Passing Wind
Journal
Or in the Vernacular
Little More Than a Spent Fart
On pages 187-8 of Blowback by Miles Taylor I read this today.
I
In the second year of the Trump administration, the president visited a counter-drug operation in Florida. The interagency outpost, jointly overseen by DHS and the Defense Department, was responsible for monitoring the flow of narcotics into the United States, as well as other illicit traffic coming up through the Southern Hemisphere. I helped organize the trip to the command center with the hope of focusing Trump's attention on the surge of fentanyl into the country - and cracking down on the criminal networks responsible for smuggling the drug.
Trump stared in wonderment at the array of TV screens on the wall. Small blips showed where suspected traffickers were moving. He was briefed on all the ways we could track the cartel mules and the maritime forces on standby to intercept the drugs. Unsurprisingly, Trump was more interested in how this vast enterprise could be used to capture illegal immigrants. So were his staff members.
And it is that last sentence, so were his staff members, that really frightens me. I meet many people who are ardent democrats here in Britain, people who believe in freedom and democracy. I also meet people, friends, who ardent trump heights.
Now, if that is the case here in Britain, then I asked myself, what on earth must it be like in the USA?
An hour or two later a read on.
II
On the flight back to Washington, D.C., Trump adviser Stephen Miller took a seat next to me to float an idea. Across from us at a small table sat the commandant of the Coast Guard, Admiral Paul Zukunft. “Admiral, the military has aerial drones, correct?” Stephen enquired.
“Yes”, Zukunft replied.
“And some of those drones are equipped with missiles, correct?”
“Sure,” the commandant answered, clearly wondering where the line of questioning was going.
“And when a boat full of migrants is in international waters, they aren't protected by the U.S. Constitution, right?”
“Technically, no, but I'm not sure what you're getting at.”
“Tell me why, then, can't we use a Predator drone to obliterate that boat?”
Admiral Zukunft looked nonplussed. “Because, Stephen, it would be against international law.”
Miller pushed back. The United States launched air strikes on terrorists in disputed areas all the time, he said, or retaliated against pirates commandeering ships off the coast of Somalia.
The Coast Guard chief calmly explained the difference. America attacked enemy forces when they were armed and posed an imminent threat. Seafaring migrants were generally unarmed civilians.
They went back and forth on the topic for a few minutes. Stephen wasn't interested in the moral conflict of drone-bombing migrants. He wanted to know whether anyone could stop America from doing it. N
“Admiral,” he said to the military chief nearly 30 years his senior, “I don't think you understand the limitations of international law.”
In actuality, the retiring Admiral didn't understand the White House’s limitations, or lack thereof. International law meant nothing to the MAGA crowd. According to former defence secretary Mark Esper, when officials were watching a live feed of the raid against the leader of ISIS, Stephen Miller reportedly proposed beheading the militant, dipping his head in pig's blood as an affront to Muslims, and parading it around as a warning. Esper says he had to tell the Trump aide that such an action would be a war crime. (Miller denied that the episode occurred.)
The account continues...
19 October 2023
All Rights Reserved
LIVERPOOL
© 2023 Kenneth Thomas Webb
Digital art by KTW
Newsletter
A Warning
“If we elect another hyper-populist president, the shield will be turned into a political weapon.”
Miles Taylor
Former Chief of Staff Department of Homeland Security during the Trump Administration.
On the road to self-destruction
Personal marginal notes - KTW
Ken Webb is a writer and proofreader. His website, kennwebb.com, showcases his work as a writer, blogger and podcaster, resting on his successive careers as a police officer, progressing to a junior lawyer in succession and trusts as a Fellow of the Institute of Legal Executives, a retired officer with the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve, and latterly, for three years, the owner and editor of two lifestyle magazines in Liverpool.
He also just handed over a successful two year chairmanship in Gloucestershire with Cheltenham Regency Probus.
Pandemic aside, he spends his time equally between his city, Liverpool, and the county of his birth, Gloucestershire.
In this fast-paced present age, proof-reading is essential. And this skill also occasionally leads to copy-editing writers’ manuscripts for submission to publishers and also student and post graduate dissertations.
