WAR : Is World War III Coming? | Audiobook 2

In 1945, President Truman ordered the only use of atomic bombs to end World War II. A 15-kiloton atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima and a 21-kiloton bomb on Nagasaki.

The nuclear scenarios being practiced in tabletop exercises included Putin ordering a test nuclear detonation over the Black Sea to intimidate Ukraine into surrendering territory, or deploying a tactical nuclear weapon against a Ukrainian military base that would render the land around it uninhabitable for years because of radiation contamination.

Colin Kahl, defense secretary Austin's principal strategic advisor and right-hand man, was at home in his pajamas with his kids when a request came through from the Russians, very early Sunday morning, October 23rd, for a second call between Austin and Shoigu. It was just 36 hours after Austin had issued his warning to Shoigu.

"This is weird," Kahl thought. "What is going on?" All the staff who write the talking points for Secretary Austin were at home; nobody was in the office, but the Russians were frantically calling.

Kahl went into a room in his house that had been turned into a SCIF (Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility) for the most highly classified work to see if any intelligence had come through overnight that might explain the urgency of the call. Nothing stood out on the intel channels.

On his cell phone, Kahl noticed Russian sources on social media and Telegram, a secure messaging app, circulating an allegation that the Ukrainians were planning to use a dirty bomb. A dirty bomb is a mix of explosives with radioactive material that spreads hazardous radiation but does not create a nuclear chain reaction or atomic blast. A dirty bomb is still extremely serious because it makes an area uninhabitable.

Reports started coming through that the Russians were also calling the defense ministers in the United Kingdom, France, and Turkey. "Holy crap," Kahl thought. "The Russians are going to fake a dirty bomb in Ukraine as a predicate for using nuclear weapons against Ukraine. The nightmare scenario. This is straight out of the Russian playbook."

Kahl thought, "What had they seen the Russians do the entire war? Try to create false flags and the predicate for escalation." He had no confirmation; it was a hunch. Kahl jotted down speaking points for Austin.

"We have all this intelligence that says the Ukrainians are thinking about using a dirty bomb," Shoigu blurted when he got on the phone to Austin. "If they do this, we would consider it an act of nuclear terrorism, and we'd have no alternative but to respond."

"Bingo," Kahl thought. "We don't believe you," Austin said firmly. "We don't see any indications of this, and the world will see through this. This seems to us like you trying to establish the predicate for using nuclear weapons."

Austin said, his baritone voice full of warning, "And if you do it, these will be all the consequences." Lloyd Austin, usually soft-spoken, once again powerfully conveyed the president's deterrent message. "Don't do it."

"I understand," Shoigu said. "We will share our information with you and the world."

Jake Sullivan called Andriy Yermak, Zelenskyy's top advisor, and told him to immediately call in the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to Ukraine's nuclear facilities, open them up to inspection. IAEA inspectors arrived swiftly and found no evidence of preparations to build a dirty bomb.

The White House and Pentagon mobilized every communication line, calling the Chinese, the Indians, the Israelis, the Turks—countries friendly with Russia who were also having calls with Putin. "Nobody should use a nuclear weapon in Ukraine." Send the signal to Putin. These countries did.

In under 12 hours, it appeared they had blown the whistle on Russia's plot. "Let me just say, Russia would be making an incredibly serious mistake if it were to use a tactical nuclear weapon," President Biden told reporters on October 26th, putting it directly on the table.

Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes updated President Biden that the intelligence community's assessment was that Chinese President Xi had the most leverage over Putin and was best placed to influence Putin's thinking on nuclear weapons. Biden called Xi and underlined the need to deter Russia from using a nuclear weapon in Ukraine. "If Putin were to break the seal on nuclear use, that would be an enormous event for the world."

President Xi agreed he would warn Putin not to go there. He even did so publicly. "Nuclear wars must not be fought," President Xi said from Beijing on November 4th, 2022. He called on countries to oppose nuclear use or threats to use nuclear weapons.

The other decisive factor in dissuading Putin from nuclear use was that there was no catastrophic break in Russia's forces. Ukraine moved slowly, incrementally, and Russian forces withdrew safely across the Dnipro River and out of Kherson. Only then did the US intelligence community revise their assessment on the nuclear threat. Putin held on to his nuclear cards for the time being.

"It was probably the most hair-raising moment of the whole war," Kahl said afterward. President Biden wanted to make sure Russia had gotten the message.

In Ankara, Turkey, CIA Director Burns had a secret meeting with Russian Foreign Intelligence Chief Sergey Naryshkin for 4 hours on November 14th, 2022. It was a scene that could come out of a John le Carré spy novel. As they sat down, Russia leaked the fact of the meeting between them—another power play.

Burns sat across from Naryshkin. They had known each other for 20 years as adversaries. Almost instantly, Burns could see Naryshkin wanted to talk about a new American peace plan to end the war. "Listen," Burns said, "whatever you're reading in Washington, we're not negotiating without the Ukrainians." Biden had been firm on that.

"And what I'm here to talk about is the grave risk of use of nuclear weapons." Burns laid out in detail to Naryshkin what the catastrophic consequences would be if Russia used a tactical nuclear weapon and broke the nuclear taboo. "It will be Russia not only terribly isolated and a pariah," Burns warned, "but there would also be very practical consequences in terms of the damage we'd inflict on the Russian military."

Naryshkin swore up one side and down the other that they had no intent or plan to do this. He said he was speaking for Putin. Burns reported back to President Biden that he was confident the Russians had gotten the message.

President Biden faced a genuine Catch-22. "The Russia-Ukraine war presents a fundamental conundrum for the United States and the world," President Biden said to his National Security Advisor. "If we do not fully succeed in ejecting Russia from Ukraine, we will have let Putin kind of get away with something."

Biden said, "If we do fully succeed in ejecting Russia from Ukraine, we face a very strong likelihood of nuclear use because Putin is not going to let himself be routed out of Ukraine without breaking the seal on tactical nuclear weapons. So we're stuck. Too much success is nukes; too little success is a kind of uncertain, indefinite outcome." The commander-in-chief concluded, "That's the strategic picture we're looking at and trying to navigate through right now."

By example and experience, Biden was acknowledging that the world is not protected from the punishments and catastrophe of a great power war. The goal, unstated but threaded through every action and policy, was to devise a way to try to get Putin to accept modified failure with a battlefield stalemate, or even better, for Putin to defeat himself.

36. Former President Trump saw the midterm elections as his opportunity to cement his political comeback. He would reward candidates who supported his rigged election claims and punish those who had not. But the midterms were not the red wave the GOP or Trump had anticipated. Republicans narrowly took back control of the House on November 16th, 2022, but Democrats held on to the Senate.

Trump was furious at the result. Many of the candidates he backed flopped in the gubernatorial races. His picks in Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Michigan lost. In Arizona, his pick, Kari Lake, lost her governor's race; she claimed, baselessly, that the vote had been rigged. In the Senate race, Trump's favorite, Herschel Walker, a three-time All-American and 1982 Heisman Trophy winner, lost in Georgia, and Mehmet Oz lost in Pennsylvania. Trump blamed his wife, Melania, for his decision to back Oz. "Not her best decision," he said, casting blame on everyone but himself.

Exit polls indicated that the former president was viewed favorably by just 39% of voters, putting him below Biden's 41% rating. And almost one in three voters said their vote was a message of opposition to Trump. Candidates with Trump endorsements underperformed, while those without it overperformed by a whopping difference of more than points.

"While in certain ways yesterday's election was somewhat disappointing," Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social, "from my personal standpoint, it was a very big victory. 29 wins and 16 losses in the general. Who has ever done better than that?" But the result was generally viewed as a referendum on Trump.

"You've got a problem with moderate women," Lindsey Graham told the former president. "The people that think the Earth is flat, and we didn't go to the Moon. You've got them. Let that go." Trump needed to move on from rigging 2020 and get back to us, focus on real policy issues, and on making 2024 a referendum on Biden.

Graham believed, "Your argument," Graham said to Trump, "should be: 'When I was in charge, we had a secure border, and look what's happened. When I was in charge, you could fill up your tank without having to mortgage your house. When I was in charge, Russia and China were in a box. When I was in charge, Iran was weak. When I was in charge, the Taliban didn't have Afghanistan.'" Graham said, "And on and on and on. Mr. President, it's not enough to criticize Biden; it's also you've got to say, 'I can fix this.' Nobody gives a damn about the 2020 election."

But Trump did. A week later, Trump was ready to announce his third presidential campaign. He hailed the announcement, "The most important speech given in the history of the United States of America. That would be remembered forever." Republicans urged Trump to delay the announcement. "Be patient. Let the GOP regroup after the midterm losses." He didn't.

"We are a nation in decline," Trump said on November 15th, 2022, before a small crowd in Mar-a-Lago's lavish ballroom. "America's comeback starts right now." He described his presidency as the golden age, but when Trump left the White House in January 2021, he had the lowest approval rating of any president. Trump was launching his presidential campaign as civil and criminal investigations stacked up against him, including Justice Department probes into his conduct on January 6th and retention of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago after he left office.

"Anyone who truly seeks to take on this rigged and corrupt system will be faced with a storm of fire that only a few could understand," Trump said in his 1-hour speech, as if the decision to run for president again was at great personal sacrifice.

Over at the White House, the reaction to Trump's announcement was mixed. The received wisdom among staff was that Trump was finished. President Biden and Vice President Harris did not share their view. "Donald Trump defied convention. All the things that should be disqualifying seemed to endear him more to his followers. The Republican elite would see the writing on the wall in terms of their voter base and soon fall back in line."

Harris found Trump's announcement deeply troubling. "This is an immensely consequential election," Harris told her National Security advisors. "The most consequential election probably this country has ever seen." The Vice President believed that to elect Trump once was to make a great error, but with a lot of unknowns, to elect Trump a second time after everything he'd done might be a death knell for American democracy. The Vice President and the President feel the weight of that very acutely in terms of what needs to happen.

Rebecca Lissner, Harris's Deputy National Security Advisor, said:

37. Jake Sullivan often described himself as the quartermaster of the Ukrainian Army. The irony was not lost on him. His father was a hardcore pacifist, a conscientious objector in the Vietnam War, who had studied for the priesthood, dropped out, and was now a Jesuit volunteer in San Francisco supporting kids who had aged out of foster care but who still needed some support. As a child, Sullivan was not allowed to have a squirt gun or video games. Now he was managing a war, getting us lethal weapons into Ukraine.

At the center of Ukraine's survival in the White House, Army Colonel Joe DeSilva, who had served in the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars, was in charge of the Ukraine weapons supply line for the National Security Council. In November, after the optimism of Ukraine's bold counteroffensive, the Ukrainians had taken up a defensive posture to try to hold their ground through the coming brutal winter months.

"Ukraine had a major air defense problem to solve," Sullivan advised. "And they were running out of artillery." Since October 2022, Russia had been bombarding Ukraine's energy grids in a targeted effort to deprive the Ukrainians of light, heat, and water during the coming winter months. Temperatures would soon plummet to as low as -5°F. Cities had been plunged into darkness, and millions of Ukrainians were without electricity.

President Biden told Zelenskyy they were rushing two NASAMS (National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile systems), which are sophisticated defense systems, to Ukraine to help buffer the barrage of Russian missile attacks. NASAMS are the premier air shield that are used to protect the airspace over the White House, the Capitol, and the Pentagon. Each NASAMS battery costs $23 million and shoots 10-foot-long missiles. Within a week of their arrival, the NASAMS proved their worth. Zelenskyy reported that the Russians fired 10 Iranian-made Shahed drones and missiles, and the NASAMS took down all 10.

To defend against Russian ballistic missiles, the US sent one of the world's most advanced long-range air defense systems: the Patriot. Patriots were first used by the US in the 1991 Gulf War to protect Israel and Saudi Arabia. Each Patriot battery cost $400 million, plus another $690 million for 50 missiles at $4 million each. Expensive, but priceless on the battlefield. The Patriots would become a game-changer for the Ukrainians, routinely knocking down Russian Kinzhal hypersonic missiles, which traveled at multiples of the speed of sound. Putin had boasted publicly that the Kinzhal was indestructible.

On December 21st, President Zelenskyy secretly traveled to Washington to address Congress. Not even the flight crew on the US military C-40 that collected him in Poland had advanced notice of who they would be transporting. In his distinctive army-green sweatshirt, Zelenskyy thanked every American and delivered a powerful plea for continued support to Ukraine. At times serious and demanding, and at other times funny, Zelenskyy showed again his greatest weapon: his extraordinary communication skill.

"We have artillery, yes, thank you. We have it. Is it enough? Honestly, not really," Zelenskyy said, inviting laughter. He received a standing ovation.

The acute weapons issue Sullivan and DeSilva had to deal with was the sustainability of Ukraine's 155mm ammunition. Maintaining a steady supply of ammunition was vital to Ukraine's ability to stay in the fight and push Russia back. The massive 36-foot-long Howitzer had become the mainstay of Ukraine's defense, a successful and versatile weapon on the battlefield. The Howitzer, a cross between a cannon and a mortar, catapulted 155mm ammunition, which is a big bullet, 6 inches wide, 2 feet long, and weighing 100 pounds each. It had a range of up to 15 miles with a sustained rate of fire of 40 rounds per hour, which made it incredibly valuable for ground troops to take out enemy targets from a distance without putting themselves in harm's way.

But Ukraine was churning through 155mm ammunition at an alarming pace and at risk of running out. The 155mm shortfall would be one of the bellwethers in the war. Sullivan realized Ukraine was the most challenging military environment for an army since World War II. "It was a full-on artillery war now," DeSilva said, with Ukraine and Russia bogged down in trench warfare. The front lines were barely moving.

In late January 2023, General Mark Milley provided a grim update. "Today, principal committee meeting, it will take Ukraine 700,000 rounds of 155mm artillery ammunition between the 1st of February and the 1st of June to both sustain the defense, execute a counteroffensive, and consolidate gains," Millie said. That was a huge number. Ukraine was burning through around 100,000 rounds a month, about 3,000 a day, and the United States did not have the stockpile to keep up.

Sullivan, Fine, and Blinken scoured the globe for 155s, but their biggest donors, European allies, were almost as tapped out as the United States. The war had exposed how far behind the United States and Europe were in basic weapons production and stockpiling. "Look for countries that want to stay under the radar," Sullivan instructed Colonel DeSilva. "Those that might not want to donate to Ukraine but who might be willing to sell to the US instead for the US to deliver to Ukraine." When President Biden had a call scheduled with a world leader, DeSilva would consider what weapons or artillery request they could tack on to the call. What did South Korea have? South Africa? Egypt? Cyprus? Ecuador?

The Pentagon was able to work out an agreement with South Korea that resulted in more than half a million rounds of 155 shells for Ukraine, but it was never enough to fill the growing deficit on the battlefield. DeSilva ran a daily interagency meeting from mid-February through April 10th, 2023, focused on plugging the 155 shortfall. "What's the deficit?" Sullivan asked every day, throwing out the names of countries like a quiz show host peppering contestants in a game of global geography. "Who haven't we tried yet? Who hasn't come through? Whose inventories have not been provably exhausted?"

Pentagon officials were almost desperately urging the Ukrainians not to overly rely on artillery fire. "Less, try to be more precise. Don't run out. You have to maneuver," was the message. DeSilva, who was coordinating with the Pentagon daily, pushed back hard. "They're not wasting it," DeSilva said. "They are using it the best they are can to achieve the tactical dynamics they need."

The Russians had laid thousands upon thousands of mines in square-kilometer interlocking areas. These death traps were only adding to the nightmare for the Ukrainians. There was no going around. Ukrainian sappers poked into the earth square foot by square foot to locate and clear the mines. Six sappers lost their legs. A Ukrainian sapper in the 35th Brigade told CBS News, "The whole process required such judicious demining work. It began to seriously delay Ukraine's plans for a counteroffensive."

Sullivan pushed Secretary Austin and others in the Pentagon to accelerate the production of 155s. Their stock power was limited because the US had not been contemplating a future massive artillery war. US production schedules had instead focused on advanced weapons like nuclear weapons, giant aircraft carriers, F-16 jets, ballistic missiles, and air defenses. Sullivan was clear: "They needed the defense industrial base also geared toward producing a lot more 155mm rounds." The National Security Advisor was spending half an hour most days on the search for 155s. It was becoming clear that if they could not find enough, they would be faced with a difficult, morally complex choice: send cluster munitions or leave Ukraine defenseless.

38. In Munich, Germany, Secretary of State Blinken stepped inside the cozy, white tent-like structure his communications team had set up in his hotel suite for secure communications. Music played backward as interference. "It can drive you crazy after a while," Blinken said of the sound, but the technicians said it masked what he was saying, making eavesdropping almost impossible.

The Secretary of State put on his headset and was dialed into a top-secret call with the President, Austin, Millie, and Sullivan. "There is a lot of interest on the part of European partners to provide Ukraine with F-16s, the premier US fighter jet," Blinken reported. He was in Germany for the Munich Security Conference and had been fielding multiple inquiries from allies about whether and when the Americans would move forward. Zelenskyy had been requesting them for a year.

The F-16 is an American-developed, single-engine, supersonic, multi-role fighter aircraft that would give the Ukrainians cutting-edge offensive and defensive air capabilities. Since F-16s are American technology, the US requires other countries to obtain US approval to provide them to third countries like Ukraine. So far, President Biden had withheld approval. His main concern was escalation that could draw NATO into war with Russia or push Putin to use a nuclear weapon.

"There is no perfect measure for this," Blinken believed. He could sense the reluctance on the other end of the phone. "We should be focused on the counteroffensive," Austin said. "And this won't do the Ukrainians any good in the counteroffensive because we can't get them trained or provide them F-16s during that. It would take too long." The Pentagon's position had consistently been that F-16s were not an immediate need; they would not have a near-term impact on the battlefield because the Ukrainian pilots would require specialized training to fly the planes, as well as intensive English language training because the manuals, the controls, everything relating to the planes was in English.

"Very legitimate logic," Blinken believed. "Look," Blinken said, "a modern Air Force is going to be part of that equation. So this is something that we're likely to do eventually. Why not get started? And there will be a long lead time," he added, "but it will answer the mail. It'll enable us to get going, you know, and it'll send a message that we're in this for the long haul."

"Tony," President Biden said, "I love you, but it's not going to happen."

"What about a Cessna?" Lincoln joked. The President laughed. Lincoln was undeterred. After two decades of conversations with Biden, Lincoln knew the President could adamantly say, "We're not going to do that," while he was still listening, keeping an open mind.

"Why don't we start in on the training?" Lincoln said. "Because there's a long lead-in time on the training, and then you can make the decision on F-16s down the road." Lincoln was emulating Biden's marriage counselor approach to resolving policy debates, referring to the middle ground. It was not unusual for Biden to hedge and postpone a hard decision.

"The thing that's important to know about the President," Lincoln told others later, "is that he will, in a discussion, in a friendly argument, he will often stake out a position that convinces you he is resolutely for something or resolutely against something. In fact, what he's really trying to do is push the people he's talking to." Lincoln said to people who don't know him as well, "They conclude, 'Oh, forget it, he's not doing that.' I know from having spent so much time with him that he's really trying to pressure-test the idea by going at it really hard."

"Let's go ahead with the training," Biden said finally.

39. General Mark Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the United States' most senior uniformed officer, had conducted a long campaign beginning early in Biden's presidency to get in to see Attorney General Merrick Garland. Garland, very loyally and cautiously, had taken his time thinking it over, but he finally agreed, and the Justice Department arranged a lunch. It is highly unusual, if not unprecedented, for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs to personally visit the Attorney General at the Justice Department. One senior Justice Department lawyer involved thought that it was the first time in American history.

General Milley thought of it as a routine part of his job as advisor to the National Security Council, of which Garland was a member. He told his staff it was his responsibility to meet with all cabinet officials to "level bubbles," an infantry term for leveling all the guns on a gun line for accurate fire. Milley, deeply convinced that Trump was a danger to the country, pressed Garland to investigate domestic threats. He was especially concerned about the far-right militia groups, many of which had attacked the Capitol on January 6th, 2021, and were still threatening violence against the federal government.

"There's a large militia movement out there," Milley reported. "And there's a groundswell of anger and anxiety that unless properly dealt with, could lead to the potential for violence. It's not going to get to civil war levels or any of that, but it potentially could get to levels of domestic violence."

Milley was not the only one to press Garland. There were so many allegations and lines of inquiry swirling around Trump and the January 6th insurrection that an independent investigation of the former president was almost inevitable. On November 18th, 2022, Attorney General Garland announced that there would be an independent investigation of Trump. Garland appointed Jack Smith, a former career Justice Department prosecutor, as special counsel to oversee and run the investigation of the January 6th, 2021, insurrection. Encouraged by President Trump, rioters had stormed the Capitol in an effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election result. Jack Smith was also appointed to probe Trump's handling of classified documents and other presidential records kept at his Mar-a-Lago club and residence in Florida.

"Based on recent developments," Garland said, "including the former president's announcement that he is a candidate for president in the next election and the sitting president's (Biden's) stated intention to be a candidate as well, I have concluded that it is in the public interest to appoint a special counsel."

Trump spoke for 1 hour and 42 minutes on March 4th, 2023, at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), the large, influential conservative group. It was founded in 1974 when Ronald Reagan, then the California governor, gave the inaugural keynote speech. "Today," Trump said, "I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution." This was an important and central theme of Trump's 2024 presidential campaign: a promise to get payback for those who felt mistreated or cast out.

