(CNN) – The secretary of state of U.SMike Pompeo was a driving force behind President Donald Trump’s decision to kill a high-ranking Iranian general, according to CNN sources, a high-risk measure that demonstrates Pompeo’s situation as the most influential national security official in the Trump administration.
Take out the Iranian general Qasem Soleimani “The battlefield” has been a goal for the main US diplomat for a decade, several sources told CNN.
Go after the second most powerful officer in Iran – the leader of the Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guard Corps, the military group political and economically powerful with regional influence – it was Pompeo’s idea, according to a source from his inner circle. That source said the secretary took the suggestion to Trump. Pompeo “was the one who made the proposal to eliminate Soleimani, he was absolutely,” said this source.
According to multiple sources close to Pompeo, the secretary of state has believed throughout his career that Iran is at the root of all the problems of Middle East and he has focused on Soleimani, the “shadow commander” of Iran, as the intellectual author behind state-sponsored state terrorism throughout the region.
“We took a bad guy off the battlefield,” Pompeo told CNN on January 5. “We made the right decision.” On the same day, Pompeo told ABC that killing Soleimani was important “because it was a guy who was the common thread, who was carrying out an active plot against the United States of America, putting American lives at risk.”
‘Lead the way’
“Pompeo provided the justification for which Soleimani is a bad guy,” the source said. “It’s not personal, because he was a terrorist and the intellectual author.” The source also said that eliminating Soleimani had been Pompeo’s mission for a decade.
The secretary of state has been so obsessed with the Iranian general that he even tried to obtain a visa for Iran in 2016 when he was a congressman from Kansas. While he said it was to monitor the elections, he also suggested to his confidants that he wanted to try to confront Soleimani when he was there. He never got the visa.
Pompeo, a West Point graduate who still has many friends in military service in the Middle East, also believed that Solemani had the blood of hundreds of American soldiers on his hands.
US officials believe that during the Iraq War, Soleimani units provided Iraqi insurgents with special bombs that could penetrate the armor, a deadly weapon against US forces. Iran denies the accusation, but the Pentagon still says that Soleimani and his troops were “responsible for the deaths of hundreds of US soldiers and the coalition, as well as the injuries of thousands more.”
More recently, Soleimani has been seen as the architect of Iranian military operations in Iraq and Syria. The source told CNN that as the years went by, Pompeo told his friends and colleagues that “I will not retire from public service until Soleimani is off the battlefield.”
Long known as a “Trump whisper” for the relationship he has cultivated with the president, Pompeo’s ability to sell such an aggressive Iran strategy for Trump, a president reluctant to conflict, is a testament to his incomparable influence.
Now, with Pompeo’s recent statement that he will not run for a seat in the United States Senate for Kansas, the former House of Representatives legislator and CIA director seems ready to continue exercising his influence on the Trump administration. .
“He is the one who leads the way,” according to the source in the inner circle of Pompeo, discussing the confrontation with Iran. “It is the president’s policy, but Pompeo has been the main voice in helping the president to elaborate this policy. There is no doubt that Mike is the one who directs her in the cabinet. ”
A former Republican national security official, who is critical of Trump but supported the attack on Soleimani, told CNN that Pompeo is so influential that he is like the “secretary of state, secretary of defense and director of the CIA” combined.
“Anti-American”
The rise of Pompeo has generated concern in some republican national security circles, where critics say he has given rise to the famous unpredictable president.
Although he has won the confidence of the president, Pompeo, does not impede, has not been isolated from the scathing criticism about the administration’s approach to Iran. On Wednesday, even some Republicans left unconvinced from an information session on the situation.
Republican Senator Mike Lee of Utah called Pompeo’s session and Defense Secretary Mark Esper “the worst briefing on a military problem in my nine years” in the Senate. Lee said the administration’s suggestion that Congress should not have a role in the debate of military action against Iran was “anti-American” and “completely unacceptable.”
Congressional Democrats were very critical, and Rep. Gerry Connolly of Virginia called the meeting “rookies.” The aspiring presidential democrat, Senator Elizabeth Warren, said she was not convinced that Soleimani presented the imminent threat the administration alleged to justify his death, while Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, the second-rank Democrat in the Senate, questioned that Esper described intelligence information about Soleimani as “exquisite.”
