Thread by @TimInHonolulu

1. On @nytimes Cyber story: Yakla raid was Trump's first op 9 days into his presidency. Flynn as NSA with poor planning and it turned out badly. 1 US KIA and 3 wounded. Yemeni civilian casualties including a US citizen. Trump distanced himself from it. It appeared to me that

2. the experience convinced him he didn't want to be that guy. A week or so later there was a report he had delegated some command responsibilities. That was in early 2017. By now the military has adapted to Trump's aversion to command responsibility. I have noticed that

3. our combat commands appear to function more efficiently. Recall when we had Bin Laden in our sites but checking with Clinton White House for possible Saudi collateral damage let Bin Laden escape. Now commands have more autonomy. If somebody shoots at us, we can shoot back.

4. Folks don't have to call the home office. That policy stumbled along with minimal Trump input or notice by the press even after February 8, 2018, when Putin's chef's mercenaries decided to attack US Special Ops forces at the @Conoco gas works east of Deir EzZor.

5. What happened was widely reported. The commanding general's report is still on my YouTube channel. A lot of Russians died in an old fashioned turkey shoot. The Russian Army commander told our general it wasn't a Russian force so our General could open fire even though he

6. thought it was a Russian force without asking.

I think Trump's bizarre DPRK conduct is related to the fact that we were close to a nuclear exchange after the suspected ICBM test launch. But after all that, now, for Trump to now want a war with Iran, is illogical to me.

7. IMO it's Bolton Pompeo not him.

So why might somebody leak the cyber command story? It appears to me possibly a reminder from the Pentagon to Trump who may have forgotten about what real war is like. Now he's got to take his intel briefings and go back to the situation

8. room. He's made his role in the military an issue by shining a spotlight on the secret that he wants to be out of the loop. But now he can't pretend it's fake news. He's got to go back to the situation room.
It will be like Yakala only a 1,000 times worse and without

9. a foreseeable end.