![]() He told me, it's the United States, not China or Russia that poses the greatest threat to U.S. Kelly: General Michael Hayden, retired Air Force four star general, former director of CIA, he wants to know: "Are we OK or not?" And I followed up with him because I wanted to make sure I understood his question. It's the obligation of the advisor, in this case, the chairman - but also there's others in the room, it's not just you - it's the obligation of the advisors to advise the decision-maker of what the left and right limits of the decision are and what the legal boundaries are.Īnd I can tell you, at no time, from either president, have I received an illegal order where the decision had been made, and it was, "You are ordered to do something illegal," right. ![]() It doesn't matter if he's the president or any other president. Kelly: I mean, you get that I'm pushing you on this, sir, because it's not just a question of looking back in an exit interview, there is the distinct possibility this former president may become our president again. ![]() Are you are you confident that guardrails are in place to ensure that no future president, should they issue orders that are not legal and lawful, would be able to say attempt to, say, attempt to overturn the outcome of an election? And that's an important thing, we the military are obligated by law to follow lawful orders. If they're legal and lawful, it's our obligation to follow them. And part of that, by the way, is to follow the lawful legal orders of whomever is the elected representative, whether you like the orders or not. So our loyalty and our, you know - we are duty bound, we are oath bound - to protect and defend the Constitution. We don't take an oath to an individual, we don't take an oath to anything other than the Constitution of the United States. That's what every one of us in uniform does. Milley: Well, my duty and responsibility is to the Constitution, that's where my loyalty is. Kelly: I do want to follow on what you just said and put to you a question that I have put to Jim Mattis - who served, of course, as Trump's defense secretary - how do you think, how have you thought, about duty and responsibility to your country, as opposed to your commander in chief? So in the case of President Trump, he never actually ordered - made the actual decision and issued the order - to deploy active duty troops on the streets of America. We have things like the Posse Comitatus Act, it requires the president to make certain judgment calls. So the active duty military is a very high bar for deployment on the streets of America. So what I'm telling you is that the military has no role - zero - in actual electoral policy, or politics. So that's an important distinction as well. ![]() ![]() Milley: He very well could have ordered that. Kelly: But President Trump, as the elect - he was elected and he wanted active duty military in the streets of American cities to suppress the protests, he was the commander in chief. Now, you asked me how close, but there's no role for the U.S. But having said that, that is not the same, by the way, as entering into politics. Marching behind the president, bad optics, bad image, clearly - and I knew that, you know, within 90 seconds, walked away from it, and then later tried to make amends on that. And I think that's an important distinction. Mark Milley: I would just say that the United States military stayed out of actual politics. Mary Louise Kelly: How close, General Milley, did we come to the American military being deployed against the American people? ![]()
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