Trump says he told the Pentagon 10,000 National Guard troops would be needed Jan. 6 but was ignored

“I said, ‘Look, this rally is going to be bigger than anyone thinks.’” Trump told Fox News host Steve Hilton Sunday night. “And I said that I think you should have 10,000 — I think I gave the number — I definitely gave the number of 10,000 National Guardsmen, and I think you should have 10,000 of the National Guard ready.”

That matches what Miller told reporter and former CIA lawyer Adam Ciralsky, who wrote a fly-on-the-wall account of Miller’s final week at the Pentagon for Vanity Fair. “‘You’re going to need 10,000 people.’ No, I’m not talking bullshit, he said that,” Miller told Ciralsky of his conversation with Trump. “‘You’re going to need 10,000.’ That’s what he said. Swear to God.”

HERE THE ACCOUNTS DIVERGE: By Trump’s account, “They took that number. From what I understand, they gave it to the people at the Capitol, which is controlled by [House Speaker Nancy] Pelosi. And I heard they rejected it because they didn’t think it would look good. So, you know, that was a big mistake.”

Miller, on the other hand, says he dismissed Trump’s crowd estimate out-of-hand as over-the-top exaggeration. “The president’s sometimes hyperbolic, as you’ve noticed,” he told Vanity Fair. “There were gonna be a million people in the street, I think was his expectation.” And Miller said he explained to Trump he could dispatch the National Guard only if there was a specific request for them.

Trump may have been referring to a Feb. 15 tweet by Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan, an ardent Trump supporter, who alleged that “Capitol Police requested National Guard help prior to January 6th. That request was denied by Speaker Pelosi and her Sergeant-at-Arms.”

FLAWED INTELLIGENCE, NOT BAD OPTICS: The events of the day, and the failure to have adequate reinforcements available to control the mob, have been exhaustively reviewed at two congressional hearings, with another planned for tomorrow to question Department of Homeland Security, FBI, and Pentagon officials for their side of the story.

But at a Feb. 23 hearing, former Capitol Hill Police Chief Steven Sund testified that Paul Irving, the House sergeant-at-arms, believed the security plan, which included 125 National Guard troops on standby, was adequate given the pre-rally intelligence.

“The Jan. 3rd assessment forecast that the protests were, quote, expected to be similar to the previous million MAGA march rallies that had taken place in November and December 2020,” Sund testified. “Every Capitol Police daily intelligence report between January 4th and January 6th, including on January 6th, forecast the chance of civil disobedience or arrest during the protests as remote to improbable.”

“Optics as portrayed in the media played no role whatsoever in my decisions about security. And any suggestion to the contrary is false,” Sund insisted. “We properly planned for a mass demonstration with possible violence. What we got was a military-style coordinated assault on my officers and a violent takeover of the Capitol building,” he said, calling the events he witnessed “the worst attack on law enforcement and our democracy that I have seen in my entire career.”

At no point during the Feb. 23 hearing, nor at a subsequent House Appropriations Subcommittee hearing two days later, was any testimony given or evidence submitted that indicated Nancy Pelosi had anything to do with the decision of how or when to deploy National Guard troops, either before or during the riot.

TWO MORE HEARINGS: The Senate Judiciary Committee will be hearing this morning from FBI Director Chris Wray, who will be pressed on whether the FBI provided adequate intelligence ahead of the Jan. 6 riot.

And tomorrow the Senate Rules and the Homeland Security committees will hold a joint hearing, but the only Pentagon officials testifying will be Robert Salesses, senior official performing the duties of the assistant secretary of defense, homeland defense, and global security, and Maj. Gen. William Walker, the commanding general of the D.C. National Guard.

Missing will be Chris Miller, who told Vanity Fair the criticism the Pentagon was slow to respond to requests for Guard troops was “complete horses—.” “I gotta tell you, I cannot wait to go to the Hill and have those conversations with senators and representatives,” Miller said. But it looks like he won’t be called.

