Restraining Trump

If Trump didn’t start any new wars, it wasn’t because he didn’t want to start them, but because people at the Pentagon kept shooting down the ideas.

There were some notable claims that Mark Esper made in his interview with 60 Minutes last night:

When CBS' Norah O'Donnell asked Esper during the "60 Minutes" interview for examples, he cited a proposal to "take military action against Venezuela," to "strike Iran" and, "at one point, somebody proposed we blockade Cuba."

One of the favorite talking points of Trumpists is that Trump didn’t start any new wars. Leaving aside the facts that he very nearly did more than once and he escalated every other war he inherited, this has been their only real defense against critics of Trump’s foreign policy record. Obviously Esper has his own agenda and he is trying to sell a book, but these claims about the Trump White House’s constant agitation for military action against other countries ring true. If Trump didn’t start any new wars, it wasn’t because he didn’t want to start them, but because people at the Pentagon kept shooting down the ideas.