The Trump administration has for years gathered information on foreign powers, including Russia and Iran, using financial means to support and encourage armed militants in Afghanistan, according to six current and former U.S. intelligence and national security officials. And, those officials said, the President has been briefed on those far-reaching efforts.
A current senior national security official and two other former officials familiar with intelligence gathering in Afghanistan said the Trump administration has closely followed the ways Iran uses the cash to support Haqqani Network militants who have killed soldiers. Americans.
But when intelligence emerged earlier this year that Russia had invented a specific plan to pay rewards to mercenaries for killing American soldiers, intelligence and national security leaders did not report to the president in person. A person with knowledge of the situation says that while they are aware that intelligence has circulated in the White House and within Trump’s own national security apparatus, they were unaware of any direct and face-to-face information that the President had received. .
The issue of what the president knew when, or if he knew anything, about Russian rewards has become a major issue in Washington. “We need to understand why the president was not informed, who knew it and when, and what our response to Russia will be if these reports are credible,” Republican representative Bob Wittman on the House Armed Services Committee said in a statement. “If this intelligence is determined to be true, this is another on a long list of escalating aggression from Russia.”
Multiple and sometimes conflicting reports have emerged about the scope and timing of information available to the President.
On Monday night, the Associated Press wrote that senior White House officials knew of “classified intelligence indicating that Russia was secretly offering rewards to the Taliban for the deaths of Americans” in “early 2019,” a year earlier than previously reported. How detailed and specific the intelligence may have been remains unclear.
“Authorities said there is fear about informing the president about Russia, in particular.“
According to the AP, then-national security adviser John Bolton “told his colleagues” that he personally briefed President Donald Trump on the subject of the reward in March 2019. But Bolton, who is now promoting a book after a prolonged silence about his time at the White House, “did not respond” to questions from the AP about the alleged briefing, and the third-person account remains unconfirmed.
CNN reported Monday night that information on Russian reward offers was in at least one issue of the President’s Daily Brief. According to the New York Times the written briefing was delivered in February, and information about Russian rewards was widely circulated in the intelligence community in May. The AP report says that intelligence first made its way into a PDB, as these documents are called, more than a year ago.
The AP noted that when Bolton appeared on NBC Sunday Meet the press He suggested that Trump alleges ignorance to justify inaction. “You can repudiate everything if no one tells you about it,” Bolton said.
But the problem is not just a matter of concealment, according to various sources, it is a matter of Trump not wanting to know about intelligence outside his comfort zone, and the reluctance of officials to send information about him, they know he will resist. Especially if your conclusions are less than clear. Those may enter a PDB, but not be mentioned in a face-to-face briefing.
Intelligence coming out of Afghanistan, with its many rival factions and shifting alliances, can be especially troublesome. The Daily Beast reported in 2015 that the Taliban were developing their ties with Russia, apparently to fight the Afghan branch of the so-called Islamic State. In the past five years, according to Afghan sources, that cooperation has expanded to include Russian-Taliban cooperation with Iran, with its well-known record of paying rewards for attacks. But the situation has become even more complicated in recent times amid Taliban accusations that ISIS recruits may have worked with former senior Afghan government intelligence officials to plan the assassination of Trump’s peace negotiator, Amb. Zalmay Khalilzad. They are said to believe that Jalilzad is selling to the Taliban.
The person quoted above with knowledge of intelligence circulating in the White House about the Russian offer of rewards to kill Americans told The Daily Beast that they did not dispute accounts suggesting that the information had appeared in at least one PDB. But the source noted that the chances that Trump has read it are only “basically zero.”
A former Trump administration official with knowledge of the president’s intelligence briefings said the assessment of Russian rewards should have been presented directly to the president. But that does not mean it has happened.
Within the national security and intelligence community, some officials raised questions about the methods used to prepare the assessment and whether the information had been corroborated through other sources. Others believed that intelligence reveals a significant change in Russia’s behavior in Afghanistan, and poses immediate risks to US troops on the ground, according to two people who read the talks surrounding the intelligence assessment.
The reluctance to report face-to-face to President Trump followed an old and familiar pattern, officials say. While intelligence officials regularly report to presidents on sensitive issues they do not always have 100 percent confidence in, senior officials in that space and in the national security community have chosen multiple times to avoid reporting to President Trump. Two current and two former senior officials involved in the briefing process told The Daily Beast.
“If there was evidence … even if he is of scant origin, there is an option to get the president’s attention but let him know that he is of scant origin,” said a former senior intelligence official. “If it is less important information, then the intelligence community generally wants to have more confidence. But the intelligence community always makes clear their level of trust. “
Authorities said there is fear about informing the president about Russia, in particular, given his past sensitivity to the issue, and that there is concern that he may post intelligence on social media.
“Trump has little patience for intelligence briefings, especially when the news is not good for him. These briefings happen irregularly and are often free for everyone, “said a former official. “It also shows little respect for classified information and could tweet about it, which would run counter to efforts to handle the problem out of the public eye.”
According to a source with direct knowledge, shortly after Trump learned of the New York Times This weekend, he had two immediate reactions behind closed doors: he reflexively questioned the veracity of the information reported simply because it was printed on the Times, which he frequently denounces as an adversary. And the prospect of more Americans dying as a result of these rewards once again made him emphasize his desire, and his explicit campaign goal, to remove US military personnel from the country from now until November.
“Why are we still there?” Trump breathed privately this weekend when he reacted to the Times reports, according to this source.
It is unclear how far the president will go in the remaining months of his first term to reduce the already reduced number of troops in Afghanistan, given the savage way in which his impulses and orders in foreign conflicts have oscillated between violence and calls for end this costly war forever.
“If President Trump wants to win, he will have to enthuse his base,” said a source close to the White House who has advised the administration on foreign policy matters. “One way to do this is to start bringing troops home from Afghanistan and start delivering on your promises to end these terrible, endless wars.” I know this is something he wants to do before Election Day, even if he just wants to follow it. “
This individual added that, “The poll on this is overwhelming: consistently 70-30 in favor of leaving, and it crosses party lines. But MAGA’s main base in places like Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania would be particularly excited about this. ”
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