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INSIDE THE LARGEST BALLISTIC MISSILE ATTACK AGAINST AMERICANS EVER: The U.S. Central Command has released a video, first shown on 60 Minutes Sunday night in a segment by veteran CBS Pentagon correspondent David Martin and producer Mary Walsh, that shows from a drone’s eye view the chilling sight of Iranian missiles raining down on the al Asad air base in Iraq Jan. 8 as U.S. troops scrambled to avoid being killed.

The two-minute video clip, recorded by a U.S. drone high overhead, shows six of the 11 Iranian ballistic missiles as they hit the base over the course of an hour and 20 minutes. The missiles, each carrying a 1,000-pound warhead, were deadly accurate and almost certainly would have resulted in American deaths and greater destruction had more than 50 aircraft and roughly half of the 2,000 personnel not been evacuated before the strike.

“Their missiles are accurate,” U.S. Central Commander Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie told Martin. “They fired those missiles to significant range. And they hit pretty much where they wanted to hit.”

The attack 13 months ago came in response to the U.S. drone attack that killed Qasem Soleimani, Iran’s most powerful general, and brought the U.S. and Iran to the brink of war.

The first warning that a strike was coming was when U.S. intelligence revealed Iran had begun fueling more than two dozen ballistic missiles. McKenzie knew he had to move fast to evacuate the base, but not too fast.

Martin: “So the last time the Iranians took a look with their commercially acquired spy photos, what would they have seen?”

McKenzie: “They would have seen airplanes on the ground and people working.”

Martin: “So when they launched those missiles, they thought that was going to be a full flight line.”

McKenzie: “I think they expected to destroy a number of U.S. aircraft and to kill a number of U.S. service members.”

Although at first it appeared there were no U.S. casualties, within days, more than 100 troops were diagnosed with traumatic brain injury, and 28 were awarded purple hearts. “It has never happened in history that a ground force has been exposed to 11 theater ballistic missiles,” said Army Maj. Robert Hales, the top doctor at al Asad.

McKenzie told CBS the evacuation plan probably saved between 100 to 150 lives and 20 or 30 airplanes, and more significantly, averted what could have escalated into a full-scale war. “We had a plan to retaliate if Americans had died,” McKenzie told CBS.

NO PINPRICK: Pentagon spokesman John Kirby, asked by the Washington Examiner’s Abraham Mahshie at yesterday’s briefing about mocking claims from Iranian-backed militias that last week’s U.S. strike on a series of buildings had little effect on their operations, insisted the strike sent a “very strong signal.”

“I haven’t seen those comments,” Kirby said. “I would go back to what I said last week, that this was really designed to do two things: to remove that compound from their utilization of it as an entry control point from Syria into Iraq; and two, to send a very strong signal that we’re not going to tolerate attacks on our people and our Iraqi partners.”

“The airstrike targeted an uninhabited structure … which led to the death of one martyr and some were lightly wounded,” said a post on a Telegram channel affiliated with these Iran-backed militias in Iraq, as reported by the Middle East Media Research Institute, a terrorist monitoring group.

Kirby said the seven 500-pound bombs dropped by two Air Force F-15s Thursday destroyed nine facilities, severely damaged two others, killed one fighter, and wounded two others.

Michael Rubin, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, referred to the target as a “dusty outpost used as a tea stop for militiamen traversing from Iraq into Syria,” and he said the strike was less than proportional.

BOUNTIES OR NO BOUNTIES? Democratic Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth is urging the Biden administration to declassify U.S. intelligence regarding Russia’s alleged offer of bounties to the Taliban to target U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

In a letter to Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines, Duckworth argues that the public, and Gold Star families in particular, “have a pressing need to know if there is any truth to these claims.”

“Despite my persistent attempts to bring transparency to these alarming reports, the Trump administration failed to provide an official response to basic questions: did the United States Government or our partners assess the likelihood of the existence of the GRU bounty payment activity, and did the United States Government find evidence indicating correlation or causation between GRU bounty payments and deadly attacks on U.S. troops by Taliban-linked militants?” Duckworth wrote.

Last September, Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, told NBC News the intelligence was inconclusive. “It just has not been proved to a level of certainty that satisfies me.”

