Trump fires Defense Secretary Mark Esper
On Twitter Monday, Washington (CNN) President Donald Trump announced that he had fired Defense Secretary Mark Esper, and that Christopher Miller, who serves as director of the National Counterterrorism Center, will “immediately” become acting secretary.
Two days after his Democratic rival, Joe Biden, was predicted as the winner of the presidential election, the President jettisoned Esper, a finding that Trump declined to embrace.
Esper ‘s increasingly strained relationship with Trump led him weeks ago to plan a letter of resignation, an effort to fashion a graceful exit in the highly awaited event of the President’s decision to fire him, CNN told multiple security sources, including a senior defence official.
A driving force behind some of Trump’s policies targeting Iran and its proxy party Hezbollah, as well as counterterrorism efforts linked to the wars in Syria and Iraq, has been Miller, who will step into Esper ‘s shoes. Miller was director of counterterrorism at the National Security Council prior to leading the NCTC.
Miller, an Iowa native and former U.S. Army general, has also worked as a deputy assistant defence secretary.
Esper had been on rocky ground with the White House for months and had been pushing back on Trump since 2019, senior administration officials told CNN, a major context for today’s shooting.
He was dubbed ‘Yesper’ by Trump
During a news conference in August, Trump went as far as mocking the derisive nickname of his security chief, “Yesper,” a title bestowed on Esper by defence officials who felt he did not go far enough in standing up to the more divisive decisions of the President.
According to numerous reports, Trump had secretly shared frustrations about Esper for months, venting about him at length on a trip to Camp David earlier this year.
In September, Trump also openly lambasted the leadership of the Pentagon, accusing them of trying to wage wars to maximise the profits of defence contractors. According to defence officials, Esper, upset, called White House staff chief Mark Meadows to complain. Shortly afterwards, Meadows appeared on TV and tried to walk back Trump’s remarks, arguing that his broadside toward the representatives of the Pentagon was not directly targeted at anybody.
Over the politically charged question of whether to rename military bases that honour Confederate generals, Esper and Trump also differed. Esper sponsored the renaming consideration. The President declined to support the proposal.
In July 2019, the Senate voted 90–8 to confirm Esper, making him Trump’s second Senate-confirmed defence secretary. He followed James Mattis, who resigned in December 2018 over Trump’s decision to withdraw from Syria, abandon Kurdish allies and pull out of Syria in the fight against ISIS.
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