Your Daily Four Star

Monday. Trump gutted a major exercise with South Korea, a gift to his pal Kim Jong Un, and payback for Seoul declining to join his Iran war. Speaking of, if you’re itching for a new war, Trump has an idea for one. Finally, it’s hard to say we’re safer when the administration systematically pushes out the people who keep the country safe, from a decorated CIA officer to a former Air Force secretary. Day 170 of the “4-week war.” Here’s what you need to know.

Hours before the big annual U.S.–South Korea drill built to deter a nuclear-armed North Korea was set to begin, Trump ordered Hegseth to gut America’s part in it, citing cost, his relationship with Kim Jong Un, and Seoul’s refusal to get stuck in our war with Iran. Retired admirals warn the move lowers coalition readiness and puts U.S. forces at risk for no real benefit, while handing North Korea something it’s wanted for decades.

Meanwhile, Trump’s threatening another war, this time with Oman. He also said Iran should wave the white flag. By the way, the 60-day memorandum of understanding that was supposed to lead to an end to the war has expired, and Iran still controls the Strait of Hormuz. But, sure, war with Oman sounds exactly like what a person in full control of his faculties would be gunning for right now.

Gift Link so you can read it all. Julia Curlee is a decorated CIA officer. She served 20 years, for four presidents of both parties, and was trusted with one of the most important intelligence documents the US Government produces – the Presidential Daily Brief. She’s also a trans woman. When almost no one else would, she volunteered to serve the first Trump White House and personally briefed Vice President Mike Pence every morning for a year. This year, Trump’s White House fired her after right-wing influencer Laura Loomer complained. Her point should worry every American: a government that purges its most experienced people for who they are, and fires the analysts who tell it hard truths, is hollowing out the very expertise that keeps the country safe. We’re watching the price of that in the Persian Gulf right now. That’s a war launched on rosy assumptions by leaders who’d shoved aside the people who knew better, and it’s American troops who are paying it, sometimes with their lives. This is where fringe right-wing social engineering got us.

And here’s the same issue from another angle. Frank Kendall, Air Force secretary under Biden, is suing the Trump administration after the Pentagon yanked his security clearance. He says he learned about it from a spokesman’s tweet, with no notice and no chance to respond. His alleged “offense?” Warning publicly that the Qatari-gifted Air Force One had “a lot of shortfalls” and posed real safety risks. An analysis that ended up being spot-on! Strip the clearances of everyone who tells you something you don’t want to hear, and eventually the only voices left are the ones who tell you what you do — which is roughly how you end up in a six-month war you called a four-week one.

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