BOLTON’S ARGUMENT: With time growing short, John Bolton is the latest former Trump administration national security official to urge President Biden to keep U.S. troops in Afghanistan past a May 1 deadline, but unlike those who argue withdrawal should be delayed to give the peace process more time, Bolton says the more important rationale is ensuring Afghanistan is not a base for terrorist operations.

“America’s basic interest is not facilitating an abstract Afghan ‘peace process,’” Bolton writes in an op-ed in the Washington Examiner. “While a stable, peaceful Afghanistan could enhance the possibility of preventing terrorist activities emanating from its territory, it is, bluntly stated, not essential.”

“Afghans can do their own nation-building in their own good time if they so desire,” Bolton says. “It is fundamentally important for U.S. security to conduct ‘forward defense’ there … that calculus does not change depending on whether the Afghan government’s military or political performance meets our expectations … If, therefore, it is not in our interest to withdraw, we should not, even if the conflict between the Taliban and non-terrorist Afghans continues indefinitely.”

LETHAL AID TO UKRAINE: The Pentagon has announced a $125 million military aid package for Ukraine, which it says “reaffirms the U.S. commitment to providing defensive lethal weapons to enable Ukraine to more effectively defend itself against Russian aggression.”

“The package announced today will include two [Mark VI] armed patrol boats that’ll help Ukraine defend its territorial waters,” said Pentagon spokesman John Kirby. “That will include some training, equipment, and advisory efforts from this.”

“To date, the U.S. has committed a total of eight Mark VI patrol boats,” which are built by SAFE Boats International, the Pentagon said in a statement. “The package also includes capabilities to enhance the lethality, command and control, and situational awareness of Ukraine’s forces through the provision of additional counter-artillery radars and tactical equipment; continued support for a satellite imagery and analysis capability; and equipment to support military medical treatment and combat evacuation procedures.”

The remaining $150 million in 2021 funds appropriated by Congress will be provided when the Defense Department, in coordination with the Department of State, certifies that Ukraine has made sufficient progress on key defense reforms this year, as required by the National Defense Authorization Act.

INDUSTRY WATCH: The Canadian technology company CAE has announced it has entered an agreement with L3Harris Technologies to acquire its military training business for $1.05 billion.

“The proposed acquisition represents a significant value creation opportunity for all CAE stakeholders. It accelerates our growth strategy in Defence and Security and is highly complementary to our core military training business, broadening our position in the United States,” said Marc Parent, CAE’s president and chief executive officer, in a news release.

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The Rundown

Washington Examiner: Biden spy office deletes three names from declassified report on Khashoggi killing

Washington Examiner: US focused on Saudi Arabia’s ‘future conduct’ after intel report ties crown prince to Khashoggi death

Washington Examiner: Biden team ‘disappointed’ as Iran demands US ‘kneel’ over sanctions relief

Washington Examiner: Pentagon insists Syria strike ‘very strong signal’ despite pinprick claim by militants

Washington Examiner: Veterans groups hope Beau Biden’s death will lead president to help ailing post-9/11 veterans

AP: Saudi envoy disputes crown prince role in Khashoggi killing

PBS NewsHour: Victim advocates say U.S. military gets an ‘F’ on sexual assault prevention

Inside Defense: Austin Holds First Meeting With DOD China Task Force

Breaking Defense: Indo-Pacific Commander Delivers $27 Billion Plan to Congress

Wall Street Journal: U.S. Has Delicate Task In Rallying Allies On China

C4ISRNET: ‘Wakeup Call’: Report Calls For Massive AI Investments To Counter China

Agence France Presse: Biden And Iran Show They’re Tough — And Diplomacy Falters

19fortyfive.com: B-52 Bomber And Hypersonic Missiles: The Ultimate Combo?

The Drive: The Navy Plans To Launch Swarms Of Aerial Drones From Unmanned Submarines And Ships

Seapower Magazine: Admiral Praises Marine Corps’ Last Hornet Carrier Deployment

Military.com: Military May Revisit Making COVID-19 Vaccines Mandatory After FDA Grants Approval

Wall Street Journal: Biden Wrestles With Troop-Pullback Vow

Washington Examiner: John Bolton: Opinion: Biden should stay in Afghanistan

Washington Post: Opinion: Afghans are living in terror. That must change for peace.

