Top US general under fire after book reveals secret calls with China last year
“General Li, you and I have known each other for now five years. If we’re going to attack, I’m going to call you ahead of time. It’s not going to be a surprise,” Milley was quoted as saying.
Calls mounted for the US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to step down Tuesday, shortly after excerpts of a book were published revealing the general secretly contacted his Chinese counterpart last year.
Journalists Bob Woodward and Robert Costa interviewed 200 different sources for a book on the transition and chaos between the Trump and Biden presidencies.
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In the book “Peril,” it is discovered that Gen. Mark Milley called his Chinese counterpart before the US election, which saw former President Donald Trump lose to now-President Joe Biden.
According to a book review in the Washington Post, Milley then called the Chinese general Li Zuocheng, days after the Jan. 6 riots at the Capitol.
Milley reportedly said he was hoping to ease any fear of a US attack on China and that if Trump ordered an attack, the top US general would inform the Chinese beforehand.
“General Li, you and I have known each other for now five years. If we’re going to attack, I’m going to call you ahead of time. It’s not going to be a surprise,” Milley was quoted as saying.
The White House was asked about the report but referred reporters to the Pentagon.
In a phone call on Jan. 8, two days after Trump supporters raided the US Capitol, Milley reportedly spoke to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The pair said Trump was “crazy.”
Shortly after the Washington Post published its review of the book, Senator Marco Rubio sent a letter to Biden demanding that he fire Milley “immediately.”
Rubio, a senior Republican, accused Milley of working “to actively undermine the sitting Commander in Chief of the United States Armed Forces and contemplated a treasonous leak of classified information to the Chinese Communist Party in advance of a potential armed conflict with the People’s Republic of China (PRC).”
Read more: Comparing Trump to Hitler, top US general claimed former president threatened coup
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