Trump Really, Really Wanted To Invade Mexico Last Year
Donald Trump repeatedly talked of sending U.S. troops to go after drug cartels in Mexico while, separately, Stephen Miller tried to send 250,000 troops to the U.S. southern border, according to The New York Times.
The Times reported on the Trump and Miller fever dreams and also explained just how crazy and dangerous they were:
If Mr. Trump had gone through with the troop deployment, it would have represented a force two and a half times the size of the 100,000 American troops in Afghanistan at the height of the 20-year war in that country. It would have also dwarfed the American presence in Iraq during the war there: The maximum number of troops in Iraq at any time was about 170,000.
It is unclear how the Defense Department could have managed such a deployment. The U.S. Army has about 481,000 active-duty soldiers, but many are already deployed around the world, as are thousands of Marines, airmen and other troops. Sending 250,000 troops to the border — much of which crosses difficult, undeveloped lands — would also have required an enormous logistical effort to house and feed the troops.
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Mr. Trump repeatedly asked about sending troops into Mexico, forcing top national security aides to push back against the idea, pointing out that to most of the world, it would look like an American invasion.
In fact, it would: the United States and Mexico have historically worked together to fight the cartels, usually through joint police and FBI operations at the invitation of the Mexican government. But despite his tweet promising to wait for cooperation with Mexican authorities, there were concerns inside the White House that Mr. Trump was suggesting something different — the unilateral use of military force to go after the cartels without necessarily getting the permission of the Mexican government.
The Times notes that it was not Miller, who worked in the White House, who came up with the 250,000 troop number: "It is not clear whether it was officials in homeland security or the Pentagon who concluded that a quarter of a million troops would be required," the report says. Which means that there was at least one more person willing to go along with the scheme.
I shudder to think what these incompetent, racist jerks might have done had they gotten a second term. Thank God they didn’t.