Two days later, on Monday, March 6th, 2023, I attended a reception at the Willard Hotel in Washington D.C. "We got a talk," General Milley said as I approached him. Milley was not in uniform but wearing a fashionable dark sports coat and plaid shirt. He had a freshly showered look and he seemed relaxed, though he stood barrel-chested with the ramrod-straight posture of an army general. Milley was still worried about Trump.

"No one has ever been as dangerous to this country as Donald Trump," Milley said. "Do you realize? Do you see what this man is? I glimpsed it when I talked to you back for Peril, but I now know it. I now know it." Milley had shared with me his worries about Trump's mental stability and control of nuclear weapons for the book *Peril*, I co-authored with Robert Costa. Milley and I continued to talk, proving it is possible to have a very private conversation in the middle of a crowded room.

"We have got to stop him," Milley said. "You have got to stop him." Him, he meant the press broadly. "He is the most dangerous person ever. I had suspicions when I talked to you about his mental decline and so forth, but now I realize he's a total fascist. He is the most dangerous person to this country." His eyes darted around the room, filled with 200 guests of the Cohen Group, a global business consulting firm headed by former Defense Secretary William Cohen. Cohen and former Defense Secretary James Mattis spoke at the reception.

"A fascist to the core," Milley repeated to me. "I will never forget the intensity of his worry." In June, Trump announced on social media that he was being indicted for mishandling classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, making him the first former president to face federal criminal charges. "The corrupt Biden Administration has informed my attorneys that I have been indicted, seemingly over the Box's hoax," Trump said on Truth Social. "I am an innocent man." His former Attorney General, Bill Barr, provided a frank assessment to Fox News. "He's toast," Barr said. "If even half of what was alleged was proven true, he's not a victim here. He was totally wrong that he had the right to have those documents. Those documents are among the most sensitive secrets that the country has."

President Biden was also ramping up his re-election campaign, attending several fundraisers in June 2023. Silicon Valley's tech hub was flush with important, deep-pocketed cash donors. The first fundraiser, hosted by Kevin Scott, the Chief Technology Officer of Microsoft, at his home in Los Gatos on June 19th, was attended by 38 guests, including some of the most serious Democratic donors in the valley. The event raised $2.7 million for Biden's reelection fund. Guests, however, said that Biden was frighteningly awful. "It was like your 87-year-old senile grandfather wandering around the room saying to women guests, 'Your eyes are so beautiful.'" Biden, who was 80, had flown in from Washington earlier that day, and one donor acknowledged, "He had probably woken up very early, but appeared tired. He could not wait to sit down and only took two pre-arranged questions. He carried a handful of note cards with the answers printed out, but even then seemed to wander off point."

At a second, much larger fundraiser that same day, hosted by venture capitalist Steve Wozniak, the former state controller and a big Tesla investor, and his wife Anita, attendees reported an almost opposite experience with President Biden. He was energetic. The host told others, "He wouldn't sit down for 2 hours." There were about 170 people at that fundraiser. Biden's performances, particularly at fundraisers, continued to show troubling signs of decline through June. During an event at the New York City Four Seasons, Biden could not find the word for "veteran." At a loss, he asked a small group of donors to help him find the right word for someone who served in the military. One guest did, and Biden used it: "veteran." The group was surprised and unsettled. And after a small "Meet the President" fundraiser attended by about 20 people at the home of philanthropists Susie and Michael Gelman in Chevy Chase, Maryland, on June 27th, 2023, guests described their interactions with Biden as painful. "He never completed a sentence," said Bill Reichblum, co-founder and president of Liberty's Journal Foundation, who attended with his wife and father-in-law, a former U.S. Ambassador to Romania. "He would start to talk about something, jump somewhere else. He told the same story three times in exactly the same way, and it meandered so much it was striking, frankly."

"My impression was there were times," Reichblum said, "it was as though we didn't exist. He was just rambling and talking as to what came into his head." Biden seemed to Reichblum like an elderly grandparent or parent who talks and talks but makes no sense. Many wondered if it was just a bad night for Biden. I would learn the significance of these fundraisers as early markers of Biden's decline only a year later, in June 2024.

40. On June 11th, 2023, Colonel Joe DeSilva updated Sullivan on the state of Ukraine's ammunition stores. "They are burning through a tremendous amount of artillery every day," DeSilva said. "It is about double what we've projected. The Ukrainians are using upwards of 10,000 rounds of 155mm ammunition per day."

Sullivan's eyes got big. "Well, when are they going to run out?"

"Potentially by the end of July," DeSilva said. "Six weeks." DeSilva looked at Sullivan grimly. They both knew an artillery war without artillery ammunition would mean the end for Ukraine. This was DeSilva's third war. He had served 38 months in the Iraq War. He saw the flaws in the U.S. approach in Iraq and Afghanistan and felt strongly that helping Ukraine defend itself against Putin's ruthless attempt at territorial conquest was the purest cause he had ever been a part of in his 21 years in the U.S. Army.

DeSilva's 93-year-old father, a Portuguese immigrant who had been a high school janitor, was always skeptical of the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. "Joe," he said to his son, "I just don't know what the heck we're doing there." But in the Ukraine war, his father said, "The Russians should not have done this, and I'm glad we're helping these people." Despite the political divisions, DeSilva felt Americans did have an innate understanding of right and wrong. Most Americans—Republicans, Democrats, and independents—felt the war was a just cause.

The Pentagon confirmed that the only significant supply of 155s on Earth that could fire from the howitzers were the U.S. cluster munitions, banned by 100 in 23 countries as inhumane and indiscriminate. Cluster munitions explode in the air above a target, releasing dozens or more bomblets over an area as wide as two football fields. The lethal individual bomblets then explode into flying metal fragments. Those that don't detonate become ticking time bombs sitting on the land, often exploding months, years, or even decades later when civilians and children find or disturb them in the fields of old wars. Studies in Vietnam found that the cluster bombs caused eight times more casualties than the regular ammunition. They are one of the ugly expedients of war.

President Biden had made it clear he was deeply uncomfortable with cluster munitions. "A last resort," he said when his advisers had raised Ukraine's requests for clusters. It was now the last resort. The Pentagon, which had been reluctant to give Ukraine many other weapons, said the U.S. clusters, Dual-Purpose Improved Conventional Munitions, would effectively double Ukraine's kill efficiency on the battlefield. The U.S. had a large stockpile of 413,000 DPICM with a safer 1.3% dud rate and a little over 800,000 clusters with a 2.35% dud rate. Russia was already actively using cluster munitions in Ukraine that had an astronomically higher dud rate of 30 to 40%.

Opposition to clusters was framed in terms of human rights, but it was difficult for Sullivan and Fine to think of a more brazen violation than if the Russians were allowed to march forward to conduct further atrocities in Ukrainian-occupied territories. More than 2,400 Ukrainian civilians were killed in Mariupol; more than 450 civilians were massacred in Bucha with clear evidence of execution, hands tied behind backs, gunshots to the head, slit throats, and ear pinning; more than 290 civilians were found dead, many from indiscriminate Russian fire or execution. The missile strikes in crowded urban centers were at the busiest time of the day. Putin was also responsible for the mass abduction of at least 6,000 Ukrainian children taken from occupied territories like Mariupol, Kherson, and Kyiv and adopted out to Russian families.

One U.S. intelligence assessment put it starkly: If the clusters were not given, the Russian army would have a 5:1 or 10:1 advantage in the artillery rounds at their disposal—a crippling disparity. The implication was that not only would Ukraine lose the war, but it would be a slaughter.

During the President's Daily Brief on June 29th, all the principals were in lockstep. Austin and Milley made the recommendation to Biden: Send clusters. Austin and Milley had been in command units during the Iraq War when cluster munitions had been used by U.S. forces. They argued no better substitute existed for them on the battlefield. Sullivan and Fine said they had received explicit assurances from allies who were signatories to the international ban on clusters that if Biden went ahead, it would not cost the U.S. anything in alliance unity. Intelligence Chiefs DNI Haynes and CIA Director Burns advised that sending cluster munitions would not be considered a major escalation by the Russians. The Russians were using more dangerous clusters at a higher rate; for them to call a red line would be laughable.

"I agree to the transfer," Biden said. "How did I become the leading public advocate for the use of cluster munitions?" Sullivan remarked later to DeSilva. "I never thought in my life I'd do that."

"Joe, that's your fault," he said jokingly. "You know, you made me do it." Sullivan understood it was one of the messy, undesirable necessities of war, forcing a difficult and far from clear-cut moral choice.

41. Yevgeny Prigozhin, Putin's personal chef turned private military contractor, was publicly incensed at the incompetence and disorganization of Russia's military. Burly, bald-headed, and straight out of central casting for a Russian thug, Prigozhin had used social media during the war to challenge the Kremlin's motives for fighting in Ukraine. "The war wasn't needed to return Russian citizens to our bosom, nor to demilitarize or denazify Ukraine," Prigozhin said. "The war was needed so that a bunch of animals could simply exalt in glory."

He was also engaged in a brazen public feud with Russia's Defense Minister Shoigu, whom he accused of depriving his Wagner forces, a mix of elite mercenaries and thousands of Russian prisoners, of ammunition in Ukraine. It had turned Wagner, which was fighting for Russia, into a meat grinder. "The scum that doesn't give us ammunition will eat their guts in hell," Prigozhin sneered.

In the months-long battle for Bakhmut, a Ukrainian city in the east, Prigozhin reported that Wagner had lost more than 20,000 men. He posted a video of himself walking in a field at night among dozens of corpses in uniform. "These are boys from Wagner who died today," Prigozhin said. "Their blood is still fresh." He then unleashed on Russia's defense leaders, yelling into the camera, "Shoigu! Gerasimov! Where is the ammunition?"

Fed up, on Friday, June 23rd, 2023, Prigozhin turned his forces around in Ukraine and ordered them to march for justice to Moscow. It was a dramatic showdown. A column of tanks slowly rolled away from Ukraine and toward Russia's capital, capturing worldwide attention. Iran played minute-by-minute coverage on its news channels, and Iran's president, Ebrahim Raisi, placed a worried call to President Putin.

"Actions that split our unity are a stab in the back of our country and our people," Putin said with undisguised venom during a televised address to the nation that day. In less than 24 hours, 125 miles from Moscow, Prigozhin announced he had struck a deal with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko and would stand down.

Two months later, Prigozhin was killed in a plane crash north of Moscow. "Taking action like killing Prigozhin, like doing the kinds of things that he's done," DNI Avril Haynes reported, as she watched Putin, "he feels a sense of empowerment. He's in control. He's done this, and that's part of the psychology of it."

During an economic conference in Russia in September, Putin said, "Mr. Trump says he will resolve all burning issues within several days, including the Ukrainian crisis. We cannot help but feel happy about it." He labeled the criminal cases piling up against Trump, now totaling 91 felony counts, as political persecution. "Given today's conditions, what is happening is good for us, in my opinion," Putin added, "because it shows the rottenness of the American political system, which cannot pretend to teach democracy to others."

Asked about Putin's comments in a Meet the Press interview with NBC journalist Kristen Welker, Trump gloated, "I like that he said that because that means what I'm saying is right. I would get him into a room. I would get Zelenskyy into a room, and I would get a deal worked out," Trump said. Pressed by Welker for specifics, Trump added, "If I tell you exactly, I lose all my bargaining chips. I mean, you can't really say exactly what you're going to do, but I would say certain things to Putin. I would say certain things to Zelenskyy." It was not clear Trump had any concrete ideas on how to resolve the war. "I get along with him really well," Trump said about Putin, "and that's a good thing, not a bad thing."

42. Ron Dermer, the closest advisor to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, often called "Bibi's Brain," was at home in Jerusalem with his family for the start of the Jewish holiday Simchat Torah on Saturday, October 7th, 2023. Around 6:30 that morning, his phone started buzzing and buzzing and buzzing and buzzing. The Red Alert system, the sophisticated app on his phone that notified him every time a rocket launched at Israel and where it would hit, was going berserk. He watched with growing alarm as a rapid stream of notifications flashed on his phone screen. A barrage of 3,000 rockets had launched at Israel. Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that controlled the Gaza Strip south of Israel, had started a massive surprise attack.

The Sabbath was a day of rest for Jewish people, but when Dermer switched on his television and saw white pickup trucks full of Hamas gunmen driving along main roads in southern Israel, he got straight in his car and drove to Tel Aviv to meet Netanyahu. By the time Dermer arrived at the Kirya (Israel's version of the Pentagon) and descended deep into the underground bunker, Hamas militants had begun to massacre any Israeli they could find. "This is war," Netanyahu told Dermer, a statement that reverberated across the entire country.

Middle East NSC coordinator Brett McGurk, age 50, had been alerted by the White House Situation Room to rocket attacks in Israel just after midnight in Washington D.C. on October 7th, 2023. Israel's time zone was 7 hours ahead of Washington. McGurk didn't think too much of it; the rocket alerts were common in Israel. Moments later, at 12:17 a.m., his phone buzzed with a text from Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Herzog, a former Israel Defense Forces General: "Hamas just launched a massive rocket strike against Israel. This is war." Next was Israel's National Security Advisor Tzachi Hanegbi: "What is happening is an attack against Israel, a coordinated attack." Then an update from Herzog: "They launched the attack by surprise, including cross-border infiltration. This is an unprovoked massive attack that cannot be ignored. We need strong public condemnation from you and clear support." McGurk wrote back at 1:12 a.m.: "We are with you."

He was up the rest of the night. The initial hours of the invasion were a blur of chaos and confusion, but the fuller picture emerged in time, and it was one of unthinkable horror. Hamas militants from Gaza stormed across the border into southern Israel. They smashed through barrier crossings, took down communication towers, and attacked unsuspecting Israeli military command posts. Then, using pickup trucks, vans, Jeeps, motorcycles, and even paragliders, 3,000 Hamas militants streamed into kibbutz communities, burning homes and slaughtering entire families, including children and babies in cribs and bunk beds. Many were still in their pajamas; others were sitting down to have breakfast. Hamas shot, beheaded, mutilated, dismembered, and burned Israelis alive.

Another 50 Hamas terrorists swarmed a music festival in Re'im, Israel, about 3 miles from the Gaza border. Jeeps and vans teeming with Hamas gunmen fired at the festival-goers, surrounding them in the open desert with few places to hide. Gunmen picked off the young men and women as they fled or hid in trees or shrubs. The Hamas militants also committed vicious acts of sexual violence against women, including tying them to trees and raping them. Ramy Davidian, an emergency worker at the music festival, recounted later in Cheryl Sandberg's documentary *Screams Before Silence*: "I saw girls tied up with their hands behind them to every tree here. Someone murdered them, raped them, and abused them here on these trees. Their legs were spread. They inserted all kinds of things into their intimate organs, like wooden boards, iron rods. Over 30 girls were murdered and raped here." Raz Cohen, another festival goer interviewed in the documentary, was hiding with his friend. "Sham, sham, who was next to me, said he's stabbing her. He, he's slaughtering her, and I didn't want to look. When I looked again, she was already dead, and he was still at it. He was still raping her after he had slaughtered her." Later, Hamas members paraded the body of a woman they had killed, Shani Louk, a 22-year-old German-Israeli national, in a pickup truck through Gaza City. She wore only underwear. The militants chanted "Allahu Akbar" (meaning God is great) and spat on her body.

Deep underground in Tel Aviv, the evening of October 7th, Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu and Ron Dermer met with Israel's security and military leadership as the surprise attack in Israel's south continued to ravage communities. Every hour, reports of the horrors worsened. The death toll reports were growing by the hundreds. "Are we in control of the situation?" Netanyahu demanded of his security cabinet. He had only been informed of the attack at 6:30 that morning. As it unfolded, early warning signals first went off around 3:00 a.m. but had never escalated to the level of informing the Prime Minister. It was a massive intelligence and military failure. "Why didn't you wake up the Prime Minister?" Dermer asked. Nobody had a good answer. Netanyahu kept a hawk-like focus on the situation unfolding: Is the IDF going to the communities under attack? Has Hamas infiltrated beyond the outskirts of Gaza? Is another attack coming? What are we prepared to do? What do we need to do diplomatically?

President Biden convened a call with his National Security team, including Sullivan, Blinken, Austin, and Burns. They provided an update on everything they were seeing unfold in Israel. "Biden said he wanted to speak to Netanyahu as soon as possible." "There needs to be the strongest condemnation of what has happened and of Hamas," Biden said on the phone later that day. Netanyahu said to Biden, "Israel will win a war against Hamas." His focus was not on the Hamas attack but on what might still be coming. "You need to begin messaging Hezbollah to stay out," Netanyahu said to Biden. "Hezbollah needs to get the message from the United States: Don't enter the war. Don't enter the war. Stay out of the war." Netanyahu, who sounded shaken, was worried that Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed militia in Lebanon, would attack Israel from the north. "These guys think we're weak," Netanyahu said. "And in the Middle East, if you're weak, you're roadkill." "Where with you," Biden said to Netanyahu and reassured him that there would be close coordination ongoing between us and Israeli military and intelligence.

Netanyahu then called Jake Sullivan directly. The National Security Advisor was in a small fishing village in the south of France about to start a short holiday with his wife, Maggie Goodlander, and a few of their good friends when he received the alert of the Hamas attack. Now he would be heading back to Washington. "Jake, we need you to basically threaten Hezbollah," Netanyahu implored him. "That's what we need you to do. We need you to tell them that if they mess with us, they mess with you." Hezbollah had the largest fighting force of any non-state actor in the world, with tens of thousands of soldiers and upward of 150,000 missiles and rockets. Sullivan could tell from Netanyahu's tone this was existential.

For Israel, a moment of the most acute vulnerability. Netanyahu's sounded like he believed he might really lose his country. Hezbollah might come, Iran might come, everyone might come, all at once, to try to destroy Israel.

A cornerstone of Israel's deterrence was Israel's vaunted military and curt, sophisticated intelligence. That notion had just been shattered. At the White House, Brett McGurk was pouring over the intelligence reporting to see if another attack was coming for Israel. He also was monitoring the reports from Israelis on the ground.

"We've got it contained. We've got them all," Israel said of the Hamas militants. Hours later, McGurk realized they had not. There are still a thousand Hamas guys inside Israel. It was a true fog of war.

The scale of Hamas's brutality wasn't fully apparent until days later. At a podium in the State Dining Room of the White House that afternoon, President Biden, flanked by Secretary Blinken, delivered a warning to Iran and its proxies, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon.

"Today, the people of Israel are under attack, orchestrated by a terrorist organization, Hamas," Biden said. "In this moment of tragedy, I want to say to them and to the world and to terrorists everywhere that the United States stands with Israel. We will not ever fail to have their back."

Biden added, "Let me say this as clearly as I can: This is not a moment for any party hostile to Israel to exploit these attacks to seek advantage. The world is watching."

It took three days for the Israelis to get a handle on the attack. "We were counting the dead for many, many days," Derman said. That number kept going up for ten days because there were bodies all over the place. Overall, Hamas killed more than 1,200 Israelis and dragged more than 240 hostages back across the border into underground tunnels in Gaza. It was the deadliest attack in Jewish history since the Holocaust.

Ron Dermer racked his brain about how this attack could have happened right under their noses. On October 6th, the day before the attack, Israel's intelligence assessment was that Hamas in Gaza was deterred. Hamas was not strong enough to take on Israel. Israel had exchanged big blows with Hamas in May 2021 after Hamas fired a rocket into Jerusalem. At the time, Israel believed they had destroyed a lot of Hamas's key capabilities.

"On October 6th," Dermer said, "I believed that Hamas got hit by a stick two years earlier. They weren't looking for a fight."

Netanyahu had also changed Israel's policy to allow Gazans to work in Israel. The number of Gazans given work permits had gradually increased to around 20,000 by October 7th. The extra workers were helping Israel's economy but significantly improving Gaza's economy as well. Hamas, Israeli intelligence assessed, now had an incentive to keep the calm so that Gazans could continue to work in Israel. Any violence would shut access down.

"The assessment that people had was that Hamas did not have an interest in going to war with Israel," Dermer said. Hamas also had stayed out of the few mini-fights Israel had over the last two years with Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a smaller terrorist organization in Gaza that was a direct subsidiary of Iran. Islamic Jihad fired rockets at Israel, and Israel retaliated by taking out some of the militant leaders. Hamas had not engaged. Israel's intelligence analysts interpreted that as another signal that Hamas was not looking for war.

Now, after October 7th, the assessment was that Hamas had remained quiet in order to prepare its surprise attack, which members of Palestinian Islamic Jihad had also participated in.

"Netanyahu knows Hamas is dedicated to our destruction," Dermer said. "He doesn't have any doubt about their will to kill us and their capabilities. It's just actually having an attack plan on this scale." The scale of the October 7th attack was the biggest surprise of all.

Months later, Israel's intelligence assessments showed that on October 6th, only three Hamas leaders knew the plan for the attack on Israel. The next day, Hamas concealed it from Israeli intelligence by keeping it within the smallest circle. Most of the 3,000 militants only found out they were not on another training exercise in the moments before the massive attack launched.

In another extraordinary oversight, Israel's intelligence agencies later discovered that they had been in possession of Hamas's attack plan almost a full year ahead of the October 7th attack.

