Apparently, on an overseas trip this past July to Turkey to meet with regional allies over the chaos and destruction of his war on Iran, trump got caught in a rather embarrassing security dilemma (via Marina Dunbar at the Guardian):
Donald Trump switched aircraft before departing Turkey earlier this month after US officials determined there was a credible threat from Iranian proxy forces targeting him and Air Force One, according to a new report from the New York Times.
The threat surfaced while the US president was attending the NATO summit. He had arrived in Ankara onboard the new Qatari-donated Boeing 747-8, an aircraft that Trump acknowledged does not have the same advanced defensive systems as the older Air Force One.
According to the anonymous sources who spoke to the Times, after US officials detected the threat, the Secret Service recommended that Trump change aircraft before leaving the country. He later announced he would depart on the older Air Force One instead.
The embarrassment originally involved the uselessness of trump's gift grift airplane being unfit for security purposes.
Over the past weekend however, more news reports got out about how trump made the move from his gaudy airplane to the older practical one: By hiding like a coward (via Katherine Faulders with ABC News):
President Donald Trump reportedly underwent an elaborate plan to hide his flight from Turkey to the United Kingdom last month using a catering food truck and a military aircraft, according to the Washington Post, amid threats against him from Iran.
The secret mission, according to the Post, was carried out without the knowledge of the traveling press and even some White House officials aboard the decoy flight, all while the White House was saying Trump was aboard the old Air Force One jet...
The president was seen boarding the aircraft on July 8, but according to the Post, after boarding, Trump was transferred to a catering cart typically used to load food and beverages...
On the flight that was believed to be carrying Trump, reporters on board were told that the windows needed to be closed the whole flight and that it was a mandate from the Secret Service. Air Force One, despite the president not being on board, according to the Post, had its transponder turned off.
So not only did trump not fly on the backup AFOne, he left the entire press pool and most of his aides to fly on it as decoys to risk getting shot down. According to reports, trump brought with him Natalie Harp, Dan Scavino, Walt Nauta, and Defense Dumbass Secretary Pete Hegseth. Notable losers officials stuck on the target plane were Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Treasury Scott Bessent, so they have to be thrilled at the realization of how much trump values their meager existence.
This is trump in his true form: Always the blustering bully who declares himself the bravest man alive and immediately hiding from the first whiff of danger.
The details of this latest incident hit social media like a firestorm, churning out mocking images of trump cowering under a serving cart or hiding under frozen chicken dinners. Comrade Misfit over at her blog rounded up a few cartoons and AI-spawned photos, so I direct you to visit her place and leave comments and suggestions for more mocking tidbits aimed at trump.
 |
| This is from Mike Luckovich |
Ashlie D. Stevens at Salon is unforgiving:
Perhaps it is because I’ve been nursing a slight and recent obsession with zany detective movies of the 1960s... but when I first heard that President Donald Trump had reportedly escaped Turkey in an “airport catering cart,” the scene arrived in my mind already blocked and costumed: a white-tableclothed trolley, steered by a nervous waiter in a bow tie, perhaps topped with a silver cloche. Beneath the linens, taking care that his shoes did not give him away, Trump crouched while he was wheeled past a succession of unfriendly eyes, their owners somehow oblivious to the president concealed at knee height...
It is worth considering why this particular image struck such a chord. In another context, a president being quietly transferred between aircraft in a service vehicle might register as little more than a piece of security choreography — unusual, perhaps, but hardly ready-made for farce. Trump in a catering truck was different. For years, he has made food part of his political stagecraft: something to display, serve, pose beside and use as shorthand for abundance, familiarity and a particular vision of American life.
The exquisite comic reversal of the Turkey episode was that, this time, he was no longer directing the tableau. He had been swallowed by the scenery...
There is, of course, nothing inherently funny about a catering truck, much less about the security concerns that reportedly put Trump inside one. But political imagery is not entirely under the politician’s control. Spend enough years standing behind pyramids of hamburgers, posing at fry stations and inserting yourself into the iconography of American restaurant chains, and eventually the props begin to accrue meanings of their own...
Which may explain why, when news broke that Trump had been spirited between planes in a catering truck, the internet required almost no time to dress the scene. The hamburgers were already there. So were Ronald McDonald, Colonel Sanders and the Burger King. Trump has spent years directing the food theater. The catering truck was funny because, for once, he disappeared backstage.
Tom Nichols at the Atlantic is taking the news more serious:
Meanwhile, military officers, enlisted staff, and several American civilians were left on a plane that was deemed too dangerous for the president. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, according to reports, was waiting for Trump on the C-32A, but Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent were on the original 747, and they were aware that Trump was on the other, secret plane. Several White House aides were reportedly on the decoy flight, including Stephen Miller, Steven Cheung, and others. The pool report from the 747, however, says that there were “no visitors to the press cabin” during the flight from Turkey to the United Kingdom.
The commander in chief is the most important person on any American aircraft, and his safety must take precedence over all other concerns or interests. If the Secret Service wanted Trump spirited out of Turkey for his security, then no one should second-guess that decision. But now that we know that Trump was getting shuttled around a Turkish airport in a food-supply crate with three of his courtiers, we also know more about this White House—and about the war in Iran.
One immediate question: If the situation was that dangerous, why send up the first 747 at all—and with two men fairly senior in the line of presidential succession aboard? Perhaps the threat wasn’t quite so dire, or its parameters were not well-enough defined, and the Secret Service acted out of a superabundance of caution. Or perhaps the president thinks it’s acceptable to send up an airplane full of innocent Americans as a decoy to draw fire so that he can evade enemy action.
This is where trump cannot shake the coward label, ever.
The way the Great Food-Truck Escapade unfolded—including who Trump chose to take with him—also reveals much about the president’s priorities. And why didn’t Trump take the press into his confidence, even if he couldn’t take them all on the safer plane? Granted, the president seems to resent most of the media, so maybe he just didn’t care about their fate, but what about his staff? Not only was it morally appalling to keep so many people in the dark about the threat; it was politically inept, on two levels.
First, imagine if something had actually happened to the decoy. Trump would later end up either having to lie or having to explain that he’d known that such a disaster was possible, and that he’d sent Air Force personnel and several American civilians—possibly including two Cabinet secretaries—to their death to cover his own escape.
And second, Trump missed a major opportunity. Had he brought a few reporters with him, they could have told the story of a clever evasion. The 747, meanwhile, could have been temporarily held and its passengers delayed until Trump emerged in Britain, when the Iranians would find out they’d been had.
That’s not how this White House works. Trump and his people operated under the kind of paranoia and callous disregard for military and civilian lives that have characterized the president’s time in office. The White House might argue that it cannot trust the media, but John Kirby, the retired rear admiral who served as a spokesperson in two administrations, noted yesterday on MS NOW that he often took the press into his confidence on similar classified matters and was never, in his word, “burned” by the decision to keep the American people informed.
The simplest explanation is that trump didn't care what happened to everyone else - save for the inner circle he needs to sustain his delusions and his cruelty - and was more intent on saving his own skin over any other practical matter.
As a result, the image of trump hiding - cowering, shivering under a tablecloth - should haunt him and his lackeys for the rest of their days.
No comments:
Post a Comment