James Mattis in Trump Cabinet members actions and issues
On War & Peace:
U.S. should keep a small force in Iraq
In [Mattis' new book, "Call Sign Chaos: Learning to Lead,"] Chapter 15, entitled "Snatching Defeat From The Jaws of Victory," Mattis goes on at length about his advice that the
U.S. should have kept at least a small force in Iraq rather than pull out completely in 2011. Mattis was then head of Central Command, overseeing the U.S. war efforts in Iraq.
However, "beginning with President Bush and continuing through the Obama administration, the White House was set on a total troop withdrawal, for political reasons,"
Mattis writes. "I argued strongly that any vacuum left in our wake would be filled by Sunni terrorists and Iran."
Source: NPR Morning Edition on Trump Cabinet
Sep 2, 2019
On War & Peace:
U.S. should keep a small force in Syria
He left the Trump administration after the president declared that he wanted to pull U.S. forces out of Syria. Those U.S. troops helped drive the
Islamic State out of the territory it once held, but Mattis and other military leaders have indicated they would like to keep at least a small force in Syria--which remains the case so far.
Source: NPR Morning Edition on Trump Cabinet
Sep 2, 2019
On War & Peace:
U.S. should keep a small force in Afghanistan
President Obama said in 2011 that he would draw down troops in Afghanistan (in addition to the complete withdrawal in Iraq). "I had been assigned two contradictory objectives," Mattis writes. "The forces under my command at
CENTCOM were to degrade the Taliban while building up the Afghan army. They were also to withdraw on a strict timetable, independent of circumstances on the ground. We could do one or the other, but not both."
Source: NPR Morning Edition on Trump Cabinet
Sep 2, 2019
On War & Peace:
Led Marines in Iraq, Afghanistan, and overall Mideast
Secretary Mattis enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve at the age of 18. After graduating from Central Washington University in 1971, he was commissioned a second lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps.During his more than four decades in uniform,
Secretary Mattis commanded Marines at all levels, from an infantry rifle platoon to a Marine Expeditionary Force. He led an infantry battalion in Iraq in 1991, an expeditionary brigade in Afghanistan after the 9/11 terror attack in 2001, a
Marine Division in the initial attack and subsequent stability operations in Iraq in 2003, and led all U.S. Marine Forces in the Middle East as Commander of the U.S. Marine Forces Central Command.
During his non-combat assignments, Secretary Mattis
served as Senior Military Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Defense; as Director, Marine Corps Manpower Plans & Policy; as Commanding General, Marine Corps Combat Development Command; and as Executive Secretary to the Secretary of Defense.
Source: DOD official website for Trump Cabinet biographies
Dec 31, 2018
On War & Peace:
Resigns in wake of announcement of withdrawal from Syria
Just two days after US Secretary of Defense James Mattis quit, the top US envoy leading the global coalition fighting ISIS, Brett McGurk, also resigned as Washington reeled from US President Donald Trump's dramatic announcement that he planned to pull
US troops out of Syria.McGurk, in his resignation letter, said that the militants were still on the run but not yet defeated, and that the early withdrawal of American troops from Syria would re-create the conditions that gave rise to ISIS. Mattis
did not mention Syria specifically in his resignation letter, but he did speak of a difference of opinion between himself and Trump.
"You have the right to have a Secretary of Defense whose views are better aligned with yours on these and other
subjects," Mattis wrote. "I believe it is right for me to step down from my position. The end date for my tenure is February 28, 2019, a date that should allow sufficient time for a successor to be nominated and confirmed," he added.
Source: Jerusalem Post on 2018 Trump Cabinet
Dec 22, 2018
On War & Peace:
Keep U.S. troops in Syria indefinitely to defeat ISIS
In April, President Trump vowed to bring American troops home from Syria. "I want to get out," he said during a press conference. The United States had spent trillions of dollars in the Middle East over the past 17 years, he complained. "We get nothing--
nothing out of it." He called it "a horrible thing." The US had been "very successful against ISIS," he said, "but sometimes it's time to come back home."By then, 95% of the ISIS pseudo-caliphate in Syria and Iraq--once the size of Indiana--had been
liberated. No longer. ISIS is now making a comeback. Two stunning reports this month--by the United Nations and Trump's own Defense Department--both contradict earlier US claims that most ISIS fighters had been eliminated. The Pentagon report [says]
ISIS has successfully morphed from a proto-state into a "covert global network, with a weakened yet enduring core" in Iraq and Syria.
So the Trump Administration has reversed course; it is now keeping U.S. troops in Syria indefinitely.
Source: The New Yorker on 2018 Trump Cabinet
Aug 30, 2018
Page last updated: Dec 03, 2021