"I don't know who in our hierarchy saw it or read it," Ambassador Herzog said, "but nobody believed it. Everybody said that Hamas is not strong enough to take on Israel. They would not dare do something like that."

Herzog said, "Now we know that our intelligence managed to put its hands on the full Hamas plans about a year before the attack. It gave the full plan of Hamas of a massive cross-she-will border attack with rockets, with everything going into army bases and to all the kibbutz and the civilian populated villages and towns close to the border. It was a very meticulous plan, and they exercised it. They trained."

Israel had failed to act on the information and, as a consequence, did not have enough of their forces close to the border when the invasion began. Israel's military secretary later said that even 15 minutes of warning would have made a world of difference to Israel's ability to defend against the Hamas attack on October 7th. Instead, Israel was caught by total surprise.

As the death toll was still being counted, Prime Minister Netanyahu and Israel's security cabinet began to plan a military response unlike Hamas had ever seen. Netanyahu wanted a decisive victory over Hamas in Gaza to eliminate Hamas leaders and permanently dismantle their control over Gaza.

"For Israel," Dermer said, "the existential threat is that if we do not wipe out an organization that did what they did to us on October 7th, then that imperils the whole future of the country because all the buzzards circling around Israel are going to look and see, 'We can get away with it.' It's not enough to just hit it hard," Dermer added. "It's not enough to deplete their capacity. You have to, for a country like Israel that relies on deterrence, on deterring enemies from doing these attacks, what we have to show all of the enemies in the region is that if you do this type of attack, they don't survive it."

October 7th struck an existential nerve for Israelis. Ambassador Herzog believed he had been a combat soldier, a corporal in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, 50 years before this Hamas attack.

"I think this war touches an existential level among Israelis, the way that the 1973 war never touched," Herzog said about October 7th. Back then, it had been Israel's military fighting against the Egyptian and Syrian militaries. The eventual ceasefire led to the Camp David Accords, with Egypt becoming the first Arab country to recognize Israel as a state. Now, Israel was fighting against a very different invading force: Hamas, a terrorist organization bent on Israel's destruction.

"If we do not remove this threat, we cannot lead normal lives," Herzog said. Hamas has become an Iranian proxy over the last decade, and if we don't defeat Hamas, then we just embolden this axis. Hamas was not thousands of miles away, but for Israelis, physically and psychologically, right next door.

The scale of the October 7th Hamas attack on Israel had surprised U.S. and intelligence agencies as well. Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes scrutinized the reports. Before October 7th, there were signs of mounting tensions between Israel and Hamas. The U.S. intelligence agencies had warned of an increasing potential for a more limited attack, something consistent with what Hamas had done in the past. But the massive scale of October 7th was a curveball out of the blue, unquestionably a surprise.

What stood out to Haynes in the intelligence leading up to October 7th were reports of protests by Palestinians in Gaza against Hamas. "Pretty unusual," Haynes mused. There were indications of the beginning of a fraying of Hamas political support in Gaza. U.S. intelligence had been more focused on Hezbollah, the militant organization that controlled Lebanon, north of Israel. In many respects, "we were looking at the tensions increasing with Hezbollah during this period even more so than with Hamas," Hayes reported.

U.S. intelligence showed that Hezbollah was in a relatively stable position but growing. A lot of Hezbollah's elite fighters who had been sent to Syria had returned to Lebanon. Hezbollah was also stockpiling advanced conventional weapons. "We don't see Nasrallah as being in a position where he wants to go to war with Israel in a full-out escalation," Haynes said, referring to Hezbollah's leader Hassan Nasrallah. But in the lead-up to October 7th, he was becoming more confident of his space and pushing against Israel, and Israel was pushing back.

Now, in the aftermath of the massive Hamas attack, Haynes pushed the U.S. intelligence agencies into overdrive. "Help Israel see what's happening on their other borders," she instructed. Hezbollah, Iran, the Houthis in Yemen, Iranian-aligned militias in Iraq and Syria were circling.

The day after October 7th, Jake Sullivan was looking for deterrence measures or symbols of deterrence in order to cool down the region. "No better deterrent than the American aircraft carrier," Sullivan called Kelly Maiman, a civilian foreign policy adviser and chief of staff to Secretary Austin, and asked, "Don't we have a carrier strike group in the Med for Ukraine purposes?" Sullivan had almost forgotten about the carrier because it wasn't doing a lot for Ukraine. "Let's reposition the Ford, see what Austin thinks." Austin agreed and directed the USS Gerald R. Ford strike group, which included the carrier, guided missile cruisers, and destroyers, to move to the Eastern Mediterranean, closer to Israel.

Sullivan also sought Biden's approval. "This is the sweet spot for us," Biden said about moving the ships. He would not have to issue a public threat or declare a red line. "The messaging should be straightforward. We shouldn't hype it, just make the move." Biden was delighted they could generate deterrence without putting the U.S. or himself on the hook in a way that might be risky. Reward without risk.

Secretary of State Tony Blinken called the head of Qatar's government, Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, or "Mbar" as he was known in the U.S. for short. "There are American hostages," Blinken told Mbar urgently. "There are hostages, and there are Americans who are hostage. It's a game-changer for us," he said with emphasis. Hamas had taken over 240 hostages, including 33 children and 12 Americans.

Mbar said he understood. Qatar, a small but wealthy emirate on the Persian Gulf, played an outsized role in the realpolitik of the Middle East. Home to some of the world's largest natural gas reserves, Qatar had the highest per capita income in the world and a GDP of about $250 billion annually. Its 43-year-old leader, Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, educated in Great Britain at Harrow, the elite school, and the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, had transformed Qatar's relationship with the West while maintaining close ties with Iran and financially backing controversial political militant groups like Hamas, which had attacked Israel so brutally. The Emir was considered one of the shrewdest politicians in the region. The Emir had helped the U.S. evacuate its citizens from Afghanistan in 2021 when the Afghan government collapsed, prompting President Biden to designate Qatar a major non-NATO ally.

"We have a channel with Hamas," Mbar said on the phone with Jake Sullivan a few days later. He was the Emir's most trusted adviser. He had served as foreign minister since 2016, and in March 2023, the Emir appointed him to also serve as prime minister.

"You need to set up a cell that will work with my team," Mbar said to Sullivan, meaning a core group of Americans and Israelis dedicated to working on getting the hostages out. Sullivan jumped at the opportunity of negotiating a channel, knowing how important the hostages were to President Biden and American policy. He told Mbar he would set up a cell and link in the Israelis. Sullivan built his cell with CIA Director Bill Burns, NSC Middle East coordinator Brett McGurk, and NSC legal counselor Josh Geltzer. Israel chose David Barnea, the head of Mossad.

Sullivan knew Emir Al Thani and Prime Minister Mbar were key to getting the hostages out safely. The Emir had hosted Hamas political leadership in the capital, Doha, for years and contributed aid in the form of hundreds of millions of dollars to Hamas in Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu had even approved of the Qatar aid on the grounds that it would contain and stabilize Hamas in Gaza. For Netanyahu, a contained Hamas leadership in Gaza was his preference, as it greatly reduced pressure on Israel to negotiate a two-state solution with the Palestinians. There was no push to recognize Hamas as a head of state. This was often referred to as "buying quiet" of the terrorist group Hamas. Now, it was obvious Bibi's strategy was a catastrophic failure. This sounded like astonishing hypocrisy, but buying protection was a way of life for leaders in the Middle East.

"Qatar has a channel with Hamas," Sullivan updated President Biden, outlining his idea for the cell and the plan he and Mbar had set in motion. "What do you mean?" Biden said. "I will get the hostages out. That's my job. You can do whatever you want, but I'm going to have to call the Emir, and I'm going to have to call CC, and I'm going to have to call B." Biden was referring to Egypt's President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who's responsible for getting the hostages home. Biden underscored his point to his National Security adviser: "I'm responsible." Biden gave Sullivan the go-ahead to proceed with the cell.

"Great," Biden said. "However you want to organize it, fine. But keep in mind that I feel responsible, and I feel ultimately I will have to deliver." Hostages were the emotional spine for most leaders, especially Biden. Getting the hostages back safely would be a victory. Failure to do could permanently stain a presidency.

President Biden put Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu on speakerphone. His senior staff gathered around the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office. It was 9:55 a.m. on October 11th, 2023, four days after 3,000 Hamas terrorists from Gaza crashed through Israel's southern border and slaughtered around 1,200 Israelis. Netanyahu was seeking unequivocal assurance from Biden that the United States would fully support Israel in a preemptive attack on Hezbollah, the massive Iranian-backed terrorist organization operating out of southern Lebanon on Israel's northern border. He claimed to have rock-solid intelligence that Hezbollah was about to attack Israel. Hezbollah's arsenal of more than 150,000 rockets dwarfed Hamas's cache of weapons weapons in the South. Netanyahu wanted to strike first with a total blitz of every Hezbollah missile site and military location.

"Do you really think you're going to be able to take all those rockets out before they just launch against your cities?" Biden said to Netanyahu. "And if they do launch against your cities in that volume, do you really think you're going to have the air defenses to be able to defend them? Is this the moment for Israel to kick off that kind of situation and put its population at risk?" Biden continued. "This is going to lead to a situation that is going to get out of control very quickly, that is going to implicate much, if not most, of your population, all of whom are in rocket range." The president had intelligence that showed Hezbollah's rockets could reach every corner of Israel, just 290 miles north to south and 85 miles east to west at its widest.

"At this point, Israel is about the size of New Jersey. No doubt you can inflict significant damage on Hezbollah," Biden said, "but the damage they'll be about to inflict on you and your cities and among your people is great. Their arsenal is huge and capable of reaching virtually all major Israeli cities," Biden said. "I just talked to my Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. I just talked to all my intel people. I just talked to my military people," Biden said. "What you guys are contemplating here is not going to work."

"The president added, 'Hey, do we all agree we do not want this to become a broader regional war?' 'It's going to be a disaster.' 'Of course, Joe,' Bibi said. 'That's what we don't want. But we have no choice, and this will shorten the war. This will shorten the war.'"

Biden knew an Israeli-Hezbollah war would likely explode into an Israel-Iran war. Hezbollah was basically a syndicate led by its secretary-general, Hassan Nasrallah, a Lebanese cleric who helped end the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon in 2000, and the supreme leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei. Iran had the largest military in the Middle East. Intercepts showed Nasrallah and Khamenei were scheming regularly. Both had an avowed commitment to the elimination of Israel as a state. Up to this point, Iran had used its proxies to target Israel, but large-scale efforts to decimate Hezbollah would be impossible for Iran to ignore.

"Look," Biden said, "one of our objectives with this terrible October 7th Hamas attack is to try to contain it to Gaza and not have a broader regional war. What you're about to do is going to guarantee a regional war."

"After what Hamas did, I can't say there won't be a regional war," Biden said, "but I can tell you if you launch this attack, there will be one. So let's kind of take our time here. And by the way, we are not on board," Biden added. If there were any doubt, the president repeated his point: "We, the United States, are not on board for that conflict. So you should not count on our support if you preemptively launch a war against Hezbollah. If they attack you," Biden said, "if they attack Israel, the United States will always stand up for Israel's security. But if you launch a preemptive war like this, we do not support it," Biden said.

U.S. intelligence agencies had been monitoring the Israel-Lebanon border closely since the devastating Hamas attack on October 7th. Israel had sent troops to reinforce its defenses, fearing Hezbollah might stream across the border in the north, just as Hamas, the terrorist group in Gaza, had done in the South. In response to Israeli reinforcements, Hezbollah had added more troops of its own and moved some of their elite forces closer to the border. The atmosphere couldn't be tenser, with both sides staring at each other, looking for the slightest provocation.

"First, we do not read the situation the same way you do," Biden said. "We do not believe war is inevitable. Second," Biden said, "this is a moment where you cannot get pushed into war by your military." Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant was raring to go, advocating for the preemptive strike. Israel Defense Forces Chief Herzi Halevi believed Israel had their military plan perfected and sensitive sources and methods had presented them with unique operational opportunities. The Israeli generals feared Hamas and Hezbollah were allied and working together, that the October 7th attack was part of a larger coordinated master plan to destroy Israel. First, Hamas would attack on October 7th to distract Israel in the South, and then Hezbollah would launch devastating attacks from the North.

Before his call with Netanyahu, Biden had been briefed by his principal advisors. He asked, "Have we seen any intel to support a Hezbollah attack on Israel?" The unanimous answer from CIA Director Bill Burns, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs CQ Brown was no.

Biden continued to make his argument to Bibi. "There is a reason that we have elected political leaders in democracies," Biden said. "We have to, yes, take the advice of the military, but it's your call. And don't think that just because your military is telling you you have to go, that absolves you of the responsibility of making the decision." Nearly 15 years earlier, when Biden was President Obama's vice president, he had passionately and unsuccessfully fought the military pressure to persuade Obama to add 30,000 additional troops to the Afghanistan war. So incensed, Biden had declared at the time, "The military doesn't run with me," a statement that later incurred the distrust of much of the U.S. defense establishment. Doubt about the military and military advice was part of Biden's approach as president.

"Third," Biden advised Netanyahu, "take a breath. Let's have our teams work together and figure out what we're actually dealing with, and then we can make a considered judgment that isn't just rushed into." Finally, Biden said, "You start this war, I have people all over the Middle East. Overall, 45,000 U.S. military personnel and contractors were based in the Middle East and would instantly become targets too. The conditions are not set," Biden said to Netanyahu. "The theater is not set for them. So I've got to look out for my people. I have skin in the game here. I don't want you doing something that's going to put our people at risk without you and me really coming to an understanding about what this is all about."

Netanyahu said his cabinet would now convene to debate preemptive strike on Hezbollah. "We're going to continue discussing it," Netanyahu said. "We'll make the decision based on Israeli interests, and it doesn't mean we won't go ahead."

Netanyahu and Biden had known each other for 40 years, meeting first when both were young men in Washington: Biden as a freshly elected Senator, and Netanyahu as the deputy chief of mission in the Israeli Embassy in Washington in the 1980s. Their relationship had its ups and downs, with more downs in recent years. But in his recent memoir, Netanyahu had referred to Biden 28 times with an unusual warmth and playfulness amid more than a few score-settling moments directed at other Israeli and American opponents. Biden, Netanyahu wrote, had a frankness that he particularly appreciated. "You don't have too many friends here, buddy," he recalled Biden telling him after inviting him to the vice president's residence. "I'm the one friend you do have, so call me when you need to." Now, the relationship was defined by a distrust that had festered for years. It was so deep that it could fracture the alliance at a time when trust was most needed.

Brett McGurk, the National Security Council's Middle East expert, was one of the president's top advisers and was sitting in front of the Resolute Desk. McGurk had managed intense crisis situations across four Republican and Democratic administrations: George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and now Biden. He was the only person in the senior ranks of the Biden Administration to have clerked for one of the most conservative members of the Supreme Court, Chief Justice William Rehnquist, 20 years earlier. He was considered a straight-down-the-middle, nonpartisan adviser who had more experience than almost anyone other than Biden.

For McGurk, it was a classic fog-of-war crisis. "You could teach it in a seminar." The danger lay in the unknown: what Hezbollah was or was not about to do, and in the military momentum building after the October 7th attacks. Here, in Netanyahu's tone, less aggressive than usual, McGurk believed Netanyahu was looking for the president to help walk him and his military leadership back off the ledge.

Biden ended with a final word in the October 11th call: "Do not do this. You know me. We have known each other a long time. This is a mistake. Do not go down this road."

"I hear you," Netanyahu said. "You've been very clear. But I also want to be clear that we're going to make our own decision, and while this conversation will inform it, it will not decide it."

President Biden had spent the last year and a half equipping Ukraine with billions of dollars worth of U.S. weapons to defend against Russia's invasion. He'd made a point of insisting no U.S. troops would fight in Ukraine. Now, a war in the Middle East might be hours away, and this time, the U.S. could be dragged in. Dread hung in the room among the advisers. They all knew Biden had immense strategic and political influence with Netanyahu. The U.S. was Israel's largest provider of military aid, but at the same time, they felt like bystanders. As close as the U.S. was to Israel, there was little that they could say or do that could ultimately stop Israel from acting in what they believed to be their vital national interest. Secretary Blinken was reminded of one of the central truths of foreign relations: even with the closest ally, each country ultimately makes its own decisions. Blinken felt a sense of global vulnerability unlike anything he'd felt in 30 years of national security work. If Israel decided to launch, it could lead to a war that would shake the entire world.

"We may just have to do it," Netanyahu finally said to Biden. "We may just have to do it."

At 10:35 a.m., Biden reconvened the principals on a secure call so they could prepare for the worst. The atmosphere was one of frightening uncertainty. Secretary Austin was rushed out of a defense ministerial meeting in Brussels so he could join the call from a small classified space, Room 17, in NATO headquarters. Left unsaid in Biden's conversation with Netanyahu, but clearly understood by the president and his national security team, was the recognition that Netanyahu and his military leaders had suffered a devastating loss—personally, professionally, and nationally—in the surprise Hamas attack. They had failed to keep Israel safe, failed their primary promise of "never again" to the people of Israel, and a successful preemptive strike on Hezbollah could conceivably restore a sense of strength and provide a much-needed win.

Five minutes into the president's call with the principals, at 10:40 a.m., word came to the Oval Office that Bibi's right-hand man, Ron Dermer, Netanyahu's top aide and alter ego, had phoned the White House Situation Room. He was requesting to talk to Jake Sullivan at once. Pulled from the Oval Office, Sullivan took the call from Dermer, who had stepped out of the Israeli cabinet meeting.

"The direction of the debate is shifting in the direction of preemptive strike," Dermer said. "Said our entire military is pushing us to go." Dermer expressed extreme displeasure that President Biden had pushed Netanyahu not to attack, reiterating Biden's argument. Sullivan reminded Dermer that this is what civilian leadership and political leadership is actually for: to have a broader perspective than just what is the military interest of the moment. Sullivan, whose tone is normally calm and steady, raised his voice: "What you are thinking about doing is dangerous, it's irrational, not in your interests, and not in the interests of the United States. You'll decide what's in your interest," he said, "but the risk was huge." Sullivan continued, "We do not believe this is good for Israel, and we fundamentally know it is not good for us. Do not go ahead with it," he added. That the president was deadly serious about that.

At 11:13 a.m., Sullivan walked back to the Oval Office to quickly update Biden, Blinken, and McGurk about what he had told Dermer. He headed to his office down the hall from the Oval. Three minutes later, at 11:16 a.m., Dermer called Sullivan again about Hezbollah. Sullivan hit the speakerphone so McGurk could listen. It was now almost an open line with Israel.

"Hey, we're just being transparent with you guys," Dermer said. "They've launched the attack. There are paragliders coming from the north. One of them just landed and shot up a funeral for someone who was killed in the October 7th attack. We are going to launch the attack, and I'm telling you, you've got to batten down the hatches," Dermer said. They were also getting reports of Hezbollah drones coming across the northern border. Air raid sirens going off. "I'm just telling you, we have no choice," Dermer said. "We're going to launch the attack." Israel had aircraft with munitions ready to strike, he said. They were going to go in 30 minutes. They were inches away from a major Middle East war.

McGurk thought maybe Hezbollah did launch a paraglider attack. Hamas had used paragliders on October 7th, but they had no corroborating intelligence. McGurk left Sullivan and ran to his desk in Room 326 in the Executive Office Building next to the White House. It was the same office he was in during the Republican Bush administration. He called Centcom Commander Eric Chella. "Hey, my J2 says there are no paragliders," Chella said, referring to the art military's intelligence portfolio. "There is no sign of any of this. It's a fan. The Israelis always do this." McGurk thought, "They claim we got the intel, you'll see it, you'll see it, but like 50% of the time, the so-called intel doesn't actually show up."

McGurk ran back to the Oval Office, borrowing a spare tie from Deputy National Security Adviser John Ferra. On the way, while McGurk was on the phone to Chella, Sullivan and Blinken made a secure call from the National Security Advisor's office to DNI Haynes, CIA Director Burns, Secretary of Defense Austin, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs CQ Brown. "Are we seeing any of this?" Sullivan asked them. "No, we are not," the intelligence and military leaders said. Sullivan rechecked this assessment with Burns at 11:31 a.m. "Still nothing," Burns said emphatically. But they could see social media and mainstream media were filled with reports of drones and sirens. Millions of Israelis were scrambling for shelter.

Sullivan called Dermer, pulling him out of Israel's cabinet meeting. "U.S. intelligence agencies are not seeing any of this," Sullivan said. "In fact, it's just not there. The social media reports were not supported at all. Israel could not make decisions based on social media. Go back into the cabinet and tell them they are false reports." Sullivan then called Dermer's chief of staff and dictated a note to send to Dermer, who was back sitting beside Netanyahu in the cabinet meeting: "Jake, your information is false. You're making decisions in a fog of war. Slow down."

At the same time, McGurk received a message from Iran, strong backers of Hezbollah, through a back channel the U.S. has with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The communication came through a trusted Norwegian intermediary. Iran's message was: "We're not looking for a conflict. Whatever is going on, we are not looking for a conflict." McGurk said they obviously couldn't know for sure if the Iranians were being honest, but it was a message consistent with the U.S. intel assessment. "Let's deflate this thing," McGurk said. The time frame for action was shrinking.

Secretary Blinken couldn't believe it. "The Israelis are 30 minutes from launching a preemptive or preventive, in their minds, attack based on totally erroneous information," he said.

