OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, known by some as the woke general, penned a ridiculous resignation letter that he never actually had the nerve to send.
The general was appointed to his position by former President Donald Trump in 2019 and has kept the job during President Joe Biden’s administration.
But it was during the last days of the Trump administration that he penned an incredibly arrogant and self-aggrandizing resignation letter to President Trump, chastising him and grandstanding.
But he never actually had the nerve to send it to the president.
The letter has been shown as a published excerpt from a coming book, “The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021,” authored by New Yorker writer Susan Glasser.
It was written during the Black Lives Matter riots following the death of George Floyd when a mob of protesters was vandalizing a church near the White House.
The media claimed that authorities had gotten rid of the protesters so that the president could have a photo op at the church, but it was later reported by the inspector general of the Interior Department that the rioters were removed so that fencing could be installed “in response to the destruction of property and injury to officers.”
Not surprisingly that is not the story that Glasser tells in her book, where she portrays Gen. Milley as a hero.
“Most of the demonstrations had been peaceful, but there were also eruptions of looting, street violence, and arson, including a small fire in St. John’s Church, across from the White House,” she said.
Gen. Milley went to the church with the president, but later, in a video address to the National Defense University graduating class he apologized and said, “I should never have been there.”
“As senior leaders, everything you do will be closely watched, and I am not immune, as many of you saw the result of that photograph of me at Lafayette Square last week,” he said.
“I should not have been there. My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics. As a commissioned, uniformed officer, it was a mistake that I have learned from and I sincerely hope we all can learn from it,” he said.
And as pathetic as that apology sounds, his never sent resignation letter, which he penned after the incident, sounds even more pathetic.
“I regret to inform you that I intend to resign as your Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Thank you for the honor of appointing me as a senior ranking officer. The events of the last couple of weeks have caused me to do deep soul-searching, and I can no longer faithfully support and execute your orders as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It is my belief that you were doing great and irreparable harm to my country. I believe that you have made a concerted effort over time to politicize the United States military. I thought that I could change that. I’ve come to the realization that I cannot, and I need to step aside and let someone else try to do that,” he said in his letter.
“Second, you are using the military to create fear in the minds of the people—and we are trying to protect the American people. I cannot stand idly by and participate in that attack, verbally or otherwise, on the American people. The American people trust their military and they trust us to protect them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and our military will do just that. We will not turn our back on the American people,” the general said.
“Third, I swore an oath to the Constitution of the United States, and embodied within that Constitution is the idea that says that all men and women are created equal. All men and women are created equal, no matter who you are, whether you are white or Black, Asian, Indian, no matter the color of your skin, no matter if you’re gay, straight, or something in between. It doesn’t matter if you’re Catholic, Protestant, Muslim, Jew, or choose not to believe. None of that matters. It doesn’t matter what country you came from, what your last name is—what matters is we’re Americans. We’re all Americans. That under these colors of red, white, and blue—the colors that my parents fought for in World War II—means something around the world. It’s obvious to me that you don’t think of those colors the same way I do. It’s obvious to me that you don’t hold those values dear and the cause that I serve,” he said.
“And lastly it is my deeply held belief that you’re ruining the international order, and causing significant damage to our country overseas, that was fought for so hard by the Greatest Generation that they instituted in 1945. Between 1914 and 1945, 150 million people were slaughtered in the conduct of war. They were slaughtered because of tyrannies and dictatorships. That generation, like every generation, has fought against that, has fought against fascism, has fought against Nazism, has fought against extremism. It’s now obvious to me that you don’t understand that world order. You don’t understand what the war was all about. In fact, you subscribe to many of the principles that we fought against. And I cannot be a party to that. It is with deep regret that I hereby submit my letter of resignation,” he said.
He ultimately did not resign and chose to, as he allegedly said, fight Trump from the inside.
“If they want to court-martial me, or put me in prison, have at it. But I will fight from the inside,” he allegedly said.