Defense News: Opinion: Senators are calling for a US-Israel working group, and it could save lives

Calendar

TUESDAY | MARCH 2

9:30 a.m. G50 Dirksen — Senate Armed Services Committee hearing: “Global Security Challenges and Strategy,” with Thomas Wright, senior fellow, Project on International Order and Strategy at the Brookings Institution; and retired Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, former national security adviser. https://www.armed-services.senate.gov/hearings

10:30 a.m. — House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee hearing: “U.S. Military Service Academies Overview,” with Vice Adm. Sean Buck, superintendent, U.S. Naval Academy; Lt. Gen. Richard Clark, superintendent, U.S. Air Force Academy; Lt. Gen. Darryl Williams, superintendent, U.S. Military Academy West Point. https://appropriations.house.gov/events/hearings

1 p.m. — Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association virtual TechNet Indo-Pacific 2021 forum, with Rear. Adm. Michael Studeman, intelligence director at the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command; Marine Corps Lt. Gen. Dennis Crall, director for command, control, communications and computers/cyber and CIO of the Joint Staff; Army Brig. Gen. Jacqueline “Denise” Brown, command, control, communications and computers/cyber director at the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command; Army Brig. Gen. Robert Parker, joint staff deputy for command, control, communications and computers/cyber at the Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2); Army Brig. Gen. Jeth Rey, director of command and control, communications and computer systems and CIO of the U.S. Central Command. https://events.afcea.org/tip20/public/enter.aspx

WEDNESDAY | MARCH 3

9 a.m. — National Press Club Newsmaker virtual discussion with Air Force Gen. John “Jay” Raymond, chief of space operations for the Space Force. https://www.press.org/events/headliners

9 a.m. — Woodrow Wilson Center Asia Program webinar: “Partners Amid Uncertainties: The Way Forward in Taiwan-India Relations,” I-wei Jennifer Chang, research fellow at the Global Taiwan Institute; Sana Hashmi, visiting fellow at the Taipei Institute of International Relations; Michael Kugelman, senior associate for South Asia at WWC; and Shihoko Goto, senior associate for Northeast Asia in the WWC Asia Program. https://www.wilsoncenter.org/event

10 a.m. G50 Dirksen — Senate Homeland Security and the Senate Rules Committee joint hearing: “Examining The January 6th Attack On The U.S. Capitol, Part II,” with Melissa Smislova, senior official performing the duties of the under secretary, office of intelligence and analysis, Department of Homeland Security; Jill Sanborn, assistant director, FBI Counterterrorism Division, Maj. Gen. William Walker, commanding general of the D.C. National Guard, and Robert Salesses, senior official performing the duties of the assistant secretary of defense, homeland defense and global security. https://www.rules.senate.gov/hearings

10:30 a.m. — Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress virtual book discussion on: The Spymaster of Baghdad, an account of how a covert Iraqi intelligence unit called “the Falcons” came together to defeat ISIS, with author Margaret Coker, investigative journalist and editor-in-chief, The Current. https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register

THURSDAY | MARCH 4

4 a.m. — NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg will address the College of Europe in Bruges (Belgium) on the topic: “NATO: keeping Europe safe in an uncertain world.” https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news

9:30 a.m. 106 Dirksen — Senate Armed Services Committee confirmation hearing for Colin Kahl to be under secretary of defense for policy. https://www.armed-services.senate.gov

10 a.m. — Carnegie Endowment for International Peace webinar: “Unraveling the Conflict in Syria,” with Maha Yahya, director of the Carnegie Middle East Center; and Joby Warrick, reporter at the Washington Post and author of Red Line: The Unraveling of Syria and America’s Race to Destroy the Most Dangerous Arsenal in the World. https://carnegieendowment.org