At 1 p.m., Dermer called Sullivan, who was in the Oval Office. "The Israeli cabinet has voted against taking military action in Lebanon," Dermer said with relief. Sullivan briefed the president. No preemptive strike. The Israel Defense Forces came out publicly and said the information about drones, paragliders, and other attacks on the northern border was false. "None of it had actually happened. There was an error, and we are investigating it," IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said. "The bottom line is, I want to calm the public and say that at this stage, there is no major security incident in the north." The drones Israelis reported seeing near the northern border turned out to be birds.

Blinken was shaken, saying to the others, "It was such a close call. The idea that this conflict could have significantly expanded on the basis of bad information. Israel could have found itself at war with Hezbollah because of some birds." It was almost unbelievable, but he had been there and witnessed it.

Later, Dermer said to Sullivan, "Well, the Prime Minister and I were never supportive of this. It was being driven by the military, and you know, so this is a good outcome, basically."

Biden remained worried. "These guys are not thinking clearly," he said to McGurk. "I've got to get there." The president wanted to fly into Israel, an active war zone, to meet Netanyahu and his war cabinet face to face. Jake Sullivan believed that he, Biden, and others had never experienced a day quite like this. Had Israel attacked Hezbollah, the first it could have quickly escalated, plunging the Middle East into war. They had lived five hours and 12 minutes, from 7:48 a.m. that morning until 1:00 p.m., on the brink, moving toward and then veering away from catastrophe with breathtaking speed, hearing the certainty and seeing it fade.

That evening, Jake Sullivan finally went home to his wife of 8 years, Maggie Goodlander, a former Navy intelligence officer and current senior Justice Department lawyer. "It has been the most stressful day in my entire professional life," he told her, "perhaps in my entire life." He had never thought coalition management would be so fraught and full of risk. The stress was taking its toll. He was not eating enough, definitely not sleeping well. "We did come within an inch of all-out war in the Middle East," he told his wife, "basically instigated by Israel believing Hezbollah was about to attack, and they needed to go." It was sobering and clarifying to see Israel in this fragile condition, with the stakes so high. The sense that they were the emperor has no clothes, "we lying naked," was so palpable and profound. It was very raw. The thing that was most profoundly in their minds was, "Is our nation just existentially at risk right now? Is this the moment when it all comes down on us?"

During a campaign speech in West Palm Beach, Florida, later that day, Trump called Hezbollah "very smart" and Israel's National Defense Minister Yoav Gallant "a jerk." "If you listen to this jerk, you would attack from the north," Trump said. The White House, in a rare response to the former president, called Trump's statements "dangerous and unhinged."

Secretary of State Tony Blinken touched down in Israel the morning of Thursday, October 12th, and went straight to see Netanyahu. When the White House needed something from Israel, there were two approaches: either the secretary went and tried to beat it out of Bibi, or the president called him. Often, neither worked. In a highly unusual move, Bibi brought Blinken straight to his War Room, his inner sanctum of decision-making.

"We need three things: ammo, ammo, ammo," Bibi declared. Blinken was not surprised. Bibi's first focus was ammunition. Nauseating footage and graphic photographs from the October 7th attacks played on a screen in the backdrop: charred human bodies, burnt babies. It was hard to look away.

"We're there with you," Blinken said to Bibi and his security cabinet. "We're there with you. We're going to support you. We have already set up channels and been talking about how to deliver things. That work is already going on," he repeated. "We're with you." The U.S. was already supplying ammunition and interceptors to replenish Iron Dome, the Israeli air defense system that destroys rockets and artillery shells fired from distances up to 40 miles. The first transport plane carrying advanced U.S. armaments for Israel had arrived at the Nevatim air base in southern Israel two days earlier. America provides Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East, with more than $3 billion in military assistance every year, and the Pentagon maintains stockpiles of weapons and ammunition at about half a dozen sites around Israel. These stockpiles had already been tapped to provide 155 mm military ammunition to Ukraine. More was in the pipeline for Israel.

Blinken said, turning to the immediate question, "What is Israel going to do about the civilians in Gaza?" The Gaza Strip, still controlled by Hamas, is one of the most densely populated places in the world, bordered by Egypt, Israel, and the Mediterranean Sea. Gaza's population of 2.3 million people is squashed into the isolated enclave of 18 square miles. Gaza City is even more crowded than New York City.

Blinken knew most of Bibi's close advisers in the room were different shades of Netanyahu. Gallant is a hawk, political but more flexible. IDF Chief Halevi is a hawk too, but he's reasonable. But how reasonable would a deeply traumatized Israeli leadership be? Netanyahu had a response ready for Blinken's question: "Let's set up a humanitarian corridor," Bibi said. "We'll take them all into Egypt and let them go there."

Blinken was stunned. From the very beginning, it was painfully clear that U.S. and Israel were not going to see this situation the same way. "Just push all the Palestinians out of Gaza into Egypt." That was the plan. Blinken knew that Sisi, the Egyptian leader for nearly 10 years, would be outraged. He would not want or accept hundreds of thousands, even perhaps a million, Palestinian refugees right away. Blinken thought of the long history of moving Palestinians out of their land. It was the Nakba, the mass displacement of Palestinian people during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, that was seen by Arab leaders as the great historical crime, the biggest loss in Palestinian memory. Nakba was the Arabic word for catastrophe.

"There may be concerns about that, but let us talk with others," Blinken said to the Israeli leaders. He was scheduled to meet with leaders all over the Arab world in the next few days.

"There won't be a humanitarian crisis in Gaza if no civilians are there," Dermer said. "One man, Sisi, can't stand in the way." Egypt's President Sisi was refusing to open the Rafah crossing, the single crossing point between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, to let Palestinians into Egypt. Sisi knew Netanyahu would love Egypt to open its border, push the Palestinians out, and then never let them back. After all, Israel had done it before. Following wars with Israel in 1948 and 1967, Palestinian refugees who fled to Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria, and millions of their descendants, have not been able to return to their homes. Israel's stance had been any resettlement of Palestinian refugees must occur outside of Israel's borders. The right to return was one of the major stumbling blocks in all peace negotiations.

"Without the Egyptian crossing open, what do you do in the meantime? You need to find a way to get subsistence items in," Blink said. Dermer was adamant: "Israel won't support it as long as hostages are being held."

"You have to do something about food and water," Lincoln said. "We're not going to do anything right now as long as the hostages are being held," Dermer repeated, holding to what was clearly Netanyahu's bottom line. When Bibi wasn't speaking, he was either passing notes with Dermer or looking around to see how his security cabinet members and Blinken reacted to what was being said. There was a sense he was constantly taking the temperature of the room.

"The entire world has to be clear that Hamas is ISIS," Bibi said. The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) was known for genocide, ethnic cleansing, rape, murder, enslavement, and other war crimes. "ISIS doesn't have a political wing. Al-Qaeda doesn't have a political wing. Hamas is like ISIS, if you see what they did to civilians here," argued Bibi, "murdering babies, murdering women. This is brutality on the scale of ISIS, and the entire world should look at it as ISIS."

"We ought to talk about that and think about it," Blinken said. "From our perspective, humanitarian assistance for the Palestinians and civilian protection is a moral imperative. But even if you disagree with that, it's a strategic imperative." October 7th was an earthquake event in the region. Blinken knew partly because of what Israel's full-scale military response would look like. It was going to be completely destabilizing. With Hamas still shooting rockets at Israel from across the border in Gaza, Blinken could not stay in Tel Aviv overnight, so he flew 45 minutes to Amman, Jordan.

The next morning, October 13th, Blinken went to meet King Abdullah II. Abdullah, 61, had ascended the throne in 1999 and shut down the Hamas presence in Jordan, exiling Hamas officials to Qatar and closing their offices in Amman. Jordan was home to over 2 million Palestinian refugees.

"We told Israel not to do this," King Abdullah said. "We told them not to get close to Hamas. Hamas is the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood is the oldest political Islamist organization in the Arab world and father to some of the most extremist terrorist groups today. Founded in Egypt, its violent offshoots have taken on different forms and ideologies, including Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza."

"Hamas has to be defeated," King Abdullah said to Blinken. "We won't say it," he clarified, "but we support Hamas being defeated. And Israel should defeat Hamas. They should never have been in bed with them in the first place. They should have actually dealt with the Palestinian Authority and worked with them." The Palestinian Authority was the governing body in the West Bank.

"Israel propped Hamas up for years," the King said. "Tens of millions of dollars flowed to Hamas with Israel's knowledge and acquiescence based on the argument that the money improved daily life and helped stabilize Gaza. It was one of the contradictions and risks of survival, an expedient but compromising."

A few hours later, Blinken met with the leader of Qatar, Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, in Doha. While the Hamas political leadership was working at their political office down the street, the Emir said to Blinken, "We explained to Hamas that no one accepts this. No one accepts what they did. You have no friends left. What do you expect us to tell the Americans and Israelis?"

The Emir invited Blinken into a lavish room with royal blue curtains and thick carpeted floors. His trusted political advisor, Mbar, Qatar's Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, joined them. Both were in long white robes and sandals, their customary dress. Blinken was in the American diplomat's uniform: a black suit and tie. Emir Al Thani said it wasn't clear whether Hamas leaders in Doha knew about October 7th in advance. "It's possible that Sinwar just did it on his own," the Emir said, "but it's also possible they know and don't want to let anyone know." Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas chief in Gaza, was suspected of being the main orchestrator of the October 7th attack. Sinwar, a Palestinian, had previously been imprisoned in Israel for 22 years, where he received life-saving surgery for a brain tumor. He was released in a prisoner swap in 2011 and had not been seen since October 7th, but the Israelis suspected he was hiding in Hamas's network of tunnels beneath Gaza.

"Two things on behalf of the President," Lincoln said to the Emir. "Right now, dealing with Hamas for the hostages, we recognize the value of having a channel to negotiate the release of hostages," Blinken relayed. "But when this is over, it can't continue to be business as usual with Hamas. That's out."

"I understand, and it won't be," the Amir said. "I don't need it anymore. I don't want to have obstacles with America. We'll keep the channel open now because you find it useful. Our relationship with America is very important." Blinken was surprised. He had thought getting rid of the safe haven for Hamas leadership would be an area they would have to work on over time and potentially even fight over. But the Amir seemed to be indicating, without directly stating it, that if you come to us at the end of this and say, "Get rid of Hamas," we'll get rid of Hamas.

"Hamas has told us they would release some hostages," the Amir continued. "They have some. Palestinian Islamic Jihad has others." Blinken was surprised again. This was the first indication Hamas would release hostages. "They are ready to release some of the hostages," the Amir continued, "but they need humanitarian corridors to allow hostages to leave. They need two to three hours of calm to move around and get the hostages safe passage," he added. "But they're ready to do it now. Now, of course, they're probably going to want something, but they showed a willingness."

Israel had begun an aggressive bombing campaign in Gaza. Wall-to-wall bombing, followed by more bombing everywhere. Blinken went, there was alert on TV or Arab media with coverage of the rising civilian death toll in Gaza and buildings reduced to rubble. Hamas was asking Israel to pause their offensive in order to move and deliver deliver the hostages.

"I've been trying to get someone in Israel, and I just can't get anyone to listen to me," Mbar said. "I will call the Israelis immediately to work on a pause," Blinken told the Qataris. That decision, that will be made at the political level, and I will work on it.

Heading back to his plane, Blinken was somewhat impressed. The Qataris had laid the groundwork for a hostage deal just six days after October 7th. It was extraordinary. On the flight to Bahrain, Blinken called Ron Dermer in Israel. "Hamas is ready to start talking about this," Lincoln said urgently. "There are Americans hostage, there are Israelis hostage. We need to get this going." He then called Biden and Sullivan. "Hamas is prepared to release hostages." They quickly set in operation their cell with CIA Director Burns taking the lead. After stopping in Bahrain, Blinken and his exhausted staff spent the night in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. It was their fourth country in one day.

The following morning, October 14th, Blinken met with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud, age 48. "Bibi should have known better," the prince said. "Everyone told them not to do this with Hamas. We told him he should have known better anyway, but we absolutely told him not to do this. Hamas is the Muslim Brotherhood," the prince added. Blinken had heard this a lot. All the Arab leaders had dealt with some version of Hamas causing trouble in their countries. Blinken realized it's why the King of Jordan, the Emir of Qatar, the Crown Prince of Bahrain, the Saudis, Egyptians, and all these leaders were so interested in this. Terrorist groups don't want to just eliminate Israel; they wanted to overthrow other leaders.

"We're concerned about the impact Israel's operations will have on all our security," the prince said. "What comes after Hamas could be worse." "You know, Dash," he said, "their term for ISIS, Dash, was worse than Al-Qaeda." Blinken asked about Saudi support for Gaza's reconstruction after the conflict. "We're not going to pay to clean up Bibi's mess," the prince said. "If Israel destroys all of this, we're not paying to rebuild it." The Saudi prince was worried they'd invest in reconstruction only for conflict to break out again, that would destroy what they had rebuilt.

"How Israel responds matters," Blinken said. This was something he and so President Biden had underscored publicly. Next, Blinken flew to the United Arab Emirates to meet with President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, known as MBZ, the head of

The royal family and a former UAE Air Force General. Hamas must be eliminated, the 62-year-old MBZ said. We can give Israel the space to destroy Hamas, but Israel has to give us space. Let humanitarian assistance in. Establish safe areas to make sure they are not killing civilians. Control settler violence in the West Bank.

Implicit in the request was an understanding that a pause would help placate his citizens, who were infuriated by the images of destruction in Gaza. MBZ's clear and fair request of the Israelis, "Give us space to give you space," stuck with Blinken. The Arab leaders were prepared to give Israel space to do what they need to do with Hamas, but Israel needed to create space for humanitarian assistance in Gaza. He stored that away in his mind for later use with Bibi.

"Israel was offering backdoor financial support to Hamas," MBZ added. "We warned Israel not to do this with Hamas. They are the Muslim Brotherhood." Unlike Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates had normalized diplomatic relations with Israel under the Trump administration's Abraham Accords.

Before flying out, Secretary Blinken and his staff were given a tour of the Abrahamic Family House, a multifaith religious complex where a mosque, church, and synagogue are built on a secular visitor pavilion. "It represents a path to coexistence, a path for the region," the Emirati told Blinken.

Blinken flew back to Riyadh that night because Saudi Prime Minister Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman (MBS) had tentatively agreed to meet. In 2018, Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi-born, US-based journalist and dissident, was brutally murdered in the Saudi Consulate in Turkey. His body was dismembered with a bone saw. The CIA later concluded that MBS ordered the assassination. Relations with the United States had been particularly tense ever since President Biden had called Saudi Arabia a pariah.

Blinken viewed MBS as just someone he had to deal with in the region. The Crown Prince had a stranglehold on power, and he also had the only carrot, the only thing the Israelis wanted: normalization with Saudi Arabia, the biggest country in the Middle East. The secretary and his staff checked into the Radisson Blu hotel in the Diplomatic Quarter and were told to be ready for MBS to send word about a meeting either later that night or early the next morning.

It had been a grueling few days for Blinken and his staff, who would wake up wondering what country they were in. But they waited by their phones. MBS kept them awake, still waiting, until 7:00 a.m. on October 15th. Blinken knew this wasn't unique to him; it happened to all kinds of people. The Saudis were night owls because evenings were cooler than days, but MBS took it to extremes.

For Blinken, MBS was nothing more than a spoiled child. "Look," MBS said to Blinken when they finally met, "I just want the problems created by October 7th to go away." Saudi Arabia and Israel had been pursuing normalization before the October 7th Hamas attack. It was part of his ambitious Saudi Vision 2030 plan, designed to reduce Saudi Arabia's dependence on oil exports and transform the country into an economy and society of the future.

"I would love to get back to that vision, but Gaza has to be calm," MBS said. "Normalization is not dead. We obviously can't pursue it right now. They're about to launch a war, but I would love to get back there at some point."

Before returning to Israel, Blinken took a detour to Cairo to meet with President of Egypt, Sisi. Sisi threw Blinken's staff out, so it was only him and the secretary. Sisi had one goal: to preserve the peace with Israel brokered by President Jimmy Carter in the 1979 Camp David Accords.

Blinken's team, which included his Deputy Chief of Staff Tom Sullivan, Counselor Derek Chollet, and State Department spokesman Matthew Miller, went to meet with Egypt's Minister of Foreign Affairs Sameh Shoukry and Intel Chief Abbas Kamel. Other than Sisi himself, Kamel was the most powerful person in Egypt, effectively running half the country for Sisi.

Kamel offered the Americans assessments of how deep and extensive the Hamas tunnels were beneath Gaza. "Hamas is entrenched in Gaza," he explained. "It will be very difficult to eliminate them. Israel shouldn't just go in all at once. Sit back, wait for them to pop up, and chop their heads off," Kamel said. He wasn't joking. The Americans realized.

On October 15th, Blinken landed back in Tel Aviv. Biden's first task: get the Israeli government to open the spigots to let humanitarian assistance into Gaza, which had been ravaged already by Israel's bombs. Blinken knew this would be a big ask of the Israelis. Getting food and water to civilians should not be controversial, but everything in war was a weapon to be leveraged.

The secretary joined Netanyahu, Dermer, and a few other key Israeli officials at the Prime Minister's office in Jerusalem. "We need you to let humanitarian assistance in," Blinken said. Netanyahu erupted, rejecting it completely. "Rejecting it? The people of Israel will not tolerate giving these Nazis aid if we have not completely destroyed Hamas," he said.

"This is aid for innocent men, women, and children who will starve and who will die if they don't get aid," Blinken said. "It's the right thing to do to let this aid in, but it's also in your interest. Since we last saw you, we've traveled around the region," Blinken added. "Met with your friends and people who are not friends, but not hostile to you, and the one thing we heard over and over is they support what you're doing. They support defeating Hamas. They can't all say it publicly right now, but they support you doing that. They want to have stability. There's no love lost with any one of these countries with Hamas. But as one of your friends said, 'Israel needs to give us space to give them space.'" Blinken said, repeating the words Emirati President Sheikh Muhammad had said to him.

"No, absolutely not," Netanyahu said. President Biden was planning to visit Israel in the next few days. Blinken did not yet threaten that the president would not come; he wanted to hold that in reserve. So he went one notch less. "You know, the president's going to be here. We need to be able to say before he comes that you're letting humanitarian assistance in," he said.

"You know that would be a huge mistake," Netanyahu said crossly. "This country's been attacked. The president's visit should not be seen as a visit to help the Palestinians; he's here to stand with Israel. Shouldn't be a visit to help the Palestinians." They all could see the meeting was getting nowhere. Bibi wanted to sit and negotiate, but Blinken suggested regrouping and coming back later in the afternoon.

Blinken went to meet Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. Two days after October 7th, Gallant had said, "I have ordered a complete siege of Gaza. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel. Everything is closed. We are fighting human animals, and we are acting accordingly."

"How do you assess this campaign will go?" Blinken asked, referring to their plans for a full-scale military offensive into Gaza. "What will the cost be? What will the casualties be? How long will it go?"

Gallant said, "I have a mission, and I am going to fulfill it. The price is not important, not on our side, not on their side." Blinken felt a chill to his core. Gallant was saying, "It doesn't matter how many people die. I have a mission to eradicate Hamas, and it doesn't matter how many Palestinians die. It doesn't matter how many Israelis die. I'm going to fulfill my mission." "Jesus," Blinken thought, "that's the headspace the Israelis were in."

At 5:00 p.m. at the Kirya, the military headquarters in Tel Aviv, Blinken was given the floor to speak to Netanyahu and his security cabinet. Blinken pushed again for allowing humanitarian assistance in. "Open a point of access through the Rafah border crossing," he argued. "Help us with humanitarian assistance to help you. Look," Blinken said, "you may disagree with us that it's the right thing to do. We believe that it's the right and morally imperative thing to do, but it's also profoundly in your strategic interest to do it. Because if you want to have any time and space to deal with Hamas, if you're not providing innocent men, women, and children with what they need, that space is going to close down on you very quickly."

"Not a drop, not an ounce of anything will go into Gaza to help people," Netanyahu continued, unfazed. "This is not me," he added. "This is not even my coalition. No one in this country can accept the idea that we're going to be providing assistance to Palestinians in Gaza when they're holding these hostages and after they've slaughtered our people."

"Palestinians, not Hamas. These are men, women, and children who have nothing to do with October 7th," Blinken said. "Again, from our perspective, it's the right and moral imperative thing to do. If you want time and space to deal with Hamas, if you are not providing for people who desperately need the assistance, that time and space will close down almost immediately. So you need to do this in order to do what you believe you need to do to protect your security and to defend yourselves."

They went back and forth for two hours. "You know, the president is going to be here in two days," Blinken said. He had seen the president's advance team at the airport in Tel Aviv that morning and the plane that carries the Beast, the president's sleek, heavily armored black Cadillac, sitting on the tarmac. The trip had leaked in Israeli media but had not been announced publicly.

"I cannot make that announcement if we don't have an agreement in principle that you're going to allow assistance into Gaza," Blinken said. All of a sudden, an alarm went off, signaling that Iron Dome had launched. The Israelis all stood up, and the Americans followed suit, marching down a stairway together to a secure bunker. Blinken felt the tension from the meeting room break as they chatted, waiting 10 minutes or so for it to be over so they could go back upstairs. The clap of the missile could be heard as it was taken down by Iron Dome right over them.

