In a recent revelation, the Subcommittee on Oversight of the Committee on House Administration, chaired by Barry Loudermilk (R-GA), has unearthed statements from key personnel involved in the January 6, 2021, Capitol incident.
These statements indicate that Pentagon officials unnecessarily delayed the National Guard's response to the protest and subsequent riot at the Capitol building due to concerns over "optics."
According to The Post Millennial, the transcripts released from the report reveal that General Mark Milley of the Joint Chiefs of Staff remembered a conversation that President Trump had with Pentagon officials on January 3, a few days prior to the incident. Trump had expressed his desire for the protests to remain peaceful, and Milley recalled Trump telling him and other Pentagon officials, "do whatever you have to do. Just make sure its safe."
In an interview conducted on April 16, Milley recounted the January 3 conversation between Trump and Acting Secretary of Defense Chris Miller. He quoted Trump as saying, Hey, look at this. Theres going to be a large amount of protestors here on the 6th, make sure that you have sufficient National Guard or Soldiers to make sure its a safe event. Trump further stated, "I dont care if you use Guard, or Soldiers, active-duty Soldiers, do whatever you have to do. Just make sure its safe." Miller responded by assuring, "Hey, weve got a plan, and weve got it covered."
However, on January 6, 2021, protesters breached the outer perimeter on the West Front of the US Capitol around 12:53 pm. Despite the escalating situation, Miller did not approve the deployment of the DC National Guard until 3:04 pm. This message did not reach Major General William Walker, the general overseeing the DC Guard, until 5:08 pm, more than two hours later, as per the timeline from the Subcommittee.
In a subsequent interview conducted by the Department of Defense Inspector General on March 12, 2021, Miller stated, There was absolutely -- there is absolutely no way I was putting US military forces at the Capitol, period." This statement contradicts Trump's request for 10,000 National Guard troops at the Capitol building on that day, as revealed by Miller in a separate interview transcript conducted by the J6 Select Subcommittee. Miller stated, "the President commented that they were going to need 10,000 troops" on J6 from the National Guard.
Miller further explained to the DoD that he considered the use of US military forces as a "last resort." He expressed his concern that "If we put US military personnel on the Capitol it would have created ... the greatest Constitutional crisis probably since the Civil War because that would have been interpreted by the press, by the punditry, but most importantly by the elected officials on the Hill as an effort by the Trump administration to influence the Electoral College count." Miller was apprehensive that the presence of the military at the Capitol would imply that Trump was planning to enforce martial law to "redo the election."
Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, in his March 2021 interview with the DoD, also mentioned a January 4th memo that was put out by the Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller that looks like it pushed some pretty significant restraints on the DC National Guard. Sund further revealed that during a conference call with other military and law enforcement leaders around 2:30 pm on J6, Lieutenant Walter Piatt, Director of the Army Staff, and Gen. Charles Flynn, deputy chief of staff for operations on J6, expressed their reluctance to deploy the National Guard due to the optics of the National Guard standing in a line with the Capitol in the background. Piatt and Flynn were the highest-ranking military officers on the call, a fact corroborated by a Politico report that supports the allegations about Piatt and Flynn's desire to delay the National Guard response.
These revelations raise significant questions about the decision-making process on that fateful day. They underscore the need for a thorough investigation into the actions and motivations of key personnel, and the potential impact of these decisions on the events that unfolded at the Capitol.
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