Alfredo Toro Hardy
US President Donald Trump is convinced that the “deep state” thwarted his first term, robbing him of the 2020 election. Expunging it seems to have become his main priority of this second term. But, is there such a thing as a deep state? There certainly is. It would be enough to read the memoirs of former US presidents or secretaries to discover their frustration in face of the bureaucratic resistance confronted while in office. In this regard, those of former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, written a few decades ago, were particularly enlightening.
The following excerpts from his Memoirs speak volumes. They referred to the interaction between the White House and the Pentagon: “Orders were given in that respect, but our military bureaucracy resists intromissions in strategic doctrine even if they come from the White House (…) When I assumed my functions, former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara told me that he too had tried to give more options to the President in strategic matters, but he finally desisted given the bureaucratic resistance (…) A 1969 presidential request demanding a reasoned explanation on the naval programs was never satisfactorily answered during the eight years that I served in Washington. The responses given were always close to insubordination and far from being useful.”
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