SECDEF Mattis/SECSTATE Pompeo Frustrated With NSC Adviser Bolton – Bolton is not holding National Security Council principals meetings. In the national security arena, the interagency process has broken down.

Cabinet chiefs feel shut out of Bolton’s ‘efficient’ policy process

Defense Secretary James Mattis has gone so far as to draft a letter requesting the national security adviser hold more gatherings of agency and department chiefs.

Extract: National security adviser John Bolton’s effort to simplify the administration’s decision-making process is frustrating Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary James Mattis and causing confusion about the United States’ position on major issues including Russia, according to officials familiar with the situation.

Mattis has drafted a letter to Bolton requesting that he hold more gatherings of agency and department chiefs “to smooth the bubble” on thorny issues ranging from U.S. policy in Syria to North Korea. Senior officials are concerned about the dearth of National Security Council (NSC) “principals committee” meetings scheduled by Bolton, officials say.

Of special concern is the U.S. relationship with Russia, especially since Trump’s July 16 meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin with only translators present. Officials across U.S. agencies have been trying to figure out what Trump and Putin discussed. Russian officials, meanwhile, have taken advantage of the U.S. confusion to make a series of announcements about what they say Trump and Putin agreed upon. Bolton did not convene any NSC principals committee meetings to discuss the Trump-Putin summit ahead of time, and hasn’t held any such meetings on the issue since the event took place.

Bolton is taking steps that could assuage these concerns, convening at least three high-level meetings this week to tackle U.S. policy on Iran, North Korea and election security.

Defenders say Bolton, who held top national security positions during the George W. Bush administration, is simply cutting unnecessary bureaucratic red tape, pushing the nitty-gritty discussions to lower levels.

But across the U.S. national security establishment, there’s a growing sense of a breakdown in the policy process since Bolton took over the National Security Council on April 9.

“The rest of the government doesn’t really know what the policy is. There’s no record, there’s no decision form. There’s nothing out there to fall back on,” said Ivo Daalder, a former U.S. ambassador to NATO who is now president of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. “Countries that we deal with don’t really know what our policy is because people in the government don’t know.”

A person familiar with the situation, noting Bolton’s reputation as a fierce bureaucratic knife-fighter, added: “There is a sense that Bolton isn’t necessarily representing the full views of State and the Pentagon regarding some issues to the president.”

This week, Bolton has scheduled a formal National Security Council meeting — so-called because the president sits in on the gathering along with the agency and department chiefs — to talk about election security, two White House officials said. The meeting will likely tackle the subject of Russia, which U.S. intelligence officials say interfered in the 2016 campaign to help Trump win. The president has downplayed this conclusion while trying to gain favor with Putin, recently drawing bipartisan condemnation for his comments on the subject during a joint press conference with the Russian leader.

Bolton also has scheduled two principals’ committee meetings to discuss Iran and North Korea this week.

The National Security Council generally doesn’t publicize the meetings it convenes. The main meetings in question are gatherings of the “PC,” or principals committee, which includes Cabinet members who deal with national security issues. There also appears to be fewer meetings of the “DC,” or “deputies committee,” which includes the No. 2 officials from key departments and agencies, according to current and former NSC staffers.

In principals’ committee meetings, top aides to the president can discuss and hash out key aspects of major policy issues. The meetings also typically produce a record for those at lower levels in an attempt to put everyone on the same page about final decisions.

“Through the process of debate and deliberation, ideas get pressure-tested, and some are dismissed as not feasible or not wise,” said Brian McKeon, a former top NSC official. “The process also has the virtue of improving support and buy-in from departments and agencies. If the leadership of the agencies believe they’ve been given a chance to have their say and contribute to the decision, in theory you’ll have less griping, leaking or efforts to re-litigate decisions.”

Bolton’s No. 2, Mira Ricardel, has convened at least two dozen deputies committee meetings, said a White House official, who would not say how many principals’ committee meetings have been held. Other observers noted that even though Scowcroft (often cited as a role model by successors) may have tried to be judicious in his use of principals committee meetings, he still held them regularly, especially in the run-up to major events. In fact, Scowcroft is credited with establishing the modern NSC structure that includes the principals committee.

