At War with Ourselves

h.r. mcmaster, at war with ourselves, my tour of duty in the trump white house.

the inner workings of the white house often remain shrouded in mystery, especially when the administration is characterized by upheaval and unpredictability.

if it weren't for insider accounts, that shroud might forever remain unpierced.

many insiders have spoken about the dysfunction of the trump administration, but few can speak with the authority of general h.r. mcmaster, who served as trump's national security advisor for one very long year.

mcmaster came into the job with a specific goal of advancing the interests of the country's long-term strategic stability and national security, but he was soon mired in a swamp of egos, deceit, and power struggles, all of which made his work increasingly difficult.

it proved to be one of the toughest tours of duty he had ever undertaken.

this chapter takes you behind the scenes, giving unparalleled insider insights into what it really takes to advise the president of the united states.

ready?

then let's follow mcmaster into the lion's den.

the call of duty.

it's february 2017 and the white house is in turmoil.

president trump's national security advisor, michael flynn, has resigned after a mere 24 days.

the president is desperate.

he needs to project stability and defeat the negative headlines, and to find someone who can quickly get the administration back on track.

enter h.r. mcmaster, a decorated, no-nonsense general known on both sides of the aisle for his intellect and integrity.

he has no idea that the next months of his life will put his skills to the test in ways he never thought possible.

it all starts off with a call.

mcmaster picks up and on the other end of the line is the white house deputy chief of staff who invites him to mar-a-lago for an interview with president trump.

less than 24 hours later, mcmaster is sitting across from trump in his lavish florida residence.

this meeting will end up changing his life forever.

the interview gets off to a quintessentially trumpian start.

as mcmaster takes his seat, the president points to a pile of newspapers on his desk.

he tells mcmaster that he's never seen anyone get such glowing praise in the press.

turning to cia director mike pompeo, he jokes that not even pompeo gets such good press.

niceties aside, the meeting starts to take a more serious tone.

trump starts to grill mcmaster on pressing issues.

north korea, china, isis.

true to his no-nonsense reputation, mcmaster gives straight-to-the-point answers.

something seems to click with trump, especially after the general mentions the importance of a broad military strategy, one that also takes diplomatic and economic pressure into account.

it's clear, effective strategy isn't solely about military power.

as the meeting begins to wind down, trump leans back with a satisfied look.

when can you start?

he asks.

mcmaster is caught off guard, but years of military training allow him to keep his composure.

right away, he says.

and just like that, mcmaster is thrust into one of the most important advisory positions in the world, national security advisor to the president of the united states.

almost exactly 24 hours after this meeting, mcmaster entered the white house for the first time in his new role.

just over a year later, relieved of his position, he would exit the building.

during his tenure, he would ruffle plenty of feathers, and ultimately, this would cost him his job.

a clash of personalities.

things started off innocently enough.

after accepting the role, he immediately set about establishing order within the national security council, or nsc, or at least attempted to.

this was easier said than done.

among the personalities he would soon clash with was steve bannon, whose appointment to the nsc had shocked many in washington and beyond.

bannon was trump's chief strategist during his presidential campaign, as well as former head of breitbart news, a right-wing website.

the involvement of someone with his background was highly irregular for the nsc, a body which traditionally avoided partisan influence.

so, mcmaster got to work making sure bannon wouldn't hold sway over the council for much longer.

he sought to explain to trump that bannon's presence was responsible for the chaos and leaks that were plaguing the council, and even the administration as a whole.

the tension between bannon and mcmaster continued to build over the next month.

by april, the general had had enough.

he confronted trump directly, telling him that bannon needed to go.

in a rare concession from the president, trump agreed.

and that was that.

bannon was off the council, and his influence on national security matters decreased.

unfortunately, it was a pyrrhic victory for mcmaster.

bannon's influence, though diminished, lingered on, and the general knew he'd made a powerful enemy.

by summer, mcmaster had finally managed to establish a semblance of stability within the nsc.

regular meetings became the norm, and decision-making was now a structured and deliberate process rather than a chaotic free-for-all.

with order restored, he was able to articulate and prioritize his vision for a paradigm shift in national security focus.

instead of the reactive, short-termism of the recent past, he proposed a long-term, comprehensive strategy.

that way, america's national security could extend beyond immediate responses, and instead rely on a new and improved culture of strategic foresight.

however, all of this was made difficult by the fact that he was serving under a rather unpredictable and impulsive leader.

mcmaster even started to see parallels between trump and former president lyndon b. johnson.

indeed, both evinced susceptibility to manipulation by those around them, especially those who knew how to provoke their ego.

bannon was particularly adept in this regard.

even though he was officially off the council, he was still serving as a chief advisor to the president.

he knew how to get under trump's skin better than anybody, fueling the president's sense of being constantly under attack.

mcmaster started to see bannon and his acolytes as akin to the witches in macbeth, a band of weird brothers whispering poison in trump's ear.

mcmaster was up against nefarious forces.

how would he get his job done?

the challenge of a lifetime it turned out that working under trump was challenging, to say the least.

but it didn't take long for mcmaster to realize the best way to make sure things stayed on track.

keep trump as grounded as possible, and stay focused on national interests.

this was because restraining the president's impulses was all but impossible.

so instead, the general decided that preparation would be his chief weapon.

for example, before an important nsc meeting on afghanistan, mcmaster had an idea.

he arranged for trump to meet with soldiers who'd recently returned from tours of duty, hoping that their firsthand accounts might help counteract trump's preconceived notions of the situation on the ground.

it worked.

by providing trump with unfiltered human stories, mcmaster successfully bridged the gap between military strategy and the personal sacrifices made by the troops.

mcmaster decided to employ visual storytelling, too.

on one occasion, he presented trump with contrasting images of kabul during taliban rule, and kabul in 2017, showing the city's improved state.

trump was a keen visual learner, and such imagery proved helpful to show the human impact of american strategic decisions.

for the president, it made policy decisions seem more tangible and real.

on many occasions, mcmaster also found himself face-to-face with a president filled with self-doubt, and this could lead to last-minute policy changes.

in one instance, trump wavered before giving a speech on the administration's afghanistan strategy.

being generally averse to nation-building, trump had needed to be convinced to extend the american mission in the country.

so, in this particular moment of doubt, it was down to mcmaster to remind the president of the long-term strategic importance of his decision.

in the end, trump reluctantly agreed, indicating he would stick to his initial decision, but only for mcmaster.

the general replied that the president should never do anything for him, only for the country.

sometimes things slipped through the cracks, and the president's impulsiveness got the better of him.

on one occasion, trump was on his way to the united nations to give an important speech.

out of nowhere, he updated the wording of the speech to include the phrase, totally destroy north korea.

diplomatic mayhem ensued.

in these situations, mcmaster's role turned into that of a damage control specialist.

it was up to him in the aftermath of such events to help shift the focus back to america's long-term interests.

the general later confided to henry kissinger that working under trump felt like walking a tightrope over treacherous terrain, but by choosing his battles, he was able to moderate the president's more erratic tendencies, at least for a time.

but trouble was brewing on the horizon.

titans of security the months wore on, and as they did, tensions increased, particularly between mcmaster and two of trump's top cabinet members, secretary of state rex tillerson and secretary of defense jim mattis.

in an ideal world, the three of them would have been working together to craft coherent foreign policy decisions.

but in reality, a power struggle was brewing, and mcmaster was finding it hard to keep his head above water.

of course, things had been difficult since day one.

both tillerson and mattis viewed mcmaster's very presence with intense skepticism.

on the one hand, tillerson didn't like what he perceived as white house interference in state department matters.

he went to great lengths to sideline mcmaster's nsc staff.

in some cases, he flat-out refused to let them attend state department policy discussions and made it difficult for them to connect with counterparts in his department.

this meant that there wasn't a whole lot of coordination on important issues, which delayed decision-making and sometimes prevented mcmaster from providing timely advice to the president.

defense secretary mattis, on the other hand, took a more calculated approach.

in many ways, mcmaster and mattis were quite similar.

they were both generals, and they both strove to contain trump's impulsiveness.

but that's where their similarities ended.

mattis preferred working directly with trump.

this meant bypassing nsc processes whenever possible, as he thought this would allow him greater control over the president's decision-making.

so what mcmaster hoped would be a productive relationship quickly descended into acrimony.

this accelerated when mattis started restricting his access to top generals.

by impeding cooperation between the nsc and the defense department, mattis made it impossible to effectively collaborate on issues like iran and north korea.

this led to even further fragmentation of the administration's foreign policy development.

by late june, tensions finally came to a head during a meeting between mcmaster and tillerson.

mcmaster remained calm and respectful, trying to address tillerson's concerns about the nsc's role in shaping policy.

tillerson made it clear that it wasn't just about coordinating between departments.

he wanted the state department to have more control over advising the president on foreign policy, and seemed resistant to alternative input from the nsc.

for tillerson, this was about protecting his department's authority, which he felt was being undermined.

it wasn't only challenges from inside the administration that mcmaster had to reckon with, though.

external forces were also closing in.

in august, coordinated calls for his removal began to appear in alt-right outlets.

conservative activists followed suit.

it was clear that bannon and his allies were behind it.

were mcmaster's past decisions coming back to haunt him?

one step forward, two steps back.