11 a.m. — Back from the Brink and the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons virtual forum: “Ending Nuclear Weapons Before They End Us: Opportunities Under the Biden Administration to Take Action,” with former Acting Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Thomas Countryman, chairman of the board of the Arms Control Association; Danny Hall, director of public affairs at Soka Gakkai International; Zia Mian, co-director of Princeton University’s Program on Science and Global Security; Michael Klare, professor at Hampshire College; Beatrice Fihn, executive director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons; and Denise Duffield, associate director of Physicians for Social Responsibility at Los Angeles. https://preventnuclearwar.org

11:30 a.m. — Atlantic Council webinar: “The Future of ISIS,” with former Jordanian Minister of Youth and Culture Mohammed Abu Rumman, expert at the Politics and Society Institute; former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Iran and Iraq Andrew Peek, nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council; Borzou Daragahi, journalist and nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council; Mara Revkin, national security law fellow at the Georgetown University Law Center; and Banan Malkawi, Jordanian-American researcher and lecturer. https://www.atlanticcouncil.org

2 p.m. — Brookings Institution webinar: “Strategic Nuclear Modernization in the United States,” with Tom Collina, director of policy at the Ploughshares Fund; Franklin Miller, principal at the Scowcroft Group; Amy Woolf, specialist in nuclear weapons policy at the Congressional Research Service; Madelyn Creedon, nonresident senior fellow at Brookings; and Frank Rose, co-director of the Brookings Center for Security, Strategy, and Technology. https://www.brookings.edu/events

FRIDAY | MARCH 5

10 a.m. — International Institute for Strategic Studies webinar: “Can Europe Defend Itself?” with Barry Posen, political science professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Bastian Giegerich, director of defense and military analysis at IISS; Francois Heisbourg, senior adviser for Europe at IISS; and Dana Allin, senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy and transatlantic affairs at IISS. https://www.iiss.org/events

11 a.m. — Brookings Institution webcast conversation with House Armed Services Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., moderated by Michael O’Hanlon, senior fellow and co-director, Center for Security, Strategy, and Technology, Brookings. https://www.brookings.edu/events

12 p.m. — Hudson Institute webinar: “Competing with China Through Budget Agility,” with Air Force Deputy Chief of Staff for Strategy, Integration and Requirements Lt. Gen. S. Clinton Hinote; Michael Brown, director of the Defense Department’s Defense Innovation Unit; former Defense Deputy Undersecretary for Industrial Policy Bill Greenwalt, visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute; former Defense Department Comptroller Elaine McCusker, resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute; and Dan Patt, adjunct fellow at the Hudson Center for Defense Concepts and Technology. https://www.hudson.org/events

1:50 p.m. — Jackson Institute for Global Affairs at Yale University Special Operations Forces Conference: “Artificial Intelligence and Big Data and its impact on SOF, Defence, and Great Power Competition, “ with Snehal Antani, chief technology officer within the U.S. Special Operations Command; Lt. Gen. Michael Groen, director of the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center; Chris Lynch, CEO of Rebellion Defense; and Charles Forte, chief information officer for the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence. https://yaleconnect.yale.edu/jacksonsofcon/home

3 p.m. — Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute virtual event: “Assessing the State of Our National Defense,” with former Secretaries of Defense Mark Esper and Leon Panetta, and former national security adviser retired Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster. https://www.reaganfoundation.org

WEDNESDAY | MARCH 10

3 p.m. — Heritage Foundation virtual event: “Lessons from the West Capella Incident: Successful Naval Presence in the South China Sea,” with David Stilwell, former assistant secretary of state for east asian and pacific affairs; and Brent Sadler, Brent Sadler, senior fellow for aval warfare and advanced technology, Heritage. https://www.heritage.org/asia/event

THURSDAY | MARCH 11

11 a.m. — National Taxpayers Union and R Street Zoom webinar: “Pentagon Purse Strings Episode 3: An Interview with Lisa Hershman, former Chief Management Officer of the Pentagon,” with Jonathan Bydlak, R Street Institute; Andrew Lautz, National Taxpayers Union; Mark Cancian, senior adviser with the CSIS International Security Program. https://rstreet-org.zoom.us/webinar/register