Returning to the meeting room, Bibi said, "Okay, we agree. The security cabinet agrees, but I've got to go take it to the larger cabinet. His full cabinet was about to meet. 'I have to go chair this cabinet meeting.' 'Come with me,' he said to Blinken. 'You'll set up in one room, we'll set up in another, and we'll negotiate this process.'" Blinken agreed.

Around 7:00 p.m., and for the next few hours, he holed up in a small office bunker six floors below ground to hammer out the US proposal with his team: Counselor Derek Schet, Assistant Secretary for Near East Affairs Barbara Leaf, Sh. Deair Stephanie Hallett, and his deputy and right-hand man Tom Sullivan. Every now and then, Tom Sullivan walked out to the garage where he could get a phone signal in the underground compound and call his brother Jake Sullivan at the White House to update him on where they were. He wanted to know how much Blinken could threaten Biden's trip; that was the main leverage he had with the Israelis.

At one point, Blinken also called Biden directly. "I want to be able to say if they don't agree to open this up, then you're not going to be able to come," he said. "Absolutely," Biden replied. "Tell them I'm not coming if they don't agree to this." Dermer stopped into the bunker a few times to argue things out with the American team and then pass notes to Netanyahu. During the cabinet meeting, Blinken would get notes back from Dermer with Bibi's handwritten edits and proposals on it.

Blinken wanted the first humanitarian trucks to start moving into Gaza through the Rafah Crossing before President Biden arrived in Tel Aviv. They continued to negotiate back and forth until 1:00 a.m., when the cabinet meeting ended. "We don't have a deal," Bibi said to Blinken. They hammered it out for another hour and 15 minutes. "Oh no, no," Bibi said. "We can't have trucks going in. We can't have trucks going in." "What do you mean you can't have trucks going in?" Blinken asked. "How are we going to get the assistance to people?" Dermer joked, "Maybe a cart and donkey would do it." "No, no, no, it's this image of, you know, things going into the Palestinians," Bibi said. "We can't have that."

"What about if we send experts in?" Prime Minister Blinken said in frustration. "You can't eat or drink an expert. People need the food and water." Finally, at 2:15 a.m., after more than 9 hours of back and forth, Bibi agreed in principle to open the spigot a notch to let humanitarian assistance into Gaza. Bibi said he was under a lot of pressure not to let this aid in. They could announce their intention to work out an agreement, but Bibi said he wanted the assistance to start going in after Biden's visit so it looked like the president made him do it. Bibi said that would give him the political coverage and leverage he urgently needed with Israel's cabinet and the Israeli public.

On November 30th, Sullivan and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin spoke for 45 minutes on a secure call about how to respond to the increasing attacks from the Houthis in the Red Sea. The Houthis, another Iranian-backed violent militia group who controlled the quasi-nation-state Yemen at the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, had been regularly attacking commercial shipping in the 1,200-mile-long inland Red Sea. The Houthis were part of the so-called Axis of Resistance, an Iran-led political and military coalition of the most radical groups, including Hamas and Hezbollah. In the White House, they called the Axis a "multi-headed monster." Iran had armed the Houthis to the teeth. The Houthis claimed they were acting in defense of Gaza.

Austin wanted to think and work through the pressing questions: how to deter, how to manage, how to avoid escalation. Austin was the star pick of Biden's cabinet, the best cabinet member as far as Sullivan was concerned. Biden trusted Austin, his colleagues trusted him, the military revered him, and Sullivan was constantly learning from him. "Jake, we own the clock," Austin had told Sullivan numerous times the past two years and repeated again now. "We own the clock. The president could decide whether to use force and when or not to use force."

Another Austin lesson had occurred in the aftermath of the US nuclear submarine deal with the Australians. Australia initially had agreed to purchase the submarines from France but withdrew in favor of a deal with the United States. The French were furious. "We are all taking incoming from our French counterparts and genuflecting and apologizing," Sullivan recalled. Austin's French counterpart calls him up and gives him a 22-minute diatribe of American perfidy. When he finished, Austin replied, "Acknowledged. Next topic."

Sullivan decided to adopt that approach next time someone yelled at him. On another occasion, Sullivan asked Chairman Millie and Austin to come to the White House to go over a Defense Department budget issue. Sullivan knew they sensed he planned to overrule them on this one. Austin sat down and looked at Sullivan calmly. "It's your meeting, dude," Austin said. Sullivan was immediately on defense. "We got what we wanted," Sullivan said, "but I also felt extra bad about it."

Secretary Austin was one of the few who could manage Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. They had spoken regularly since the Hamas attack on Israel, often these calls involved Austin holding Gallant's feet to the fire about civilian casualties. "Gallant's usual excuse or defense mechanism was to hearken back to October 7th. 'Remember what Hamas did to us?' Gallant said on one such call. 'The horror.' 'Yo, yo,' Austin said, cutting him off. 'This is Lloyd. You're talking to. Just give it to me straight. I know what happened. I got it. I got it. I got what happened. But what I'm asking you about is how you guys are responding. Why did you decide to take the military action the way you did?'"

"Israel must do more to protect innocent civilians," Vice President Harris said at a press event on the sidelines of the COP28 climate change conference in Dubai on December 2nd, 2023. Biden had made a point of including Harris on almost all of his calls with Netanyahu, now more than a dozen, which they referred to privately as the "Bibi calls." Before and after the calls, the President and Vice President briefed with Blinken, Austin, and Sullivan. While Biden had kept a tight lid on his criticism of Israel's handling of Gaza in public, Harris was direct.

"Too many innocent Palestinians have been killed. Frankly, the scale of civilian suffering and the images and videos coming from Gaza are devastating," Harris said. "It is truly heartbreaking." She also had a pointed warning for Netanyahu. "Under no circumstances will the United States permit the forced relocation of Palestinians from Gaza or the West Bank, the besiegement of Gaza, or the redrawing of the borders of Gaza," she said.

In the midst of the climate summit, Harris met with the leaders of Egypt, Jordan, and the UAE and held phone calls with others, including the Amir of Qatar. She almost had to jog to make her speech on climate change, trying to manage a war. War was a non-stop diplomatic push; ending one was even more difficult.

King Abdullah of Jordan said he had no love lost for Hamas, but Israel needed to do better on civilian casualties and finish its military operation. Jordan has a large Palestinian population, and he was feeling the heat from angry protests and unrest on his streets. The longer this war went on, the more unsettled the entire region became. On the plane, she sent a report to the president. It said the Arab leaders were supportive of planning for the day after the conflict ended if it involved Palestinian leadership in Gaza and a pathway to a Palestinian state. The quiet, almost unspoken, shared view of Arab leaders was that a prerequisite to any of it realistically happening was different leadership in both Israel and Gaza. Netanyahu was on a warpath; he was not looking for a peace deal with the Palestinians.

Blinken was also in Dubai for talks with Arab foreign ministers about day-after planning. Many Arab countries did not want to be seen engaging in these discussions, as it could make them appear acquiescent to or complicit in Netanyahu's ongoing military operations in Gaza. "Look," Blinken said to Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry and Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, "one way or another, this is going to be over, and we need to be ready for it. Because there are big questions about what happens in terms of security in Gaza, what happens in terms of governance, what happens in terms of humanitarian assistance and development, and we need to get going on that now."

Shoukry and Safadi disagreed. Unless and until there was a clear plan for the day after, the day after by which they meant the creation of an independent Palestinian state, they would not talk about the day after in Gaza. Virtually all the Arab foreign ministers were in agreement. "There can't be an effective day after unless there's a political plan to deal with Hamas in Gaza. Israel was only demonstrating they had a military plan. Israel was not going to kill every Hamas person and was not going to kill the idea of Hamas. So they argued there has to be a political plan for leadership and security in Gaza." They were convinced that Israel couldn't effectively defeat Hamas, the idea of Hamas, the ideology, absent a real political horizon for the Palestinians. It was a version of the message Harris received. "When this planning is realistic, will come to the table," Blinken told them. He agreed with their analysis and would also work on the pathway to a Palestinian state. It was wishful thinking.

Blinken met alone with President Sisi in Egypt to discuss the security situation in Gaza after Israel had completed its military operations. "I'm prepared to put troops on the ground," Sisi said, "but we need the United States with us. I can bring other Arabs along. I want you to take that back to President Biden." Blinken said, "Okay, let's flesh this out. We're not going to put American boots on the ground in Gaza, but we can look at how we can support a mission by Arab countries and others."

Blinken, Sullivan, Austin, and Joint Chiefs Chairman CQ Brown drafted a plan. The idea they came up with was to support an Arab-led force with a headquarters run by the United States, with a US military command, probably in Egypt, where the US could assist with command and control. "Hamas is an idea, and you cannot destroy an idea," Blinken later pressed Israel's war cabinet during yet another trip to Tel Aviv.

Tony Dermer said, "Nazism is an idea, and the Nazis in Charlottesville had picket torches that they got from Bed Bath & Beyond, but they don't have a state called Germany anymore." Dermer was referring to when white supremacists carrying flaming torches and chanting "Jews will not replace us" and the Nazi slogan "Blood and Soil" had marched onto the Charlottesville campus of the University of Virginia the weekend of August 12th, 2017. "It's one thing to have a bad idea," Dermer said. "It's another thing to have a bad idea in control of territory. Our goal," Dermer argued, "is to remove the territorial control that Hamas has over Gaza. We have to dismantle this army."

Blinken tried to bring the discussion back. "Today, after planning, what would Gaza look like when they had dismantled Hamas? Who would lead?" "We should have a Palestinian state, really?" Dermer said. "So what are we going to do? Turn October 7th into Palestinian Independence Day? You're going to give a great reward for terrorism by giving them a state, giving the Palestinians a state after the worst terror attack in Israel's history and the worst attack on Jews since the Holocaust? That makes total sense," Dermer said sarcastically. Blinken could see the conversation was going nowhere.

Middle East coordinator Brett McGurk had been holding daily morning calls with Qatari Prime Minister Membar about the 252 hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. "The way to deescalate this and buy time is a hostage deal. For us to really push the Israelis on a hostage deal," Brett Membar said on one call. McGurk said, "Prove to us that this can work." He suggested they start with a test run: negotiate the safe return of an American-Israeli mother, Judith Ranan, and her daughter Natalie, who were being held by Hamas, and then go for something bigger. Membar was confident Qatar could get Hamas in Gaza to deliver. McGurk remained skeptical. He updated Sullivan and Biden daily on their progress in the negotiations and floated the idea of the pilot plan. "Let's try it," Biden said.

A Red Cross team entered Gaza on October 20th, and a US Embassy team was at the Israeli border, ready to meet the two Americans. In Washington, McGurk was on edge as he tracked Judith and Natalie as they moved through Gaza, worried that at the last second, Hamas might decide to blow up their vehicle as it approached the border. Israel had agreed to a fragile 6-hour ceasefire. McGurk's phone rang. It was Stephanie Hallett, the US Charge d'Affair, who was on the border in Israel. "They're here," she said with relief. "They look healthy." McGurk grabbed Sullivan from his office, and they went straight to the Oval.

President Biden called Judith and Natalie. "Hey," Biden said to Judith Ranan, "I've been working on getting you guys out. I'm just so blessed to hear from you. We're going to make sure you get everything you need." Judith, overcome by emotion and exhaustion, was at a loss for words. "Thank you, thank you, thank you," she repeated. Biden turned to Dermer after the call. "Keep going," he said. "Keep this going." Qatar had delivered.

CIA Director Burns began working intensely with Director of Mossad David Barnaea to hammer out the contours of another much bigger hostage deal. From the Israeli side, McGurk coordinated with Membar and Egypt's Intel Chief Abbas Kamel, who had the channels with Hamas in Gaza. Now that there was a real possibility of securing the release of a large number of hostages, Biden pushed Netanyahu to agree to a longer pause in fighting. The pause was the only realistic path to getting hostages out safely, but in Netanyahu's view, it would also give Hamas time to regroup and reorganize.

Netanyahu wanted to know how many hostages would come out. Hamas at first guaranteed 10. Netanyahu wanted far more. He requested the release of all women and children being held by Hamas and for Hamas to provide proof of life of the hostages it held. Biden said he supported the request. Hamas came back and said it could guarantee the release of 50 hostages in exchange for which Hamas said Israel would release 150 imprisoned or detained Palestinian women and teenagers. Hamas refused to provide identifying information for the hostages.

President Biden called the Amir of Qatar. "Enough is enough," Biden said. "We need the names or clear identifying information for who's in the 50: age, gender, nationality. Without that, there's no basis to move ahead." Hamas produced the identifying criteria for the 50 hostages. McGurk, in Israel, watched as Netanyahu pounded the table in his war cabinet meeting on November 14th and declared, "I'll never accept, never accept these terms. Bibi always wants to squeeze every ounce of blood from the stone." McGurk thought, "They're going to cave." Netanyahu shouted and banged the table once more. Coming out of the meeting, Netanyahu grabbed McGurk's arm. "We need this deal," Netanyahu said. So much of politics was performance, McGurk realized. Netanyahu called Biden the same day to confirm that he agreed to the deal.

Membar passed the final text to Hamas. Five days later, on November 19th, "This is the final offer," he told them. They would have to wait a few days for the reply. Hamas political leadership in Qatar had to pass the text by hand through a complicated network to Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who was deep in the tunnels beneath Gaza. Three days later, on the morning of November 21st, Qatar received word that Sinwar approved. Hamas released 50 of the 252 hostages, among them three Americans, in four phases starting November 24th. For every additional 10 hostages Hamas released beyond the initial 50, Netanyahu would extend the ceasefire an extra day. On November 30th, 105 hostages had been safely returned, including two Americans.

Sullivan met with the remaining American-Israeli hostage families in the White House that day. Some of the families came in person; others attended online. "It was brutal," Sullivan told his wife Maggie Goodlander that night. Hamas was still holding six Israeli-Americans hostage. Sullivan kept checking his phone. "The pause ends at midnight tonight, our time," he said, "unless Hamas presented a new list of names for the release of at least 10 more hostages. We are actively waiting to hear if they will produce a list or not," Sullivan said. "If not, then tomorrow, we'll see bombs drop."

Sullivan glanced at his phone again. "The real sticking point for tomorrow's list," Sullivan said, "was that the women who were still held by Hamas were in their 20s and 30s. The Israelis fear part of the reason Hamas do not want to part with them is because they were raped," Sullivan said, "or still are. The other factor was that Hamas believed all the Israeli women in their 20s and 30s were IDF. It made them more valuable in Hamas's view to getting concessions from Israel." The next day, Hamas shot rockets at Israel, and Israeli jets launched a barrage of rockets at 200 targets in Gaza. War resumed.

Christmas Day, December 25th, 2023. Brett McGurk was at his home in the Rouss in southeast Washington with his family. By 9:00 a.m., his young daughter had opened all of her presents, and he was sitting down with a cup of coffee when the White House Situation Room duty officer called. "We had an attack on Erbil Airbase in northern Iraq. Three American Service members have been wounded by shrapnel from an Iranian drone from an Iraqi militia group," the duty officer said, "one critically." In the 11 weeks since October 7th, US forces had been attacked at least 100 times in Iraq and Syria, mostly involving rockets and drones, but this was the first serious US casualty. The National Security Council staff and the Central Command general staff working on this holiday were gathering facts fast on what happened so they could provide options to the president.

McGurk drove to the White House. President Biden, who was at Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland, for Christmas, convened a call with his National Security team: Secretary Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General CQ Brown. The military leaders briefed him on his strike options. He could target the Iranian-backed militia group responsible and Iran's Revolutionary Guard facilities, particularly in Iraq, where the attacks emanated from. Biden could also strike so-called persona targets: the four individuals responsible for planning the attack, using very specific signals intelligence and overhead satellite imagery. Austin and his team at the Pentagon were tracking the precise locations of the four individuals.

Biden quizzed his advisers on the risks of each option. Their response needed to be carefully calibrated. He ordered them to strike first at the sites and then progress to the persona targets once the strongest opportunity to take the individuals out presented itself. That night, at about 4:45 a.m., the US military conducted discreet air strikes against three sites used by Iranian-backed militia groups to launch unmanned aerial drone attacks. US Central Command said the air strikes likely killed a number of militants, but there were no civilian casualties. "The strikes were taken to deter future attacks and were conducted in a manner designed to limit the risk of escalation and minimize civilian casualties," the president said in a letter to Speaker of the House Mike Johnson. "The United States stands ready to take further action as necessary and appropriate to address further threats or attacks."

About two weeks later, Biden ordered strikes on the persona targets. After two were hit, the attacks on US forces in Iraq and Syria paused. So Biden paused his message to the militia leaders was clear: "We have pinpointed your location. If you attack again, we will kill you." But the violent threat was not mitigated.

On Saturday, December 30th, the Houthis shot two anti-ship ballistic missiles toward a large commercial container ship named the Maersk Kang Joo. US Naval forces on the USS Gravely shot down the missiles before they hit. The next day, New Year's Eve, Yemeni forces in fast boats attempted to sink the same container ship. US Naval helicopters launched from the Eisenhower and the Gravely and fired at the fast boats, which fired back. The US sank three of the four small boats, killing the crews. The fourth boat fled.

President Biden was in St. Croix in the US Virgin Islands for his annual New Year's vacation with the First Lady. Jake Sullivan and his wife Maggie Goodlander had traveled with them. They had planned for a relaxing New Year's weekend on the beachfront. The morning of New Year's Day, however, President Biden was on another secure call with Secretary Austin, General CQ Brown, Jake Sullivan, Brett McGurk, and others to discuss whether Biden should conduct direct strikes into Yemen against the Houthis. Austin and CQ Brown said the military would need preparation time for a strike of that nature, so Biden did not authorize immediate strikes but wanted to make sure they did the planning. "What happens if we hit those targets?" Biden asked, peppering his advisers with questions. "What's the collateral damage? How might the Houthis react? Are we ready for their counter-reaction? Are our people protected? Do we have enough missile defense? Do you have the resources you need?" The president made it clear he did not.

Want to use military force in a way that would generate second or third order consequences. The region was already a classic Tinder Box, which could catch fire and spr spr instantly.

"Get everything set up and ready to go," Biden said. He also directed them to coordinate with their allies to provide a strong condemnation and warning to the Houthis against further attacks. A joint statement signed by 13 countries was released two days later.

Through January, the Houthi attacks continued. Biden told McEr, "I want to try diplomacy with the Iranians, in addition to the threats and use of force." The Middle East had to be managed carefully. Biden wanted to be active, but not too active, as was his style. He was anxious to temp down the Wild West Field of the Middle East.

Biden had three clear messages for the Iranians: "We're not looking for a massive Middle East conflict here. We want to contain this conflict to Gaza, and we're not looking for a war with Iran." Biden told Murk, "But, but," Biden said, "and a big butt, we will protect our people and we will protect our interests." He told Murk to warn the Iranians, "You either stop this or else."

Murk flew to Muskat, the capital of Oman. The US did not communicate directly with the Iranians but used intermediaries like the Omanis. It was a grueling flight of more than 7,000 miles.

"You have to get a handle on the Houthis, which are firing these missiles at ship," McEr said in a message passed via the Omanis to Ali Bagheri Khani, Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister and chief nuclear negotiator. The setup always felt strange to Murk. He could see the Iranians on the other side of the room, and they could see him, but they did not talk to one another directly. The Omanis passed the messages back and forth. It was, however, the best in-person communication option the US had to get a message to the Supreme Leader of Iran.

"We can't control them," the Iranian Representatives replied. Murk heard this answer a lot from them. He knew Iran had totally shut off, at least temporarily, the attacks on US forces in Iraq, so they could turn it off in the Red Sea. Murk believed he relayed Biden's warning: "If you can't stop the Houthis, we're going to directly target them." Murk said, "And we could directly target you because we hold you responsible." Iran would not give Murk a commitment.

President Biden ordered air and naval strikes against the Houthis that night. They hit Houthi missile and drone launch sites, weapons storage areas, and radars with precision-guided bombs. A Navy submarine fired a Tomahawk cruise missile. Five US allies—Britain, the Netherlands, Australia, Canada, and Bahrain—joined the response. The Houthis came back with a warning: "The US and UK must be prepared to pay a heavy price." McEr believed it showed the careful, intentional way Biden was using military force.

A week later, the administration and the UK announced a package of sanctions against four key Houthi leaders. Limiting the sanctions to individuals was intended to minimize harm to Yemen's population of 32 million, who already were ravaged by famine and war. Biden wanted to increase the pressure and escalate the threats, but only so much. One of his basic foreign policy tenets was still: "Great powers don't bluff," so there would be no bluffing. He was determined to avoid a wider regional war.

On Sunday, January 28th, the Iran-backed militia groups operating in Syria and Iraq launched an unmanned aerial drone attack on US forces stationed at a remote desert outpost, Tower 22, in Northeast Jordan, near the Syria border. Three American Service members were killed and more than 30 had injuries ranging from cuts to serious brain trauma.

"Today, America's heart is heavy," Biden said in a statement that condemned the "despicable and holy unjust attack." He vowed to hold all those responsible to account "at a time and in a manner of our choosing."

On Friday, February 2nd, the US Central Command forces struck 85 targets across seven sites—three in Iraq and four in Syria—linked to Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps and militia groups. Biden did not strike inside Iran.

