Def Sec Mattis in tight spot with Trump's border-troops nonsense
When President Donald Trump issues an election-time order to send up to 15,000 troops to confront what experts say is a non-existent threat on the U.S.-Mexico border, what should Defense Secretary Jim Mattis do about it?
Mattis’ answer, so far, has been to support the president and mostly keep his mouth shut. He gruffly batted back a reporter’s question Wednesday about whether Trump’s troop deployment order was a political stunt by saying: “We don’t do stunts in this department.” Unfortunately, some of Mattis’ colleagues fear he’s doing just that, in implicitly backing Trump’s incendiary talk of an immigrant “invasion” that requires sending active-duty troops.
Watching Mattis walk the Trump tightrope is agonizing. For many Americans, the retired Marine four-star general is the model of a stand-up guy — the sort of independent, experienced leader who can steady the nation in a time of division. But in dealing with Trump, Mattis often takes a seat and quietly accommodates the president’s erratic and divisive rhetoric — evidently believing that it’s better to hold fire and work from inside to sustain sensible policies.
The danger for Mattis now is that he may be losing credibility on both sides. Trump no longer seems to trust him fully, and some Pentagon colleagues wonder why he doesn’t speak out more forcefully about unwise policies. Mattis’ role in the administration is precious, but so is his credibility as a truth-teller — which is his ultimate legacy beyond any position or medal.
The border deployment is troubling for Marines of Mattis’ generation because they remember an incident in West Texas in May 1997. As part of a detachment of Marines assisting anti-drug operations, Corporal Clemente Banuelos shot and killed an 18-year-old American goat herder. Banuelos thought he was returning hostile fire.
The lesson for military officers back then was that active-duty troops, trained to kill enemies, shouldn’t be used for policing actions — especially in border-security matters that were highly politicized, then as now. It was “an unfortunate use of Marines,” remembers Lt. Gen. Greg Newbold, a retired Marine who’s a longtime friend of Mattis.
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