mcmaster found himself facing an attack that he could never have foreseen.

the charges against him were as wide-ranging as they were fantastical, but they seemed to be gaining traction.

some accused him of being a globalist, intent on sabotaging the president's america first agenda.

others labeled him as anti-israel, or simply as out of step with trump's populist base.

all of this was then amplified by russian bots and trolls.

and with each wave of attack, mcmaster felt his standing in the white house erode further.

then members of his team started receiving threats.

the mood was now firmly one of chaos and isolation.

and while mcmaster still had trump's public support, the relentless nature of the onslaught was making his work increasingly difficult.

all the while, trump's erratic shifts in policy were only making things harder.

mcmaster's goal was to maintain long-term pressure on u.s. rivals, especially syria and afghanistan.

every time the president changed his mind, however, regional powers like turkey or russia seized the opportunity to flex their muscles.

u.s. allies, on the other hand, were regularly expressing their frustration with unpredictable american decision-making.

as hard as mcmaster tried to provide guidance, the president's impulsiveness meant it was often one step forward, two steps back.

then 2018 arrived, and with it the annual world economic forum.

with rumors of his impending departure swirling through the administration, mcmaster stayed as focused as possible.

he knew that the forum was a critical opportunity to promote the administration's long-term strategic agenda, so he spent long hours preparing all the necessary briefings for the president.

in mcmaster's eyes, the top of the agenda had to be china and the administration's shift from engagement to competition.

but the journey to the summit aboard air force one did not go well.

mcmaster attempted to make clear to the president the importance of articulating the administration's position on china's aggressive economic expansion.

trump, however, seemed more excited about the headlines that his attendance was generating.

what's more, his prepared speech was mostly focused on america's strong economy and on broadcasting that the country was open for business.

unfortunately, mcmaster's hopes for a last-minute change of heart weren't realized.

trump delivered a speech that combined america-first rhetoric with reassurances to the global elite, effectively diluting the key points mcmaster wanted to emphasize.

and with the spectacle of trump attending the event dominating the headlines, mcmaster couldn't help but feel that important strategic messages weren't reaching america's adversaries.

indeed, with each passing day, mcmaster felt his influence slipping away.

departures and reflections after arriving back in washington, it wasn't long until mcmaster was confronted with yet another crisis.

the poisoning of russian spy sergei skripal and his daughter on british soil.

trump's response to the kremlin's flagrant act of aggression would be key to projecting american power.

mcmaster knew he had to give everything to convince the president to make the right call and project american strength.

he recommended expelling diplomats straight away, as well as implementing strict sanctions against kremlin officials.

trump seemed hesitant, however.

on one hand, he didn't seem to fully believe the intelligence implicating the kremlin.

but mcmaster persisted.

he explained that failure to respond would both embolden america's adversaries and cut against the international condemnation of chemical weapons.

in the end, the president chose to delay any response, and mcmaster was left feeling frustrated and more isolated than ever.

a few weeks later, trump did finally expel 60 russian diplomats.

one of the largest russian ejections since the cold war.

but the winds of change were blowing in the white house.

colleagues who mcmaster had previously considered allies were beginning to turn on him.

chief of staff john kelly, for instance, started meeting tillerson and mattis without his knowledge.

mcmaster was essentially being sidelined from taking part in many key decisions.

clearly, the end was near.

as winter turned to spring, speculation about his position ran wild in the dc press.

rumors and whispers in the west wing seemed to confirm his imminent dismissal.

mcmaster, ever the professional, kept going about his duties.

but he knew it was not to last.

then finally, on march 22nd, trump called mcmaster to inform him of his decision to replace him with the hawkish john bolton.

this made it clear that mcmaster's consensus-driven approach to national security had been passed over for a more aggressive stance.

trump thanked mcmaster for his service, and the general offered to assist with the transition.

he even offered to personally brief bolton on the key issues involved in his work.

mcmaster's final day in the white house was as bittersweet as it was emotional.

he expressed gratitude to the nsc staff who had stood with him during a very challenging year, and then proceeded to make his final departure from the west wing as national security advisor.

as he was driven past the jefferson memorial, he looked out the window.

it was cold outside, but the cherry trees, which had stood skeletal and leafless all winter, were beginning to blossom.

soon they'd be covered in flowers.

in this chapter-2, at war with ourselves, by h.r. mcmaster, you've learned that h.r. mcmaster's one-year tenure as national security advisor can be captured in one word, chaos.

this is because the general's mission of establishing the united states' long-term security strategy took place in an administration known for its unpredictability and inflated egos.

all of this notwithstanding, mcmaster maintained a no-nonsense approach throughout his tour of duty, and did his best to further u.s. interests both at home and abroad.

okay, that's it for this chapter.

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