House Speaker Mike Johnson criticized Biden's response. "The tragic death deaths of three US troops in Jordan, perpetrated by Iran-backed militias, demanded a clear and forceful response," he said. "Unfortunately, the administration waited for a week and telegraphed to the world, including Iran, the nature of our response. The public hand-wringing and excessive signaling undercuts our ability to put a decisive end to the barrage of attacks endured over the past few months. Now is the time for President Biden to wake up to the reality that his policy of placating Iran has failed," Johnson said. "To promote peace, America must project strength."

January 8th. Lincoln and his top advisers crossed the desert in an SUV to meet with Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman (MBS) at his Royal Winter Camp in the ancient oasis city of Al-'Ula in South Arabia. MBS, the 38-year-old all-powerful leader who oversaw a country with one-fifth of the world's oil reserves, was there on a retreat. He had been hosting American congressmen over the weekend. Blinken entered the cavernous tent, lavishly decorated with colorful rugs and floor cushions. A feast of local cuisine awaited them, including baby camel burgers, lamb, and chicken.

Before October 7th, Biden, Sullivan, and Blinken had been working with the Saudis for months to settle the relationship between the US and Saudi Arabia, seriously damaged by the murder of journalist Khashoggi. Another potentially globe-shaking project was a proposal for normalization, as it was called. It would mean full diplomatic, economic, and strategic ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia. Should this be achieved, it could change the balance of power in the Middle East. Diplomatic relations between the two Middle East powerhouses could further isolate the threat from Iran, which had the biggest military in the region.

After the trauma of October 7th, however, and Israel's military campaign and relentless bombing of Gaza, it was hard to know whether the Saudis were willing or even able to move forward with normalization. The Saudi population was seething with anger at the devastating humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Sitting on floor cushions, Blinken asked MBS directly, "Do you want to pursue normalization, and what is required in order to actually do it?"

"Normalization between the two Middle East superpowers would be a turning point for the region, securing Blinken's place in diplomatic history on the scale of Henry Kissinger."

"Not only do I want to pursue it, but I want to pursue it with urgency," MBS said. "I think we need to try to get this done in the next few months because then you will be into your election season. It's going to be hard for you to do anything then."

"It was a surprising strategic understanding of American priorities and politics," MBS added. "Who knows what comes after the election? So this is the moment, and I'm prepared to do it."

The US was also getting closer and closer to finalizing its own agreements with the Saudis on defense cooperation, on civil nuclear power so the Saudis could build up their nuclear power industry, and an economic plan.

"If we conclude our agreements," Blinken added, "what do you need from Israel in order to actually do the normalization?"

"I need two things," MBS said. "I need quiet in Gaza, and I need a clear political pathway for the Palestinians for a state."

"Your Royal Highness, the word in Israel is that when it comes to the Palestinian state, you don't really mean it and that you don't really want it. You pay lip service to it. So just tell me," Blinken said, "what is the answer?"

The Saudi royal family had a lengthy history of being disappointed by Palestinian leadership.

"Do I want it?" MBS said, and tapped his heart. "It doesn't matter that much. Do I need it? Absolutely," he continued. "And I need it for two reasons: One, I have 70% of my population that's younger than I am. Before October 7th, they paid no attention to Palestine and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Since October 7th, that's all they are focused on." MBS said, "And I have other countries in the Arab world, in the Muslim world, that care deeply, and I will not betray my people." Millions of Muslims from around the world travel to Saudi Arabia for the annual Hajj, a pilgrimage to Mecca, the birthplace of the Prophet Muhammad. Lincoln knew MBS viewed himself as the leader of the Muslim World at large, the Arab world.

"I will not betray my young people or the Arab or Muslim World," NBS said.

"Can I tell that to Bibi?" Lincoln asked. "He would be traveling to Israel next."

"Yes," MBS said, "in those words. Yes, in those words."

In Israel, on January 9th, Blinken sat alone with Prime Minister Netanyahu in his small, stark office with white walls and a wood floor. They sat almost knee to knee. Bibi on a chair, Blinken on a couch. Netanyahu had been filmed and photographed in this office many times. He looked tired and worn. Blinken, also tired, lost no time in hammering home the inadequacies of humanitarian aid going into Gaza.

Netanyahu argued back that they had taken steps. "Bibi, being Bibi," Blinken thought with frustration. Israel had taken a few small steps on humanitarian assistance, but it was all grudging, pulling teeth. The Kerem Shalom border crossing in southern Israel was finally open. Israel had agreed to guarantee a minimum daily supply of fuel to Gaza. They reluctantly agreed that flour the Turks had sent, which was sitting at Ashdod Port, an Israeli cargo port south of Tel Aviv, could enter Gaza, and agreed that a US shipment of flour could also go in. But they agreed only in principle.

"It's not going as fast or as effectively as it needs to be," Blinken said. He confronted Netanyahu about the toll to civilians. Israel was now conducting military operations in Khan Yunis, Gaza's second-largest city. "When is that going to be done? When are operations going to be over?" Lincoln asked, "because this is getting to a very difficult place."

Bibi was defensive. "Look, I need to tell you what I heard from MBS, from the Crown Prince," Blinken added, switching topics. Netanyahu visibly perked up and leaned in. "He wants to pursue normalization," Blink said. "Wants to pursue it urgently. But he needs two things: he needs quiet in Gaza, and he needs a Palestinian pathway."

Bibi was animated. "I want to do this," he said immediately. "What do you think he means by quiet in Gaza?"

"Well, I can tell you what he told me was no Israeli boots on the ground," Blinken said. "I said, 'Well, that may be a pretty high bar to reach.' 'We're going to work on this,' Bibi said, seemingly unphased. Then he paused again. 'Palestinian pathway? What does that mean?'" Bibi, for his entire political career, had been adamantly opposed to an independent Palestinian state.

"It's got to be credible. It's got to be irreversible. It's got to be something that people can really believe and buy into," Lincoln said. "We understand that there have to be some conditions, particularly to make you confident about your security, but it's got to be a clear and irreversible pathway."

"Bibi said, 'Well, look, I think we can work something. We can work something. We'll need creative word-smithing on it.'"

"No, no, no. You missed the point," Blinken said. "It can't be creative word-smithing. It's got to be real. If it's creative word-smithing, there is not a person on this planet who will not believe that you will find a way to weasel out of whatever words you put down on a piece of paper that will not do it."

"No, no. We'll work on it," BB said. Netanyahu then brought Blinken into his security cabinet meeting, where the Israelis were laying out their next phase of military plans. "It's clear that this is not going to be over anytime soon," Blinken thought with alarm as he surveyed the preparations. At the end of the meeting, as they stood up to leave, Blinken grabbed Netanyahu's arm and said, "You got one more minute?"

"Yeah, of course," bib said. "What you told me in your office about wanting to pursue normalization and what's required, and what we just heard—that doesn't line up."

"It can't work. Let me work on it," BB repeated. Blinken called Biden on the plane home. "Mr. President, look, I heard a lot of interesting things on this trip," Blinken said, updating him on the tragic situation in Gaza and his new list of concerns, as well as his conversations with MBS and Netanyahu.

"Okay, let's get together as soon as we can when you get back," Biden said.

54. Sullivan and Blinken drove to the 125-acre Camp David and had lunch with Biden on January 14th. It was just the three of them, sitting around a table. There was snow on the ground, a beautiful day, but cold. Blinken relayed in detail his conversation with MBS about pursuing a normalization agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia and Netanyahu's reaction.

"Look, my sense is this," Lincoln said of his talk with Bibi. "Right now, the Prime Minister's legacy is October 7th, and that's not a legacy that he wants. Now, maybe he thinks he can get some 'quote unquote' victory over Hamas, but that's, I think, very elusive and ephemeral. But if he actually could produce normalization with Saudi Arabia, it would define Netanyahu's legacy." Netanyahu had long argued that making peace with his other neighbors in the Middle East was the path to security for Israel.

"It's the Holy Grail or the Golden Ring," Lincoln said. "It's what Israel has wanted from day one, which is normal relations with its neighbors."

"Oh, come on. There's no way he can do what's necessary now, right?" Biden pressed. "Blinken, there's no way that can happen." Biden's detector was blinking red. Polls in Israel since October 7th showed 65% of Israelis opposed a two-state solution, a complete reversal from 2012 when polls indicated 61% of Israelis supported it.

"Sir, you're right that it's unlikely, but it's not impossible. Bibi is being tugged in different directions on this, but there's part of him that clearly would like to do this," Lincoln said. "More than would like want to do this."

"Okay, let's pursue the normalization piece," Biden said. "Let's see if we can conclude our own agreements with the Saudis and bring this to a point where it becomes a real decision for Netanyahu, not just a hypothetical maybe." That will prove to be leverage, Biden added. He said he was still skeptical Israel and Netanyahu could do what they needed to do to move forward with the deal, but was willing to test the proposition. Sullivan and Blinken agreed. They had the added challenge of getting part of the US treaty with the Saudis through Congress. The first agreement, the defense cooperation agreement, was short of NATO Article 5 protection but similar to the defense agreements the US had with Japan, Australia, and South Korea. It promised if Saudi Arabia were attacked, the US would come to its defense.

Blinken remembered early on in the administration, Biden had told him, "Every administration has its Middle East crisis." When fighting broke out for 11 days in Gaza in 2021, Blinken had gone to Biden and said, "We checked the box." Biden had just laughed and told him, "Famous last words, right?"

Blinken was back in Israel three weeks later when he placed a worried call to President Biden. Israel's war cabinet had just given a briefing on their plans to enter Rafah in southern Gaza, where remaining Hamas battalions were hiding among civilians. There were somewhere around 1.4 million people in Rafah, most of them living in squalid conditions in makeshift tents with open sewers and pushed there by Israel's military operations in northern Gaza.

"Where would they go? The Israelis don't have any plan that we can see for what to do about those civilians," Lincoln said. "It's a recipe for disaster. We need to demand a plan." He spoke so quickly, his words falling over one another. It was clear Blinken was worried and shaken.

"Blink added, 'Look, personally, I can't be part of supporting something like that absent a plan.'"

"Tell the Israelis that we need to see a plan," Biden said. "Let's talk more about this when you get back." Biden reassured Blinken.

Biden called Netanyahu on February 11th, their first phone call in three weeks due to simmering disagreements. Biden had played down his frustrations with Netanyahu on a number of occasions with journalists. In December, he shared an inscription from an old photograph of him and Netanyahu: "Bibi, I love you, but I don't agree with a damn thing you have to say. It's about the same today," Biden had noted. Now, he said publicly that he told Netanyahu he needed a clear, credible, implementable plan to protect civilians, in the absence of which the US could not support an operation in Rafah.

On February 14th, Valentine's Day, Lincoln had lunch alone with the Vice President in his small private dining room off the Oval Office.

"Rafah could be a civilian catastrophe, Mr. President," as we discussed. "There is no plan that the Israelis have to get civilians out of harm's way in Rafah," Blinkin said. There was nowhere for the people to go. The Israelis had told Blinken would send the civilians to Al-Mawasi, a beach area on the coast, but it's already saturated. There are already 250,000 people there, and there is almost no sufficient humanitarian support for them. "It doesn't add up," Blink said. "There's no place to put them, much less care for them," he continued. "But even if the Israelis do come up with a plan to move people out of harm's way, there are 1.4 million people in Rafah. They're not going to move all of them. We think as many as half a million will remain in Rafah," Blinkin said.

Biden agreed. "From everything he knew of Israel's military operations, they would do terrible harm to civilians. If you extrapolate from what we've seen, it probably adds up to more than a thousand children being killed and women and others," Blinkin told the President.

"We can't be part of that. It's such a tight rope to walk for me and for the United States," Biden said with frustration. His patience with Netanyahu was wearing thin. There were four remaining Hamas battalions the Israelis said they wanted to destroy. Biden said the Israeli Defense Force was overrated.

"Look," Blinkin added, "even if they somehow succeed in eliminating these remaining battalions, by our estimate, they are going to remain north of 10,000 armed Hamas who have not been killed or injured such that they were off the battlefield. In addition, the IDF told Blinken they estimated there were about 130,000 card-carrying members of Hamas—not militarized, not engaged in terrorism—but they could jump in. Then there were those, particularly young people, who had been radicalized by what's happened over the last few months, people whose relatives and community members had been killed by Israel's military operations. Basically, the Israelis are going to inherit an insurgency that will bleed them for a long time."

"Look," Biden said, "you know I've committed my entire career to Israel's security. This trajectory was damaging Israel's security. We can't countenance the civilian harm that's being done. We have to try to move them off this. I'm prepared to draw a clear line," Biden added. "Let's say we draw the line at Rafah."

But Biden did not trust Netanyahu. "What if they do it anyway? What then?" Lincoln said. "There are three broadly speaking categories of things that we can look at: one is public separation, two is something at the United Nations." The US had so far resisted calls for a ceasefire at the UN that weren't attached to getting hostages out, but they could amend that position. Three, suspending some military assistance to Israel for Gaza.

Biden was clear: "I will not cut off or suspend defensive assistance to Israel. It has to preserve its deterrent against Iran and Hezbollah." The President believed that if US support for Israel appeared wobbly, Iran and its proxies, particularly Hezbollah in the north, could take it as the signal to escalate the conflict in Gaza by opening up another front in the war.

The once solid public support for Israel's military operations in Gaza had been cratering in the United States. Daily news reports showed devastating images of Palestinian children wounded and killed, families searching for food and water, tent encampments, and cities reduced to rubble in Gaza. Biden's continued military aid to Israel, despite the growing civilian death toll in Gaza and lack of humanitarian aid getting in, was roiling Democrats, labor unions, and university campuses in the United States.

"But I agree," Biden told Blinken, "we need to look at whether we could and should pause assistance that goes directly for use in Gaza if they don't get this right." A diffuse wave of student-led protests over the worsening humanitarian situation in Gaza had sprung up at colleges across the country. The more college administrators cracked down on the pro-Palestinian demonstrations and tent encampments, the more the protests grew, attracting participation from faculty and members of the public. At Columbia University, the school called in the police to clear a major student protest for the first time since the Vietnam War. About 100 were arrested. Some Republicans described the college protests as hotbeds of anti-Semitism. Mostly, they were a mixed bag of messages, predominantly aimed at bringing about an end to Israel's military operations in Gaza.

Biden called Netanyahu on February 15th. "We already said we were not going to support an operation absent a plan to get the civilians out of harm's way and care for civilians," Biden said. "We don't see how you can do that. It doesn't add up. We don't know where you'll take people, never mind how you'll care for them," Biden continued. "Even if you could, we don't see how you don't do something that does terrible damage to the civilians who remain in Rafah." And Biden said, "It doesn't lead anywhere because you're going to have a long-term problem on your hands."

Meanwhile, Blinken and McEr had been pushing the Israelis on a ceasefire. "They had a dilemma. We saw the quickest way to short-circuit what was happening in Gaza was the hostages-for-ceasefire agreement," Lincoln said. "If we got that agreement, we'd get at least a six-week ceasefire with the prospect of extending it. Instead of going guns blazing into Rafah, Israel could work with the Egyptians to control the border so that nothing could get in to resupply Hamas, suffocating Hamas of resources."

Blink delivered President Biden's message to Bibi. "We're not going to support you on a major operation into Rafah," he said. "You're heading to a place where either Hamas is going to be left in Gaza running it, which the US agreed was unacceptable, Israel will have to stay and inherit an insurgency, or there will be nothing left, just anarchy."

"Blinken said, 'Well, you're right, Bibi said. We'll have our hands full for decades. That can't possibly be good for Israel.'"

"Blinken said, 'What the Arabs kept telling Blinken, and Blinken believed they were right, was that there had to be a political answer to Hamas, specifically Palestinian leadership. It needs to be, in our judgment, Palestinians and the Palestinian Authority.'" Lincoln told BB, "We believe that's where you need to get. Maybe it can't be done in one fell swoop," Blinken added. "The Egyptians, the Emiratis have expressed real interest in being part of a security force that would transition to Palestinian Authority. We'd be training up Palestinian Authority."

Netanyahu liked the idea of the Arabs going in. He was not keen on the Palestinian Authority, to say the least.

"Look," said Blinken, "your place in the world is in peril. You might not realize it until it's too late, but you're losing support from your remaining supporters and the countries that have been the most supportive of Israel besides the United States—Germany and the United Kingdom. I can tell you from my conversations with their foreign ministers that it's right at the edge of the table, and it's about to fall off. You may not be able to see it, but you need to know it," Lincoln said angrily.

Netanyahu still did not move on the idea of a military operation into Rafah. It was obvious Blinken had no influence, so he called Biden. "Let me get on the phone with Bibi on this," the President said. "I have ideas for dealing with Rafah in a different way," Biden told BB. "Dealing with your main problem, Hamas, in a different way, and you need to hear them because we're not—we can't support a major military operation there," Biden said. "And we still haven't seen a plan to get people out of harm's way."

Netanyahu agreed to send Israeli representatives to Washington, but he pulled the plug after the US abstained from a UN Security Council resolution on a ceasefire. Bibi viewed it as a betrayal. "He is a handful," Lincoln said about Netanyahu. "But as much as it's tempting to blame everything on Bibi or blame everything on Smotrich or Ben, the extremists in his cabinet, the hard reality is most of what's coming from Israel these days is a reflection of the overwhelming majority of its people."

In a remote prison camp known as Polar Wolf in the Arctic Circle, Putin's opposition leader and vocal critic, Alexei Navalny, age 47, was pronounced dead on February 16th, 2024. The cause was unclear.

"Make no mistake, Alexei Putin is responsible for Navalny's death," President Biden declared. "What has happened to Navalny is yet more proof of Putin's brutality." It was a vivid warning to opposition figures inside Russia.

55. Our retired Lieutenant General Keith Kellogg picked up the phone on Sunday, March 10th, 2024. It was Trump checking in after Super Tuesday. Kellogg still prided himself on being one of only five senior advisers who had lasted through Trump's entire presidency.

"Just get ready when we start campaigning hard," Trump said. He was in good spirits. "Get ready to go." Super Tuesday's results had been expected. It was now all but assured that the November 2024 election would be a Biden-Trump rematch. Trump had won 2,231 delegates, and only 1,215 were needed to guarantee him the Republican nomination. Kellogg told everyone that he was supporting Trump's 2024 campaign 100%. "For him, it was a binary choice between Biden's policies and Trump's policies. The southern border, that's number one," Kellogg said. "I think we've got a broken military, which is number two. Then you look at the regional conflicts: Europe with Russia, you look at the Middle East, and you look at the Far East. I fall really, really hard on the side of Donald Joe Trump," Kellogg said. "And I'm just very, very nervous about the current policies of Joe Biden."

"Trump's policies are good, and the fact is, I know the guy," Kellogg said. "And Joe, for all of his experience, Joe Biden's experience in National Security, he just doesn't get it." Kellogg regularly argued that Trump was a different kind of person. Out of the spotlight, he could listen and actually wanted to hear every voice in the room.

"When the door was closed in the Oval Office," Kellogg said, "we'd sit there, and the term I'd use is a 'boogat,' which is a bunch of guys sitting at a table bullshitting." During one heated National Security Council meeting in the Situation Room about Afghanistan, Kellogg recalled how Trump paused and went around the table to ask everyone's opinion. "Okay, what do you think?" Trump asked the woman two seats down from Kellogg. "Mr. President, I'm the note-taker." "Oh, no," Trump said. "If you're in this room, you're talking." So the note-taker weighed in briefly. Trump appeared to enjoy putting his advisers in the hot seat.

"He would tell me up front, 'This is what I'm thinking about,' and then you would need to push back on it or support him," Kellogg said. "And I saw a lot of people fold under pressure," he added. "I mean, absolutely fold. There were other times when I actually sat there and said, 'You know, I really want the popcorn concession on this one because this is just an absolute knockdown, drag-out.' It was fun to watch." As president, Trump's decisions were often made in an instant. "It wasn't a comeback to tomorrow, come back a week from Tuesday, come back 3 weeks from now," Kellogg said. When Trump had decided to move the US Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in 2018, he was told in the Situation Room that a third Intifada was going to start because of it. "Well, we'll take that risk," Trump said with a shrug and ordered the move, creating a firestorm in the press but no third Intifada in Israel.

It was Trump's demeaning and aggressive language that would be a problem for some voters, Kellogg believed. For instance, Trump had repeatedly called Republican rival Nikki Haley a "bird brain," and his campaign had left a bird cage with bird seed outside her hotel room. "He's much different now," Kellogg reassured others. "His mind's in a good place." He could see the possibility of a second term within reach and was ready for a contest. Trump's cabinet selection process and decision-making would also be significantly different this time.

"There's no book out there that says 'Presidents for Dummies,'" Kellogg said. "You learn on the job, and you figure out, 'Okay, this is the way it's going to go.'" Referring to 2017, Kellogg added, "Last time, he didn't come out of the gate fast. We were not prepared for governance because everybody was new." Kellogg said now Trump and Biden both had four years in the White House and knew what was possible as president. This would be the longest general campaign this nation's ever seen, Kellogg said, but he believed Trump was ready for a long political fight in 2024.

On the phone with Trump now in March, they jumped through topics from apples to oranges to apricots in about 45 seconds, Kellogg said. They landed on Israel. Kellogg had just returned from Tel Aviv. He updated Trump on his meetings with Netanyahu's right-hand advisor Ron Dermer and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. Kellogg had also secretly met with Netanyahu.

"What was Bibi's state of mind?" Trump asked.

