conducted a similar operation off the coast of Alaska,” Sullivan said. “Given that our response was tepid, I strongly encouraged senior military leaders to be ready with a much more robust response should such another joint Chinese-Russian naval operation occur off our coast.“For that reason, I was heartened to see that this latest incursion was met with four US Navy destroyers, which sends a strong message … that the United States will not hesitate to protect and defend our vital national interests in Alaska.” More

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      in US Politics

      Biden overturns Trump decision on US space command headquarters location

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      Joe Biden has decided to keep US space command headquarters in Colorado, overturning a last-ditch decision by the administration of his presidential predecessor Donald Trump to move it to Alabama while also ending months of politically fueled debate, according to senior federal officials.The officials said Biden was convinced by the head of space command, Gen James Dickinson, who argued that moving his headquarters now would jeopardize military readiness. Dickinson’s view, however, was in contrast to air force leadership, who studied the issue at length and determined that relocating to Huntsville, Alabama, was the right move.The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the decision ahead of the announcement.The president, they said, believes that keeping the command in Colorado Springs would avoid a disruption in readiness that the move would cause, particularly as the US races to compete with China in space. And they said Biden firmly believes that maintaining stability will help the military be better able to respond in space over the next decade. Those factors, they said, outweighed what the president believed would be any minor benefits of moving to Alabama.Biden’s decision is sure to enrage Alabama lawmakers and fuel accusations that abortion politics played a role in the choice. The location debate has become entangled in the ongoing battle between the US senator Tommy Tuberville and the defense department over the move to provide travel for troops seeking reproductive healthcare.Tuberville, an Alabama Republican, opposed the policy and has blocked hundreds of military promotions in protest.The US officials said the abortion issue had no effect at all on Biden’s decision. And they said the president fully expected there would be different views on the matter within the defense department.Formally created in August 2019, the command was temporarily based in Colorado. And air force and space force leaders initially recommended it stay there. But in the final days of his presidency, Donald Trump decided it should be based in Huntsville.The change triggered a number of reviews.Proponents of keeping the command in Colorado have argued that moving it to Huntsville and creating a new headquarters would set back its progress at a time it needs to move quickly to be positioned to match China’s military space rise. And Colorado Springs is also home to the air force academy, which now graduates space force guardians, and more than 24 military space missions, including three space force bases.Officials also argued that any new headquarters in Alabama would not be completed until sometime after 2030, forcing a lengthy transition.Huntsville, however, scored higher than Colorado Springs in a federal government accountability office assessment of potential locations and has long been a home to some of the earliest missiles used in the nation’s space programs, including the Saturn V rocket. It is home to the army’s space and missile defense command.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAccording to officials, the air force secretary, Frank Kendall, who ordered his own review of the matter, leaned toward Huntsville, while Dickinson was staunchly in favor of staying put. The officials said the defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, presented both options to Biden.The decision was good news for Colorado lawmakers.“For two and a half years we’ve known any objective analysis of this basing decision would reach the same conclusion we did, that Peterson space force base is the best home for space command,” Colorado’s Democratic US senator John Hickenlooper said in a statement. “Most importantly, this decision firmly rejects the idea that politics – instead of national security – should determine basing decisions central to our national security.”Colorado’s other Democratic US senator, Michael Bennet, said the decision “restores integrity to the Pentagon’s basing process and sends a strong message that national security and the readiness of our armed forces drive our military decisions”. More

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      House Republicans pass defense bill, setting up clash on abortion policy

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      The Republican-led House of Representatives on Friday approved a huge defense bill that includes amendments overturning the Pentagon’s policies on covering abortion services for the military, healthcare costs for transgender service members and diversity initiatives – setting up a historic clash with Democrats and the Biden administration that could imperil spending on the armed forces.The amendments, pushed by the GOP’s right flank with the support of the speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy, represent the latest instance of conservative lawmakers using their influence in Congress’s lower chamber to attempt to change Joe Biden’s policies on a range of issues that chiefly animate the Republican base.They also seems certain to spark a major battle with Democrats who hold control of the Senate, and whose assent will be needed for the defense spending bill, a version of which Congress approves every year, to become law.“House Republicans have made a commitment to America that we fight for a nation that is safe,” McCarthy said shortly after the amended National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) covering the 2024 fiscal year passed on a mostly party-line vote.“Radical programs that are forced [on] our troops at the expense of readiness are now eliminated. Cutting-edge technology that is essential for the future of this country and to keep freedom around the world in the rise of China and Russia, will receive more investment than we’ve watched in the past,” McCarthy said, adding that the legislation costing $886.3bn would also give service members their largest pay increase in two decades.The NDAA is one of the bills Congress must pass every year, and often attracts bipartisan support, with politicians of both parties eager to show they support the United States military. But while it is not unusual for the defense spending measure to include provisions addressing other issues on Congress’s mind, rightwing Republicans this year proposed several amendments dealing with some of the most divisive issues in American society.On Thursday evening, Republicans pushed through an amendment to the bill that reverses a defense department policy covering expenses and leave for troops who must travel out of state to seek an abortion. The policy was implemented after the supreme court last year struck down Roe v Wade and allowed states to ban the procedure.The party also supported amendments banning the Pentagon’s healthcare plans from covering gender-affirming care for transgender individuals, as well as a provisions targeting diversity, equity and inclusions programs and banning any teaching in the defense department’s school system that America is “a fundamentally racist country”.Amendments halting military assistance to Ukraine and ending a policy of renaming military bases bearing monikers inspired by the Confederacy were voted down.While they did not formally tell their members to vote against the NDAA, the House’s top Democrats, Hakeem Jeffries, the minority leader, whip Katherine Clark and caucus chair Pete Aguilar released a joint statement accusing Republicans of corrupting legislation that should be used to support American troops.“Extreme Maga Republicans have chosen to hijack the historically bipartisan National Defense Authorization Act to continue attacking reproductive freedom and jamming their rightwing ideology down the throats of the American people. House Republicans have turned what should be a meaningful investment in our men and women in uniform into an extreme and reckless legislative joyride,” the trio wrote, adding that they would vote against the bill.In the end, only four Democrats supported the NDAA, all of whom represent swing districts. The four Republicans who voted against it were conservatives of varying stripes, with Colorado’s Ken Buck releasing a statement saying the legislation is too expensive.“Our country is careening toward fiscal ruin, and Congress continues to turn a blind eye by passing these massive spending packages with no attention to their cost or efficacy,” Buck wrote, noting that he agrees “with several amendments to this bill”. More