Some analysts wondered whether Bolton has had fewer principals committee meetings in part because he’s trying to reduce the possibility the discussions will get leaked to the media. Bolton is also known to be a voracious reader and NSC staffers are expected to regularly provide his office with updates on their subjects.

Pompeo’s frustration over the lack of principals committee meetings was confirmed by a senior administration official, although State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert dismissed the idea that there’s a problem.

Bolton also has not held a town hall for NSC staffers. Some say this is a missed opportunity because such a gathering could help improve morale within the NSC, which took a hit after Trump fired the well-regarded McMaster to make way for Bolton.

“He’s a jovial, funny guy,” an NSC staffer said of Bolton. “But not a lot of people get face-time with him.”

Some analysts and former officials said Bolton may have decided to ease up on the number of meetings at high levels because Trump isn’t necessarily interested in being presented with an array of options.”He doesn’t care about formal process. He doesn’t care about advice,” Daalder said of Trump. For more, please see the hyperlink below:

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/07/25/bolton-cabinet-meetings-mattis-pompeo-trump-740429

St-Louis Post-Dispatch, 25 July 2018, David Ignatius: Trump thinks he’s his own best foreign policy adviser

Extract: The Helsinki summit showed that Trump thinks he’s his own best foreign policy adviser. The formal interagency process that traditionally surrounds such big events all but disappeared for the U.S.-Russia encounter, with no full National Security Council meetings to prepare for Helsinki and none last week to discuss its results.

Trump chose to go it alone with Russian President Vladimir Putin, literally and figuratively. Officials who wanted to know what happened had to read the president’s tweets or White House press briefings.

I don’t think there is an interagency process now,” cautioned one prominent Republican foreign policy expert. “Trump glories in not listening to advisers. He trusts his instincts, as uninformed as they sometimes are.”

Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker and one of Trump’s closest informal advisers, outlined the challenge in an interview Tuesday: “A major problem for Trump is that he’s a golfer; he doesn’t play a team sport. The rest of the team has to know … what play you’re calling. In golf, it’s just between you and the ball. I think that’s a major weakness. … The world is far too complicated for one person to control everything.”

“It worries me,” added Gingrich, that Trump doesn’t consult more closely about Russia-related issues with officials such as Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. As of Monday, Dunford still hadn’t been briefed on Helsinki, even though it directly affects the more than 1 million troops Dunford oversees.

Mattis, a retired four-star general who commands nearly universal respect in Congress, has an especially delicate challenge. Trump is fickle, and he may now be chafing at his defense secretary’s careful counsel. A Republican source tells me Trump recently complained: “He’s not ‘Mad Dog Mattis,’ he’s ‘Moderate Mattis.’”

Another Republican says that at the G7 summit in Canada in June, Trump asked European leaders, “What do you think of Mattis?” Europeans feared it was a trick question, because too much enthusiasm might undermine Mattis.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is the “Trump whisperer,” the member of Trump’s inner circle who seems most similar to him in outlook and temperament. He’s the chief action officer on North Korea and Iran, the administration’s two most ambitious, dangerous challenges. Will Trump give Pompeo the latitude to communicate strategy on these big issues to the country and the world? If he feuds with Pompeo, Trump is sunk.

The final piece of the post-Helsinki puzzle is National Security Adviser John Bolton. He is deliberately tightening the NSC circle, reducing the frequency of formal principals’ meetings, to remedy what he thinks was interagency overkill during the Obama years. Bolton prefers small group meetings with Mattis, Pompeo and Trump. Bolton mistrusts the interagency principals and deputies committee meetings. Bolton deputy Mira Ricardel orchestrates the deputies meetings, and there have been more of them.

Gingrich is right. Trump will not succeed unless he consults his advisers, all of his advisers, and makes full use of the NSC interagency process. On his own, Trump will fail. For more, please see the hyperlink below: