Security chief may change foreign policy team
Adviser wants access to US military, intel
WASHINGTON: Lt Gen HR McMaster, US President Donald Trump’s new national security adviser, is considering a reorganisation of the White House foreign policy team that would give him control of Homeland Security and guarantee full access to the military and intelligence agencies.
Just days after arriving at the White House, Mr McMaster is weighing changes to an organisation chart that generated consternation when it was issued last month.
One proposal under discussion would restore the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to full membership in a Cabinet-level committee, according to two officials who discussed internal deliberations on the condition of anonymity.
Another likely change would reincorporate the Homeland Security Council under the National Security Council, the way it was during the administration of President Barack Obama, the officials said. The decision to separate the Homeland Security staff, they said, was primarily a way to diminish the power of Mr McMaster’s predecessor, Michael Flynn, who resigned last week. Now that Mr Flynn is out and Mr McMaster is in, both councils may report to him. Left uncertain is what, if anything, will happen regarding Stephen Bannon, the president’s chief strategist, who has played a major role in shaping foreign policy. Under the original organisation plan last month, Mr Bannon was invited to attend any National Security Council meeting led by the president and was made a regular member of the so-called principals committee of Cabinet secretaries.
One senior official supportive of Mr Bannon’s position said it would not change under any reorganisation. Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, said this week that Mr McMaster would have full authority to organise his staff, but that any change in Mr Bannon’s status would have to be approved by the president.
Veterans of past administrations and members of Congress from both parties criticised the decision to put Mr Bannon on the principals committee, saying that it risked injecting politics into national security. President George W Bush’s senior adviser, Karl Rove, was generally kept out of sensitive national security meetings. Mr Obama’s senior adviser, David Axelrod, attended some national security meetings but was not given formal status.
White House officials said the concern about Mr Bannon’s role was overblown. But Mr Trump was surprised by the intensity of the blowback to the initial order and complained that Mr Flynn had not made him understand the significance of the changes or how they would be perceived, according to senior officials.
The principals committee, led by the national security adviser, is the central body that decides foreign policy issues that do not go to the president and frames the choices for those that do. The organisation chart issued last month said that the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff would attend the committee’s meetings only “where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed”.
While the decision to give Mr Bannon a seat was a conscious one, Mr Trump’s team did not intend to reduce the role of the intelligence director or Joint Chiefs chairman, officials said. In crafting their organisation order, the officials said, Mr Trump’s aides essentially cut and pasted language from Mr Bush’s organisation chart, substituting the national intelligence director for the CIA director, who back then was the head of the nation’s spy agencies.
What Mr Trump’s team did not realise, officials said, was that Mr Obama’s organisation chart made those two positions full members of the committee.
As a practical matter, Mr Trump’s aides may not have intended a substantive change, but the political symbolism of elevating Mr Bannon while seemingly demoting military and intelligence leaders was an immediate distraction.
Even before Mr McMaster’s appointment, White House officials were talking about revising the organisation chart.
The issue came to a head after Mr Trump asked for Mr Flynn’s resignation last week because Mr Flynn had misled Vice-President Mike Pence and other White House officials about what he discussed with Russia’s ambassador in a December phone call.