"Netanyahu is a wartime leader," Kellogg said. "This is a guy who came out of Special Operations and the Israeli military. He understands war." Netanyahu had served in the Sayeret Matkal, an elite Special Forces Unit of the Israeli Army that conducted clandestine reconnaissance missions. He later fought in the 1973 Yom Kippur War and was promoted to the rank of Captain in the IDF reserves. Kellogg said he believed that Biden was too critical of Netanyahu in public.

"Biden, Netanyahu do not see eye to eye about virtually anything," Kellogg added. "I understand in our Administration when you were president, that there were times you had some quips with Netanyahu whilst you were doing the Abraham Accords, but he was closer to you than he is to Biden."

"If people think there's a two-state solution now, they're wrong," Kellogg said. "It will not happen in the near term, and it won't happen because of the animosity now within the Jewish population." He told Trump about his visit to some of the kibbutzim attacked on October 7th. He had met with an Israeli woman who said she would never again trust Palestinian people because she had recognized some of the attackers who came across the border on October 7th. They had worked in her kibbutz, she claimed. In the five months since October 7th, no Palestinians had been let back into Israel to work.

"Israelis look at this in almost biblical terms," Kellogg said, "as a fight for survival. Unless you understand that, you don't understand what's happening in Israel, and this Administration does not understand that," he said, referring to Biden. Kellogg also criticized Biden for pushing Israel to call a ceasefire. "They're not going to go along with the ceasefire," Kellogg scoffed on the phone to Trump about the Israelis. Dermer had told him as much in their separate 1½-hour meeting. "They're going to go into Rafah. They're going to finish the battalions. They're going to eradicate Hamas," Kellogg said. "And I mean eradicate Hamas, all the leadership of Hamas," Kellogg said. Biden was not being supportive enough of Netanyahu.

"You cannot have humanitarian assistance be your primary thought," Kellogg said. "Your primary thought should be eradicating Hamas as a fighting unit."

Trump was quiet on the other end of the line. He had criticized Netanyahu's handling of Hamas and the images of Israel's military operations in Gaza. "I think Israel made a very big mistake," Trump had said during a Now interview with Israeli media at Mar-a-Lago. "I wanted to call and say, 'Don't do it.' These photos and shots—I mean, moving shots of bombs being dropped into buildings in Gaza, and I said, 'Oh, that's a terrible portrait. It's a very bad picture for the world.' I think Israel wanted to show that it's tough. That sometimes you shouldn't be doing that," Kellogg said.

He would write up an after-action report with his main conclusions:

1. We need to support the state of Israel and the administration of Bibi Netanyahu.

2. Understand a two-state solution is not going to happen. It's just not.

3. Israel will have a ceasefire, but it will be a short-term ceasefire to try to get the hostages out.

4. This is a war. Some of the scenes you see will not be pretty. Just accept that.

5. This is resolved by the US and Saudis. The Middle East is broken," Kellogg said. "It's fractured, and you're going to have to bring it back in balance. You can do it because of your ability to talk to people."

Kellogg mailed Trump a hard copy of his four-page action report. He knew it was too long for Trump. "When you're with Donald J. Trump, that's a long memo," Kellogg said. "You need to try to keep it one page."

Former Trump cabinet members were making the rounds to various embassies in Washington, saying that a new Trump administration would be friendly and accommodating to their countries. Former Trump National Security Advisor Robert O'Brien and former CIA Director and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had visited South Korean Ambassador to the US Sung Kim. The line they pushed was that Trump would be more reasonable and more predictable this second time round. They advocated the essential nature of Trump's relationship with each country. For instance, that Trump realized the relationship between South Korea and the United States was instrumental to mutual security, and the two nations would be shouldering many burdens together. Ambassador Cho said O'Brien is probably on the short list to be the next Secretary of State if Trump is elected. Koji Tomita, the Japanese ambassador to the United States, thought Trump courted former Japanese leaders by playing golf with one and, in a very clever way, sharing information about Japan's vast investments. "Japan has been the largest foreign investor here in the US for the past several years," Tomita said. Of course, that rang a bell with Trump. The former Trump senior officials were carefully bonding and planting seeds. They were building a new network out of the old one.

56. "Ha, let's call Trump," Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said to Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman in Saudi Arabia during a visit in March. Graham, who had traveled to the Middle East five times since October 7th, was trying to keep the negotiations for a normalization deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia alive—an incredibly ambitious, almost unreachable goal. MBS, the powerful 38-year-old who effectively ruled the oil-rich Kingdom, had one of his aides bring over a bag containing about 50 burner phones. He rummaged through it and pulled out one labeled "Trump 45."

"Hey, I'm here with Lindsay," MBS said moments later to Trump, with a laugh. "How are you doing?" The Crown Prince then put the cell phone on speaker so Graham could also hear Trump's side of the conversation.

"Lindsay's great," Trump said to MBS. "He was your worst problem. He tried to get me to overthrow you." Laughter erupted on both sides of the call.

"Yeah," Graham said into the phone, "you were right about MBS. I was wrong." Graham's relationship with MBS had soured after the horrific killing and dismemberment of journalist and Washington Post contributor Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. The CIA had concluded that MBS ordered the assassination. Back then, Graham had referred to the Crown Prince as a "homicidal maniac" and warned of a "bipartisan tsunami against Saudi Arabia."

"Nothing happens in Saudi Arabia without MBS knowing it," Graham said on Fox & Friends in October 2018. "I'm not going back to Saudi Arabia as long as this guy is in charge. This guy is a wrecking ball." Now Graham considered himself to be pretty good friends with the Crown Prince.

On one of his earlier trips to Saudi Arabia, Graham had asked MBS to get Jake Sullivan on the phone during their meeting so that Graham could brief them both on a conversation with Netanyahu. The Crown Prince had pulled out a burner phone, this time labeled "Jake Sullivan."

"Hey, I'm here with Lindsay," MBS said on the phone with Sullivan. "Where?" Sullivan asked, his voice full of surprise. "I'm in Saudi Arabia," MBS said. "He, Lindsay, just got back from Israel." After they hung up, this time with Trump, Senator Graham impressed MBS on talks of a Saudi normalization treaty with Israel.

"If you want to recognize Israel, you've got to do it on Biden's watch," Graham said. "There's no way you're going to get Democrats to vote for a defense agreement to go to war with Saudi Arabia introduced by Donald Trump." The carrot the US continued to dangle in front of MBS was the prospect of a serious bilateral defense cooperation agreement with the United States. It would mean that if Saudi Arabia was attacked, the US would come to its defense.

"It's a big deal," Graham reminded MBS. "It's an insurance policy against Iran. It's a checkmate against Iran." MBS pointed to the anger on his streets at the situation in Gaza. He could not possibly sign the treaty with Israel unless there was some commitment to march toward a Palestinian state over the arc of time. But after October 7th, Graham knew that Netanyahu and Israeli society had only hardened more firmly against the idea of a two-state solution.

MBS said he still wanted to enrich the uranium in Saudi Arabia to diversify his energy sector to include nuclear power. "Well, that's going to be hard to do because people are afraid you'll create a bomb," Graham said. "I don't need uranium to make a bomb," MBS said. "I'll just buy one from Pakistan." Pakistan was one of the nine countries with nuclear weapons.

Months before the Hamas attack on October 7th, Graham had updated President Biden in the Oval Office about his talks with the Saudis and Israelis. Sullivan and Blinken had attended.

"Mr. President, here's what I told MBS," Graham said. "I told him I think that normalizing with Israel is possible. I would support it on your watch, Mr. President. I'm trying to help." Blinken and Sullivan added, "I'm telling MBS, if you recognize Israel, I'll get you 45 votes for the defense agreement you need from the United States from Republicans. Trump's not going to get in your way. Democrats wouldn't vote for it if Trump introduced it because they hate Bibi and they hate Trump," Graham said. "Republicans would vote for the defense agreement with Saudi Arabia if Israel encouraged us to. We can get 45 Republican votes," Graham said. "You have to get the rest from your caucus."

"I can do that," Biden said. "Listen." Graham pushed, "This guy is willing to do it because he gets under our nuclear umbrella and he doesn't have to worry about building a bunch of bombs."

"Do you think you can deliver?" Biden had asked Graham.

"I can deliver," Graham said. "Can you deliver?"

"I can deliver," the President replied.

"Mr. President, the Abraham Accords made this possible," Graham added, referring to the Trump administration's Middle East bilateral agreements between Israel and the UAE and Israel and Bahrain. "Trump will get his fair share of the credit, but you're not going to get a treaty through the Senate unless it's on your watch. It's going to take a Democratic president to convince Democrats to vote to go to war for Saudi Arabia."

"Let's do it," Biden said confidently.

Back in the Middle East in the early fall of 2023, Graham had called President Biden. Once close friends, Biden and Graham had worked various deals together as Vice President. Biden told President Obama, "Lindsey Graham has the best instincts in the Senate." Obama agreed. But along came Trump, and Graham's support of Republican attacks on Hunter Biden had ended the friendship.

"We're good to go," Graham said to Biden on the phone. They were on the 5-yard line of the defense agreement and working on hashing out the precise language of the civil nuclear deal.

"Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu lit up like a Christmas tree during our meeting," Graham told Biden. "This thing is on the verge of being done." They had scheduled a quiet negotiation between Netanyahu and a Saudi Ambassador in Tel Aviv in November 2023. It would be a historic moment. But along came October 7th. The Hamas attack and Israel's military operations in Gaza had set back all real prospects of a historic peace treaty.

"Only way you can do this is to get a ceasefire," Graham said to Blinken and Sullivan after his latest meeting with MBS in March 2024. "And during that ceasefire, close this deal."

57. TI Israeli Ambassador to the US Michael Herzog, a former IDF General, pulled Brett McEr aside during a White House meeting the afternoon of Monday, April 1st. "We just did a strike and took out IRGC Commander Muhammad Reza Zahedi in Damascus, Syria," Herzog said, "along with six other members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)."

"You did what?" McEr said. "Have you really thought through the consequences?" Muhammad Reza Zahedi, age 63, had been a general, the highest-ranked Iranian commander in the IRGC Quds Force, a US-designated terrorist organization, and a founder of the IRGC going back 45 years to the 1979 Iranian Revolution. Zahedi was also a personal friend of Iran's Supreme Leader. Killing him was a strike at the core of Iran. Israel had just driven a stick into a hornet's nest. McEr, Sullivan, and Finnegan looked at each other.

There were mixed feelings. On one hand, the Americans could understand the targets. The IRGC existed to run these proxies like Hezbollah, who were focused on destroying Israel. Ambassador Herzog argued it was a legitimate act of self-defense. But the White House advisers wondered if the Israelis had considered how Iran might respond. McEr knew from years of experience that Israel thought they were very good at managing the escalation ladder. The Israeli Defense Forces had taken calculated shots for some time, which they called their "freedom of action," and which the United States supported. But this, McEr believed, was a major miscalculation.

The US had received no advanced warning from Israel, which perhaps was a good thing, but the strike had immense implications. The precision strike had been carried out by two US-made, Israeli-operated F-35s at around 6 p.m. Iran sent a message via Swiss intermediaries that said, "Iran will respond against Israel, but also holds the US responsible for the attack." Iran claimed in the note that Israel could not have conducted the attack without US approval. Immediately, US forces, which had already sustained more than 150 attacks from Iran-backed militias, went on alert again.

At 8:00 p.m., Sullivan and McEr sent a response to the Iranians that underscored the US had no prior knowledge of the attack, did not approve it, and did not participate in it. "The US is prepared to respond to any attacks against our personnel and facilities," the message warned. "We do not seek a war with Iran." The US wanted no part and had no part in it.

At 9:00 p.m., John Kirby, now National Security Council spokesman, reiterated the message publicly. "Let me make it clear," Kirby said from the White House podium. "We had nothing to do with the strike in Damascus. We weren't involved in any way."

The tension ate away at Murk. It was clear from the intelligence and public statements that Iran considered Israel's strike a huge blow. Murk's real fear was Hezbollah might take this as an opportunity to enter the war with a large-scale attack on Israel, which the United States had been trying for years to prevent. Suddenly, the region was ablaze with hot, dangerous uncertainty again. The question lingered: How and when would Iran respond?

Three days later, on Thursday, April 4th, Biden spoke to Netanyahu in a secure call for 30 minutes. Blinken and Murk listened in.

"We are seeing the Iranians preparing to do something big," Biden said. "Look, Bibi, we have our differences. I want you to know that when it comes to your defense, Israel's core defense against Iran, I, Joe Biden, I've got your back, and you don't need to question that. Okay? We're going to help you defend against whatever Iran is going to do. I'm not with you on attacking Iran. I'm just not. We're not going to do that," Biden said.

The conversation then turned to the situation in Gaza. "What's your strategy, man?" Biden asked.

"We have to go into Rafah," Bibi said flatly.

"Bibi, you've got no strategy. You've got no strategy," Biden said.

"That's not true, Joe," Netanyahu replied. "We are dismantling Hamas. We've taken out 75% of their battalions. We have to go after the next 25%. That's what we're doing now." And Joe, Netanyahu said, "It's only going to take 3 weeks. Trust me. It's not going to take long. This is the end of the war. We have to clear Rafah, and it's over. It'll take 3 weeks. I'll put a time limit on it, Joe."

"Three weeks?" Biden said. "No. It'll take months." They had heard this before. The Israelis had, for example, said their operation in Khan Yunis would take 3 weeks. It had taken nearly 5 months. Netanyahu at times sounded aggrieved, as if the whole world had turned against Israel. "The UN, everybody," he challenged and questioned whether the humanitarian situation was that bad in Gaza.

Biden read out a list of actions Israel needed to take in terms of humanitarian assistance. His tone was no longer diplomatic. "You need to flood the zone. There needs to be a surge in assistance," Biden said. "It needs to be sustained, and you need to have a process in place so that the humanitarian workers can do their job safely." Biden's asks of Israel was specific, down to the number of trucks that Israel needed.

To let into Gaza and the crossings that needed to be opened, we want the Ashod port open for the direct delivery of assistance into Gaza. Biden said, "Open the AAS Crossing so that aid can reach Northern Gaza and deliveries from Jordan can go directly into Gaza. We want to see 350 trucks a day, including 100 trucks a day to the north."

Biden said, "Before the October 7th attack, about 500 trucks had been crossing the border into Gaza to bring food and medicine inside. Israel, there were protests blocking roads for trucks going into Gaza, showing opposition was not isolated to Netanyahu. Inside Gaza, there were alarming indications of famine."

"You need a deconfliction cell to make sure the humanitarians are in the room with the IDF and your command units to make sure that something like World Central Kitchen can't happen again," Biden said. He was referring to the Israeli drone strike that had mistakenly hit a World Central Kitchen aid convoy, killing seven international aid workers, including an American. The convoy had just unloaded more than 100 tons of food shipped to the Gaza Strip.

"If you don't do that and we don't see results, then you've lost me," Biden said. "I'm out." This was an unusually categorical statement for Biden.

The president then turned to the hostage deal. The US believed there were about 70 or so Israeli hostages still being held by Hamas in the web of underground tunnels beneath Gaza. McGurk, who had managed the US side of the hostage negotiations with CIA Director Bill Burns, believed there would have been a ceasefire months ago if Hamas had agreed to release more hostages. On multiple occasions, McGurk had seen hostage exchange offers approved by the Hamas political leadership in Doha and Egypt, but when those Hamas representatives sent it through their network and into the tunnels to Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas in Gaza, it came back with, "We reject this offer." This is what drove the Israelis completely crazy. Israel had put a full ceasefire on the table in exchange for the release of women, elderly, and wounded hostages, and Sinwar rejected it.

Now, Biden pushed Netanyahu to make the most forward-leaning offer to Hamas yet. Burns had advised Biden that this deal had a pretty good chance of working because it gave Hamas what they wanted. The offer was: Hamas releases 40 hostages; Israel releases 900 Palestinian prisoners, including 100 with life sentences. McGurk thought it was an astonishing offer and not an easy thing, by any stretch of the imagination, for Netanyahu to agree to do. Israel considered the 100 with life sentences to be terrorists, many who had killed Israelis.

"It's worth paying a big price to get the hostages out," Biden told Netanyahu. They both knew that otherwise, the hostages would very likely die in the tunnels. Netanyahu said they would make the offer after the call.

The Israeli government released a four-page list of steps that they were going to take in response to what Biden said they needed to do on the humanitarian side. Lincoln was pleased but also frustrated. "These four pages are almost verbatim the things that the president, in his conversations with Bibi, had been telling them to do going back to December," he said. "Had they actually done them in December, we might be in a different place."

The next day, April 5th, Sinwar responded through intermediaries. No, Sinwar had spent years in Israeli prison, learned Hebrew, and devoted his life to destroying Israel. A total ideologue, he was believed to be hiding out in underground living quarters beneath Gaza, surrounded by hostages for protection. The Israeli military had found some of his furnished digs deep in the tunnels with comfortable sleeping quarters and showers. On one occasion, IDF soldiers found his handwriting on a chalkboard shortly before he fled.

US intelligence and other direct observations showed there was an extraordinary labyrinth of hundreds of miles and multiple levels of tunnels in Gaza. Sinwar had categorically rejected leaving the tunnels and appeared to be living in his underground kingdom without a care in the world for what was happening to Gazans above him, willing to sacrifice every last Palestinian for his cause, according to the intelligence.

"It's hard to negotiate with someone with a death wish," Burns said about Sinwar. Israeli and US intelligence analysts also concluded that Sinwar thought the war was going his way. Israel was becoming increasingly less popular and isolated. Sinwar had rejected Israel's offers of a ceasefire in exchange for hostages, so Israel now argued they had to go into Rafah, believing the only way to get the hostages out was a combination of negotiations and military pressure.

The leader of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayed Al Nahyan (MBZ), had told McGurk, "The Israelis have to learn something that we know in the Arab world: take time with your revenge. Be patient. It's a better approach. To go in and smash up Rafah is not serving the interest of the Israelis when, in fact, you could kill Sinwar." MBZ said, "Take your time." He advised the Israelis were determined to kill Sinwar, who was already projecting himself as a martyr.

Meanwhile, in Tehran, on April 5th, thousands of Iranians gathered for the funerals of Commander Zahedi and the other six IRGC members killed in Israel's strike. "Martyrs on the Road to Jerusalem" was written on the trucks that transported the coffins. People at the funeral held placards that read, "Death to Israel" and "Death to America." Iran's supreme leader, Khamenei, had vowed that Israel would pay. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, the senior Iranian missile commander, was pushing for a big missile attack on Israel. US intelligence indicated that the supreme leader, who was usually pragmatic because he was not looking to get into a major war, was so furious about the assassination of Zahedi, his friend in Damascus, that he was not putting the brakes on.

Hajizadeh, on April 9th, Iran sent another message through the Swiss intermediary. Iran said it had no intention of targeting the US but threatened US bases in West Asia if the US challenged Iran's response against Israel. That night, new information showed Iran was preparing a historically unprecedented attack on Israel using a variety of missiles and drones, including ballistic missiles.

At 10:00 a.m., April 10th, Sullivan called the principals together. Secretary of Defense Austin, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs CQ Brown, and CENTCOM Commander General Eric Cilla briefed them on the defense preparations. The principals agreed the moment called for direct engagement with Iran's chief of defense, Muhammad Bagheri. Direct engagements with Iran were extremely rare. CQ Brown sent a letter to Bagheri urging restraint and warning that the scale of their planned attack could cause an escalation into an all-out Middle East War. General Cilla and military coordination officers flew to Israel to help prepare the defense. Secretary Austin moved the US Eisenhower to the northern Red Sea closer to Israel. He sent the Arleigh Burke and Carney, two missile destroyers, as well as fighter planes. France, the UK, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan agreed to help with Israel's defense.

58. Owen, Saturday, April 13th, at 3:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, Iran launched Operation True Promise, beginning with a swarm of 100-50 UAVs, which would take 7 hours to reach Israel. Iran then launched 30 cruise missiles, which would take about 3 to 4 hours. Then, 110 ballistic missiles were in the air, which only take 12 minutes to reach their target. The drones, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles were all designed to reach Israel at the same time.

The Saudi chief of defense notified Cilla that the US couldn't go into Saudi airspace yet because he didn't have the approval of the Crown Prince and his brother. McGurk sent a message to the Crown Prince: "The attack is underway. We need access to your airspace. Please instruct your chief of defense." MBS gave the order and opened the airspace for US F-15 jets.

President Biden returned from Wilmington and was in the Situation Room at the White House at 5:15 p.m. with Jake Sullivan, John Finer, Brett McGurk, Phil Gordon, and others when the first missiles launched. General Cilla, who was positioned in Oman, was projected on a screen to narrate in real time what they were seeing. Vice President Harris, who was traveling domestically that day, also called in.

"US surveillance systems can detect any ballistic missile launched anywhere in the world. The missiles go into outer space and then re-enter the Earth's atmosphere, traveling at 15,000 miles per hour," Mr. President, Cilla said. "We have confirmation of 30 ballistic missiles. They were in the air." The missiles appeared on a screen in the Situation Room as yellow streaks. It was like looking at something out of an old '80s movie or computer war game. Biden watched as the yellow streaks moved toward Israel. From intel and reporting, they knew Iran's missiles were good.

