In an appearance on Fox News Sunday, Pompeo would not confirm a claim from former national security adviser John Bolton about whether former President Donald Trump had turned down a deal to trade Bout for former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, who was not included in the prisoner swap. “I don't want to talk about the private conversations I had. Ambassador Bolton is free to say whatever he might like, but we were very focused on getting Paul Whelan out, every American back home.
“And if Mr. Bout decides to go back to his previous line of work, then we're going to do what we need to do to hold him accountable and to protect our interests.”TRUMP: ‘I WOULDN’T HAVE MADE THE DEAL FOR A HUNDRED PEOPLE’: On his Truth Social account, Trump insisted he would have freed Whelan and that Griner would not have been arrested had he been in office.
“I also have to say here that President Trump wasn't especially interested in engaging in that swap for also Paul Whelan. He was not particularly interested in Paul's case in the way that one would have thought he would be.”Good Monday morning and welcome to Jamie McIntyre’s Daily on Defense, written and compiled by Washington Examiner National Security Senior Writer Jamie McIntyre and edited by Stacey Dec. Email here with tips, suggestions, calendar items, and anything else.
“Extensive planning went into this unilateral operation to ensure its success. Initial assessments indicate no civilians were killed or injured,” said Central Command in a statement. “I'm glad that the Republicans have now, it appears, managed to get this out of U.S. law,” he said. “But there's a lot more to do. We should go back and fix the wrongs that were done to people who refused the vaccine previously.”
The statement came a day after Putin said the risk of nuclear war is increasing in remarks to Russia’s presidential Human Rights Council. “Concerning the threat of nuclear war … the threat is growing, to be honest,” he said. Previously she had been the Pentagon producer for ABC’s John McWethy and reported for Jane’s Defense Weekly.
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Trading a confessed pot smuggler for the world prolific arm dealer while living behind two veterans is not only was wrong. It also the lack of media journalistic integrity while trying to divert attention from this prisoner swap failure by embracing a defense of it.