It has been a couple of weeks since Elissa Slotkin, Mark Kelly, and different Democrats launched their outrageous video suggesting that members of the U.S. Military should refuse supposedly ‘illegal’ orders from President Trump. Individuals are nonetheless speaking about it as a result of we have now by no means actually seen something prefer it prior to now.
What the Democrats tried to do right here is fairly easy to know. They’re making an attempt to drive a wedge between our army and President Trump, the Commander in Chief. It’s the kind of factor that the CIA does throughout coloration revolutions in overseas nations and Elissa Slotkin is former CIA.
One query about all of this that retains developing is that this: The place did this come from? Who got here up with this concept? It actually doesn’t appear like one thing Democrats would simply provide you with out of skinny air.
Effectively, right here is one doable reply to those questions.
A couple of month earlier than these Democrats launched their video, a By no means-Trump Republican named Tom Nichols wrote a column for The Atlantic which reads like a blueprint for this complete factor. Take a look at this:
The Civil-Navy Disaster Is Right here
To seize a democratic nation, authoritarians should management three sources of energy: the intelligence companies, the justice system, and the army. President Donald Trump and his circle of would-be autocrats have made fast progress towards seizing these establishments and detaching them from the Structure and rule of regulation. The intelligence neighborhood has successfully been muzzled, and the nation’s high attorneys and cops are being purged and changed with loyalist hacks.
Solely the army stays exterior Trump’s grip. Regardless of the firing of a number of high officers—and Trump’s menace to fireplace extra—the U.S. armed forces are nonetheless led by generals and admirals whose oath is to the Structure, not the commander in chief. However for the way lengthy?
To begin with, what Nichols says right here is totally mistaken. The army shouldn’t be exterior of Trump’s grip. As President of the USA, he’s the Commander in Chief. Now learn this subsequent half and pay particular consideration to the bolded ending:
Trump and his valet on the Protection Division, Secretary of Bodily Coaching Pete Hegseth, are actually making a devoted run at turning the women and men of the armed forces into Trump’s private and partisan military. In his first time period, Trump recurrently violated the sacred American custom of the army’s political neutrality, however individuals round him—together with retired and active-duty generals comparable to James Mattis, John Kelly, and Mark Milley—restrained a few of his worst impulses. Now nobody is left to cease him: The president realized from his first-term struggles and this time has surrounded himself with a Cupboard of sycophants and ideologues relatively than advisers, particularly these on the Pentagon. He has declared warfare on Chicago; known as Portland, Oregon, a “warfare zone”; and referred to his political opponents as “the enemy from inside.” Trump clearly desires to make use of army energy to exert extra management over the American individuals, and shortly, high U.S.-military commanders could must resolve whether or not they are going to refuse such orders from the commander in chief. The best disaster of American civil-military relations in fashionable historical past is now beneath means.
The similarities listed below are plain. It seems like somebody within the Democrat social gathering learn this column and thought it will be a good way to undermine Trump by making an attempt to plant seeds of dissent within the army.
In fact, it may simply be one nice huge coincidence too. Anybody shopping for that?
In his subsequent column for The Atlantic, Nichols instructed that Mark Kelly ought to be the Secretary of Protection. Is that this additionally a coincidence?
The writer of the under “Atlantic” screed is Tom Nichols.
From 1997 to 2022, Nichols was everlasting school on the U.S. Naval Warfare Faculty. He has by no means served within the army, however does have plenty of levels from some ostensibly spectacular universities.
In case you have been questioning… pic.twitter.com/mvcigrWdAC
— Cynical Publius (@CynicalPublius) December 3, 2025
Republicans in Congress have to look into this. There are just too many handy coincidences right here.