“It wasn’t like that,” Durbin said.
Since becoming the main American diplomat, Pompeo has been the key person for the administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran. In April, Pompeo was an important force behind the controversial Trump administration movement to designate the IRGC of Iran, including the Quds Force, as a foreign terrorist organization.
It was the first time that the United States designated part of another government as a terrorist organization and laid the groundwork for legal rationalization to kill Soleimani, who had led the Quds Force since 1998.
In June, after Iran shot down a US drone, Pompeo was disappointed when he failed to convince Trump to take aggressive measures against Iran and Soleimani. The president, at the last minute, revoked the decision to attack IRGC objectives.
But this time, according to multiple sources with knowledge, Pompeo built a case with which he won the president, particularly after December 27, when a rocket attack killed an American civilian contractor in the city of Kirkuk, in the northern Iraq
On December 29, US planes killed at least 25 people in bomb attacks against the Kataib Hezbollah militia group, which informs Iraqi leaders but is heavily influenced by Iran. On New Year’s Eve, Iraqis protested in response to US attacks and stormed the US embassy complex in Baghdad.
Worry about another 1979
According to multiple sources familiar with these events, Trump was deeply concerned that embassy protests could lead to a repeat of the deaths of four Americans in 2012 at a diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya, or even the 1979 confrontation between Washington and Tehran, when Iranian students stormed the US Embassy in Iran and held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days.
“I know that Trump tweeted about Benghazi, but he didn’t want to face another 1979 Tehran,” said the source in the inner circle of Pompeo. Referring to Iran today, this source said they “wanted to take hostages.”
A Republican congressional source with knowledge of the facts said the death of the US contractor was critical.
While Pompeo and Esper have argued that intelligence suggested an imminent threat, this Republican source said that “intelligence may not be different from (Soleimani’s) plans” to attack, similar to those he had carried out in the past. . The difference this time was that an American was killed, the Republican said, linking the decision to attack increasingly intense encounters that began with the death of the 27-year-old Iraqi-American linguist from the San Francisco area.
“If an American had not died, I don’t think any of this would have happened,” said the Republican.
As planning began, Pompeo collaborated with the president of the Army Chiefs Set, General Mark Milley, and the CENTCOM commander, General Kenneth McKenzie, to assess the profile of the troops in the field. Multiple sources also say that Republicans Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina kept informed and also pressured Trump to respond.
Trump was not reluctant to attack Soleimani, several sources said, adding that the president’s other chief advisors, Esper, Milley, CIA director Gina Haspel, and national security adviser Robert O’Brien, “were all aboard”.
Pompeo has forged “very close relations” with Haspel and Esper, alliances that reinforced his ability to present the case to Trump. “Everyone works together very, very closely,” said the former Republican national security official.
That said, the former official expressed concern about the lack of deep experience in the Trump national security team. Several analysts pointed out this as a factor in the enormous influence of Pompeo within the administration.
The government is so committed by Trump and all the vacancies and lack of experience, said this former official, “everything is being done by a handful of leaders: Pompeo, Esper, Milley. There are many things left on the floor. ”
‘A very low scale’
Pompeo is possibly the most experienced member of the national security cabinet, said the former national security official, “but it is a very low scale.”
“It’s such a small group and there’s a lot to do,” said the former official. “Everyone in this administration is a level and a half higher than they would be in a normal administration. They have no reservations, ”they said.
The Trump administration has been harmed by the president’s refusal to hire Republicans to criticize him. Other Republicans will not work for the administration, for fear of being “contaminated” or summarily dismissed, the former official said.
Since the layers of experience have taken off in the White House, some analysts say that safeguards have also been removed. Peter Bergen, of CNN, wrote in his new book, “Trump and his Generals,” that former Defense Secretary James Mattis told his assistants not to present to the president options to face Iran militarily.
Randa Slim, a member of the Middle East Institute, argues that since the departure of Mattis, former National Intelligence director Dan Coats and former White House secretary and retired Navy General John Kelly, there are very few voices in the House Blanca who offer “deeply considered advice.”
“We don’t have those people who have that experience and can look Trump in the eye and have their respect and who can say, O Hey, hey, hey, wait!”, Said Slim.
Manu Raju, Laurie Ure and Zachary Cohen of CNN contributed to this report.
– .
