Washington – Christopher C. The little-known terrorism official, who went to the Middle East last month to pursue a diplomatic mission, asked Qatar to help buy or marginalize some senior al-Qaeda-linked Shabab leaders in Somalia. , Which is more committed to attacking the West.
Mr Miller received blessings from Kash Patel, then a senior member of the National Security Council. Officials said President Trump’s national security adviser, Robert C. O’Brien, was also aware of the trip. But they bypassed the country’s chief diplomat, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo – and when he found out, he considered the idea half-baked and shut it down.
Now, American national security and foreign policy are under control. Mr. Trump abruptly installed Mr. Miller as acting Secretary of Defense this week – at least on paper, the same as for the last two months of Mr. Pompeo’s administration. Mr. Patel is becoming Mr. Miller’s Chief of Staff.
The visit was a surprise increase for Mr. Miller, a former Green Barrett officer who was an anti-terrorism adviser to the National Security Council 11 months ago, who lacked significant experience in managing an expanded organization. He will use extraordinary power and responsibility during the Trump administration’s uncertain settlement – when Mr. Trump admits he is denying losing the election – immediately drawing tremendous attention to the Pentagon’s largely unknown leader.
Mr. Miller has shown an awkward behavior that, according to people who have worked with him many times, conflicts with the serious policy matters he has undertaken. His background in the military special forces is a notion with a reputation for being rigorous-charging and not always respecting bureaucratic investigative procedures, designed to ensure a thorough calculation of possible outcomes before acting.
Mr. Miller’s previous unofficial trip to Qatar gives an insight into the executive secretary’s mindset. U.S. The awkward shuttering of efforts for the government was a shameful result, in part because the Emir of Qatar had explicitly approved Mr Miller’s proposal to be explored.
It could also provide an example of the last ditch initiative or operation, whether explicit or implicit, that Mr. Trump and his top aides may have chased into his office during the past week.
“The policy process in this administration is still strange,” said a Somalia expert at the American University in Washington and a former counterterrorism analyst at the State Department.
Officials familiar with Mr. Miller’s unfinished adventure described him on condition of anonymity because of his sensitive diplomatic and intelligence nature. A spokesman for the State Department, the National Security Council and Mr Miller declined to comment.
Mr. Miller seemed a potential ambassador for such a delicate diplomatic awe. He spent his 31-year military career in dubious special operations assignments. He commanded the Special Forces Quick-Reaction Team, which was dispatched to Afghanistan in December 2001 to help the team that was accidentally hit by an American bomb. They stopped to increase security around Hamid Karzai, who has just been named Afghanistan’s interim president. During the Iraq war, Miller Miller hunted down high-priced rebel leaders.
In 2018, he became an anti-terrorism official in the National Security Council, the arm of the White House, which helps manage international affairs related to the military, intelligence and foreign policy.
Mr. Miller was often with Mr. Patel, a former aide to California Representative Devin Nunes, a top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, and an outspoken supporter of Mr. Trump.
In contrast, Mr. Miller is not known as a partisan ideologue, according to interviews with officials who work with him. His anti-terrorism and hostage-centered portfolio has allowed him to largely avoid national security issues that attract political provocation during the Trump era, such as Russia. His watch on the National Security Council includes meetings that led to an American commando attack in northwestern Syria last year that killed the leader of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and won the confidence of officials such as Mr. O’Brien. . And Mr. Patel.
Before Mr. Miller briefly took over the Pentagon’s counterterrorism role this year, the Senate confirmed in August that he would head the National Counterterrorism Center, the agency created after the September 11, 2001 attacks, which serves as a clearinghouse. Coordination for information on the threat of terrorism and for the sharing of intelligence between organizations, including the CIA, the FBI, and the National Security Agency.
The center does not play an operational role. But Mr Miller, studying Shabab’s senior leadership and intelligence reports about Somalia, told colleagues that it was possible to change the equation that the United States has been embroiled in an irregular war with Shabab – including periodic drone strikes targeting potential terrorists. Fatal Shabab attack on American airport on Manda Bay in Kenya in January.
U.S. officials have long struggled to figure out how to deal with Shabab – a consolidated organized group of groups, most of which focus on the so-called paramilitary goal of controlling Somalia but some of which want to take part in al Qaeda’s global jihad. . Its boundaries.
Near the end of the Obama administration, the executive branch considered the entire group an enemy in the war on terror, and Mr. Trump relaxed the limits on military strikes in Somalia. But years of regular bombings have failed to relieve Shabab and in his fourth year the Trump administration has flirted with the idea of withdrawing from the Horn of Africa.
In the midst of that brainstorming, Mr Miller wondered if it was possible to separate key Shabab groups from al Qaeda in order to reduce its threat to American interests outside Somalia’s borders. He focused on a group of about 10 older leaders with strong personal ties to al Qaeda rather than smaller, more nationalist Shabab leaders.
It was difficult to get accurate, timely information to target and assassinate Shabab leaders linked to the law. Mr Miller raised the idea of isolating them or removing them: perhaps the younger leaders would be persuaded to revolt against them, or the conflict could be bought into a different group, officials said.
Given his previous experience as a Green Barrett officer in Afghanistan and Iraq, Mr. Miller realized that he would be attracted to the idea of unconventional dealings with elements of the Islamist terrorist group trying to reduce the threat. , A former senior director of counterterrorism at the National Security Council during the Obama administration, who has worked with Mr. Miller.
“Based on Chris Miller’s military background in the Special Forces, he will certainly be very interested in working with irregular forces or others to defeat our terrorist enemies,” Mr Hartig said.
The Qataris had experience as mediators for peace talks with the Afghan Taliban. Mr. Miller approached Mr. Patel with the idea of his registration for his efforts for equal development. With the blessing of the National Security Council, Mr. Miller, to contact the Ambassador of Qatar to the United States, to receive the blessings of the richest man in the country.
Then, on the Columbus Day weekend, Miller and his aides left for Doha to hold talks with senior Qatari officials, including his foreign minister and counterterrorism leaders. The Qataris are said to have expressed interest in some ideas but were cautious about how to proceed. As an initial step, they proposed to put a looping in the Norwegian diplomats, who also served as go-between with the Taliban.
According to officials, Mr Miller returned with a proposal with instructions for three-way talks with Qatar and Norway. At the time, however, Mr. Pompeo and his superiors became aware of his efforts.
The move was seen by the State Department as freelance diplomacy – an intrusion into Mr. Pompeo’s weeds – and more often than not, many anti-terrorism policy officials saw it as inadequate.
Among the problems: find out who to talk to in Shabab, whose leaders kill each other when there is an ideological dispute; To find out what the United States-backed Somali government’s efforts for a new partnership would mean; And to examine the risks of public relations negotiating with persons with a legal basis.
Mr. Pompeo insisted that the State Department take Mr. Miller’s initiative. He referred the matter to the department’s Africa bureau, where officials said Mr. Trump appeared to be dead bureaucratically just before he lost the election – and a coup that exposed the U.S. government to flying to the Middle East.
“This story is fantastic on many levels,” Ms. Becken said. “By removing 10 Shabab activists, it will not continue to reduce the threat to US interests. The threat from Shabab is not so simple. We tried it, and it didn’t work. “
Thom Shankar contributed to the reporting.