"Mr. President, we can probably defeat 30 missiles," Secretary Austin said. About 3 minutes later, 30 more Iranian missiles launched. Minutes after that, 30 more. Soon, it was 110 ballistic missiles flying toward Israel, a mind-blowing number, far more than they expected. Biden was very quiet, silent, as he watched the missiles from his chair at the head of the table. McGurk was watching President Biden very closely. Steve Hadley, National Security Adviser to President George W. Bush, had told him, "In situations like this, keep your eye on the president to see if you can get a read on what he might be thinking." Never in history, McGurk realized, had any country tried to defeat 110 ballistic missiles. Even if only 30 missiles hit their target, Israel would have to respond in a very decisive way, and the result would almost inevitably be a major Middle East War.

Then, the integrated defenses kicked in. "What are you seeing?" Biden asked Cilla, who talked through the defense operations they had set up. "Kill baskets for the UAVs as they came in. US military coordinators in Israel were leading the ballistic missile defense. 'You take down those, we'll take down these. The Brits have those. The Saudis have these.' It was an extraordinary integrated defense operation. A lot of history was made as they watched. This was the first time Iran had ever directly attacked Israel, and the first time the US military had ever directly defended Israel. Saudi Arabia and Jordan had come to Israel's defense. It was unprecedented, a major power move against Iran."

Then, the bad news. "We've confirmed four impacts in Israel," General Cilla reported, meaning four missiles had struck Israel. Tension in the room heightened. They didn't know what had been hit or how many more would get through the defenses. When Iran announced the end of its military operation, the US and its partners had intercepted and shot down almost all of Iran's missiles and drones, nearly 300 in total, proving, for the moment, the enormous power in collective defensive capability. A lot of Iran's missiles failed. One seven-year-old girl was badly wounded, but the damage to Israel was unbelievably small. No deaths, no major damage to Israel. But Biden knew Netanyahu, Israel would respond, and it risked bringing them right back to the brink of war with Iran.

Biden said his instinct was to tell Bibi, "Look, let it end here. You started this by taking out some IRGC guys. They responded, and we avoided major casualties. They didn't hurt you. Let it end here." Biden looked up at Vice President Harris on the screen. "What's your view?" "That's right," Harris said. "Tell Bibi to take the win."

Biden and Netanyahu spoke on the phone at 9:00 p.m. It was 4:00 a.m. in Israel. "Let's take time to think through the next move," Biden said, "because in my view, you won. You just took out the entire leadership of the IRGC in the Levant. They just launched everything at you, and we just defeated it with a coalition of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, France, and the UK. Just extraordinary. You don't need to make another move. Do nothing."

"We were just attacked by 100 ballistic missiles," Netanyahu said. "I live in the Middle East. You cannot let this stand. We have to respond."

"Take the win," Biden advised. He reiterated that the United States would not participate in any Israeli offensive action against Iran. "We're not going to be part of an offense," Biden said.

Netanyahu said, "I want to be clear. We will make our decisions ourselves. The state of Israel will do whatever is necessary to defend itself."

After the call with Bibi ended, Biden said to his advisers and cabinet officers in the Situation Room, "I know he's going to do something, but the way I limit it is tell him to do nothing."

Israel's cabinet debated how to respond. They were considering a range of options, including strikes outside of Tehran. Some of the hardliners in the cabinet, like Israel's Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, argued that this was the moment to take out Iran's nuclear facilities. This was rejected.

On April 18th, Israel's Defense Minister Gallant notified Sullivan that Israel would take a small, precision retaliatory response. He said that Israel would not publicly confirm the strike to give Iran the chance to save face and de-escalate. Later that day, Israel sent a back-channel message to Iran that said, "We are going to respond, but we consider our response to be the end."

US intelligence showed Iran fueled about 30 of their missiles, potentially to launch after Israel attacked. The US military again postured to defend Israel. At 8:00 p.m. on April 18th, Israel struck the air defense system outside Isfahan, the city where Iran's main nuclear facilities are located. Israeli pilots launched sophisticated missiles from airplanes that Iranian air defenses did not detect. It was Israel's way of saying to Iran, "We can hit you with pinpoint accuracy whenever we want, so let's stop this."

Brett McGurk was in his office watching the missiles, little yellow streaks, cross the trajectory of his screen in real time. The calibrated strike caused a small explosion. Social media took over. Someone posted they had just heard an explosion in Isfahan. What was that? Television coverage in the US suggested major war was breaking out. Reporters bombarded the White House with questions. What was happening? Sullivan and Finer directed the National Security Council and White House Press teams to stay quiet. If a US official said Israel had just retaliated against Iran, it would become a bigger story, and Iran might feel compelled to respond.

In Iran, the message released through official channels was: "Nothing to see here. Nothing happened." Iran said a quadcopter, a small drone that anyone could buy on Amazon, had exploded and done no damage. Iran reopened its airspace to civilian planes. McGurk was relieved. It was a signal they were not going to respond. It was over. They had again averted a Middle East War.

59. I, in the spring of 2024, CIA Director Bill Burns made his 10th visit to Ukraine. The CIA provides massive intelligence assistance to Ukraine, but he also believed that Ukraine had grown an impressive intelligence service. He met secretly with President Zelensky and later reported, "He's aged and he's tired because there's an awful lot of strain on him, too, but he hasn't lost his resilience either. He still strikes me as tough as he was at the beginning of the war."

"We're running out of air defense munitions," President Zelensky said warily, "artillery munitions as well." He was deeply worried about the US Congress, where the question of continued aid to Ukraine was stuck in a bitter partisan battle he could not impact or understand. Burns had arrived in Ukraine 3 days after a grim battle was lost. Avdiivka, a Ukrainian city in the East, had held out almost the entire war, but the lack of ammunition had forced Ukrainian troops to retreat. The loss signaled to Ukrainians and the West that Russia was now gaining the decisive upper hand in the war.

Burns spoke with the Ukrainian Special Forces Commander: "We fought as long and as hard as we could. We ran out of ammunition, and they just kept coming."

Burns returned to Washington and engaged in endless conversations with members of Congress, especially House Republicans who were opposed to Ukraine funding. "There's going to be more Avdiivkas unless we come through. It's not an issue of courage and tenacity of Ukrainians; it's the running out of ammunition. That was how wars are lost. It's not any more complicated than that." He could see Ukraine running out of ammunition by the end of April 2024.

Throughout the war, the certainty that Uncle Sam had their backs was a source of hope in the trenches. As US support waned, so did the morale of Ukrainian soldiers on the front lines. Burns was convinced if Russia won the war, it would have huge implications not just for Ukraine, not just in Europe, but for the entire world.

"China was a huge factor," Burns believed. "Xi Jinping was watching. It's about Xi Jinping's view of the world," he said. "He was actually quite sober in the first year of the war in Ukraine. He didn't expect the Ukrainians were going to fight back as hard as they did, that we're going to support them in the way the president did, that our intelligence turned out to be as reliable as it was. So it's getting him to pause a little bit about Taiwan scenarios. If we're seem to be walking away from the Ukrainians, it's the surest way to stoke Xi's ambition and his confidence and everything else," Burns believed. "So there's a lot at stake in this right now, too."

Then he made perhaps his most important point: "If you want to deter Xi, then show we're capable of staying in Ukraine." A war of territorial conquest. During his confirmation hearings before the Senate in 2021, Burns said an adversarial, predatory Chinese leadership poses our biggest geopolitical test. In his 2019 memoir, *The Back Channel*, of his 32 years as a diplomat, Burns wrote, "It was all about maneuvering in the gray area between peace and war." As CIA director, he had lived in that gray area to avoid war, but war had come.

60. President Biden faced another war, much closer to home: the one at the fair United States-Mexico border. "Demonic is the word Ali Mayorkas privately and angrily used, through gritted teeth, to describe the Republican attacks on his leadership of the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the roughly 2,000-mile Southwest border of the United States." As Homeland Security Secretary, at times described as the second toughest job in Washington after the presidency, the 5'8", 64-year-old bald Cuban immigrant was contending with a cascading crisis at the border as the 2024 election grew nearer. The border was a visible, high-impact political target. News channels showed thousands of migrants piling into caravans, walking along dusty roads across Mexico, and families crossing the Rio Grande on makeshift rafts or climbing through border fencing without much hindrance. In 2022 and 2023, the number of migrants apprehended at the southern border each year has exceeded 2 million, a record outpouring of migrants predominantly from Central America. Migrant crossings in a single month had risen from 75,100.

From his first days as President, Biden revoked Trump's hardline immigration policies, promising instead to transform the US immigration system with a gentler, more humanitarian approach. Biden appointed his Vice President, Kamala Harris, to address the root causes of migration in Central America's Northern Triangle, a portfolio Biden had responsibility for during his vice presidency. Some called it an opportunity for Harris; others saw it as Biden handing off a poisoned chalice to his vice president. Many of Trump's zero-tolerance policies had been viewed as cruel, including his policy of separating children from their parents at the border, expelling more than 13,000 unaccompanied children, and his ban on Muslims from certain countries entering the United States. Trump's largely unsuccessful effort to build a wall along the border had also been widely assessed as ineffective.

Biden's approach focused on creating legal pathways for people to come to the United States and to citizenship. But as migrants started streaming across the border by the hundreds of thousands, sentiment in the United States quickly started to change and ignited a political firestorm. Republicans blamed Biden for replacing Trump's "do not come" message with a "welcome to America" sign. The word "invasion" now appeared in 27 Republican television ads ahead of the November 2024 election. Biden blamed Republicans for the lack of funding to improve border controls. "Congressional Republicans have refused to consider my comprehensive plan and they rejected my recent request for an additional $3.5 billion to secure the border and funds for 2,000 asylum personnel and 100 new immigration judges," he said on January 5th, 2023. And in 2024, Biden blamed Trump for killing his attempt at a bipartisan border deal, which had included the strictest border measures to date. But Trump had opposed the bill as a gift to Democrats, and Republican Speaker Mike Johnson called that plan "dead on arrival."

"I'm told my predecessor called members in Congress and demanded they block the bill," Biden said in his State of the Union Address on March 7th, 2024. "He feels it would be a political win for me." Republicans booed in response and ridiculed Biden's open border policy as weak. The bipartisan bill, negotiated as part of a trade-off with Republicans to get a Ukraine aid supplemental bill approved, would have funded 1,500 more Immigration and Customs personnel and 100 more immigration judges to help with the backlog of around 3 million cases. There had been more than 6 million illegal crossings at the southern border since Biden took office, one of the greatest levels of human displacement in world history. Records showed that once someone was in the United States for over a year, they were unlikely to be removed.

Trump referred to the people coming across the southern border as "prisoners, murderers, drug dealers, mental patients, and terrorists. The worst they have. In some cases, they're not people, in my opinion," Trump said during a rally in Ohio in March 2024. "These are animals, okay? And we have to stop it." Biden condemned Trump's rhetoric during his State of the Union. "I will not demonize immigrants, saying they poison the blood of our country," Biden declared. "I will not separate families. I will not ban people from America because of their faith." But nearly 80% of Americans and 73% of Democrats said they disapproved of the Biden administration's handling of the large number of migrants at the US-Mexico border.

America, home to more immigrants than any other country, was intensely divided on what immigration should look like today. New York Mayor Eric Adams, a Democrat, had repeatedly criticized Biden for the flood of migrants to New York City, which had a record high homelessness problem and was now also trying to house more than 42,000 migrants. "The president and the White House have failed New York City on this issue," Adams said. "Allow people to work, which I believe that's one of the number one things we can do."

Sensational video footage also showed the new range of nationalities arriving at the border. Historically, migration to the southern border was primarily a regional phenomenon involving people from Mexico and Central America. Now, due in part to a rise in transcontinental human smuggling networks, people were also coming from places much farther away, including China and India. The reasons for this massive migration influx at the border were numerous. Employment opportunities in the United States were skyrocketing. In Biden's first year, 6.7 million jobs were added. No other president since World War II had such job growth in their first or any year in office. Some studies found a strong correlation between the number of job openings in the US and the number of border arrests. US polls indicated that American voters believed the major pull factors for migrants were good economic opportunities, Biden's more welcoming approach, and the threat of violence in migrants' home countries. Global and regional forces were also contributing, including a rise in authoritarian regimes and gang violence, worsening economic conditions in some countries, greater climate change pressures, including food and water shortages, and forced displacement from natural disasters. The rise of social media also showed people how to make the crossing.

"Fundamentally, our system is not equipped to deal with migration as it exists now," Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas said on NBC News. "We have a system that was last modified in 1996." Congress had not been able to pass comprehensive immigration laws in decades due to political gridlock. The Republican-led House Committee on Homeland Security had singled out Mayorkas as the villain and voted to impeach him by a single vote, 214-23, on Tuesday, February 13th, 2024. He was charged with high crimes and misdemeanors for willfully and systematically refusing to enforce existing immigration laws and a breach of public trust by lying to Congress and saying the border was secure. He was only the second cabinet officer in US history to be impeached. An angry House Republican report accompanying the Homeland Secretary's impeachment concluded that Mayorkas has emboldened cartels, criminals, and America's enemies. The House Democrats released a 29-page rebuttal, saying, "In a process akin to throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks, committee Republicans have cooked up vague, unprecedented grounds to impeach Secretary Mayorkas. The MAGA impeachment is a baseless sham, and the few rational Republicans left in Congress know that, even if they refuse to admit it. But spaghetti on the wall can move American politics. It is not naturally there, and it is ugly."

On January 3rd, 2024, House Speaker Mike Johnson led 64 Republicans to the southern border port of entry Eagle Pass, Texas, with maximum hoopla. "It's been an eye-opener," Johnson said at a news conference. "One thing is absolutely clear: America is at a breaking point with record levels of illegal immigration," he said. Biden should reinstate former President Trump's "Remain in Mexico" policy and restart border wall construction and other provisions to stop illegal border crossings, which were up 25% just in the last month. Republicans had Biden over a barrel that he had in part created for himself by revoking Trump's policies and not replacing them with an effective, more humanitarian alternative. They had their spaghetti on the wall for display.

"The system is broken," Mayorkas said. He believed much of the Republican effort was driven by contempt for immigrants, adding, "Hate is its own ammunition." The Democrat-controlled Senate permanently tabled the impeachment charges against Mayorkas, but the political war over the border was deadlocked. Biden contended he needed new funding and legislation, while Speaker Johnson and Republicans said the illegal border crossings could be dramatically cut by presidential and executive branch action, especially by restoring Trump's policies. It was inevitable that Trump would weigh in. "As the leader of our party, there is zero chance I will support this horrible open borders betrayal of America," Trump said to his supporters at a campaign rally in Las Vegas. "I'll fight it all the way. A lot of the Senators are trying to say, respectfully, they're blaming it on me. I say, 'That's okay. Please blame it on me. Please.'" Trump was out of the presidency, but his shadow not only lingered over Biden but absolutely controlled Republicans. The average American might not fully understand that Trump had influence, but Congress did. Trump waved his little finger, and the party bowed and obeyed. The only good day for the Biden White House on immigration was when there was absolutely no immigration news. None. Zero. And that was not often.

61. "You are at a pivot point in the Ukrainian struggle," I said to President Andrzej Duda of Poland in a bright, sunlit room of the Polish Consulate in New York on April 17th, 2024. I wanted to see whether the populist, right-wing president felt vulnerable sharing a 300-13-mile border with Ukraine. Should Russia take Ukraine, what might it mean for Poland? Duda, age 52, with short-cropped hair and rimless glasses, has a powerful and expressive confidence. His eyes flash, and his hands punctuate each phrase. Duda's 9-year presidency had spanned three American administrations: Obama, Trump, and Biden. The Polish leader prided himself on having good relations with all of them, but he was particularly close with Trump.

"My biggest political dream is to make sure that Russia does not win in Ukraine," he said. "This is absolutely the most important thing for the security of my country, Poland, of our part of the world, but also, I believe, for the security of the whole world. Ukraine is our neighbor, and it is of fundamental importance to us that Ukraine remains a sovereign, independent state that does not succumb to Russia." Duda said, "We know what Russian occupation means. We know what Russian terror stands for, and we know that Ukrainians have to be helped." He leaned forward and tapped the desk in front of him with his index finger for emphasis.

Poland also shares part of its northern border with Kaliningrad, a Russian province, and part of its northeastern border with Belarus. Russia stored nuclear weapons in both places. Did Duda believe his country could be next if Russia took control of Ukraine? For the 26 months since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Polish people had lived with war on their doorstep. "You might not feel it in the United States the same way," Duda said. Polish families brought millions of Ukrainian refugees into their homes and communities. Poland had world leaders flying in and out of their airports and taking the 12-hour train ride to Kyiv. They hosted embassies that could no longer operate in Ukraine, as well as weapons facilities too enable huge quantities of military equipment and humanitarian aid, mostly from the United States, through their border to the Ukrainians.

Duda asked me to think about 1939. During World War II, Hitler and Stalin had made a pact to attack and occupy Poland. Poland was attacked first by Germany on September 1st, 1939, and then by Russia on September 17th. "We did not get any help," Duda said. Polish people remember that the Allied Powers did not come to aid Poland in 1939. "We joined NATO in 1999, and for 17 years, there were no NATO forces in Poland," Duda added. "That's when I said, 'Okay, good. So we are in NATO, but there is no NATO in Poland.'" His expression was incredulous. During the Obama administration, American troops were stationed in Poland for the first time on a rotational basis, but not permanently. The policy was continued by Trump and then Biden. In early February 2022, just before Russia's invasion, President Biden had sent 1,700 elite US troops to Poland. Another 3,000 US troops from the 82nd Airborne Division later deployed to Europe, including hundreds positioned in Poland, in Rzeszów, close to the border with Ukraine, as well as Romania and Germany, to bolster the Eastern flank. Biden sent Vice President Harris to Warsaw in early March 2022, mere weeks after Putin's invasion, to further signal that the US would not tolerate Russian aggression against NATO Eastern flank allies.

Duda said, "Biden has 100% credibility in relation to the commitments that he made." "Via my country, we were not yet attacked, and the Americans already sent their troops," he said. In a phone call, Biden had personally reassured Duda that the US had Poland's back. "We will always protect Poland," Biden told Duda. "It was of huge importance to me, emotionally personally," Duda said.

A month earlier, on March 11th, President Duda published an op-ed in The Washington Post that called on NATO countries to raise their defense spending from 2% to 3% of their GDP. Poland was now spending 4% of its GDP on defense, more than $27 billion annually. The US spent 3.49%, or $860 billion, in 2023. Many NATO members, however, were not meeting the 2% target, including France, Spain, and Canada. At a campaign rally in South Carolina in February, former President Trump, a frequent critic of NATO, said he would let Russia attack allies that did not pay their dues. Trump said a president, who he did not identify, once asked him, "Well, sir, if we don't pay and we're attacked by Russia, will you protect us?" Trump replied, "No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want." His audience cheered.

Duda took a more diplomatic tone in the Post. "The Russian Federation has switched its economy to war mode. It is allocating close to 30% of its annual budget to arm itself because of the growing threats." Today, Duda argued, the time has come for members to spend more. Notably, most of the NATO members with the largest defense spending were those on the Eastern flank closest to the war, including Poland, Estonia, Lithuania, Finland, Romania, Hungary, and Latvia.

"Russia cannot win this war," Duda said. "This is the most important thing. We are dealing with brutal Russian imperialism, which is killing people," he said. "And now these imperial teeth are red with the blood of Georgians, with the blood of Ukrainians." He was referring to Russia's 2008 invasion of Georgia and the 2014 and 2022 invasions of Ukraine. "We need to support Ukraine all the time with military technology," Duda said. He believed Russia could not win against the modern weapons in the US and NATO arsenals, but those weapons needed to actually get to Ukrainians on the front lines. Ukraine was facing potentially catastrophic ammunition and weapons shortages. The massive $6.8 billion Ukraine aid package had been stalled in the US Congress for almost 6 months. The Russians were gaining new ground. Trump was calling leaders "suckers" for sending aid to Ukraine. He vetoed every attempt at an aid package, claiming support for Ukraine was a waste of taxpayer dollars, that Ukraine was corrupt, and that Russian victory was inevitable. President Biden was irate that he had to get the package to pass through Mar-a-Lago before it could get through Congress, President Duda said.

The Ukrainians desperately needed long-range ammunition and aircraft to be able to repel Russia. "The Russians had far more troops at their disposal. Ukraine wins whenever it can keep Russians at a distance," he explained. "If there are direct clashes, then such direct clashes are usually won, unfortunately, by the Russians because to Russians, it is not important that 10 Ukrainian soldiers died and 100 Russian soldiers died. For them, it is important that they can win." Russia saw its troops as expendable. "These are not children from Moscow, from St. Petersburg," Duda said. "These are not families from Russian elites. These people come from distant parts of Siberia, from some distant parts of Russia, who are called by Russia, and they are sent to die. Their lives do not cost much to Russia."

I asked Duda if he had spoken to President Putin since the war started in February 2022. "No," he said. "Why not?" "You cannot talk to people who murder others and who behave like bandits." The Polish president had traveled to Ukraine four times to offer support to President Zelensky in Kyiv, including on February 23rd, 2022, just hours before Russia attacked. "Never until the end of my life will I forget the moment when we said goodbye to each other," Duda said. When he told me that we might never see each other again, and I told him that we will do absolutely everything to make sure that they survive. "We, as Poland, but also we as NATO, we as the free world, will not leave Ukraine alone," Duda said and pounded the table.

That evening, April 17th, former President Trump hosted President Duda for a 2.5-hour state dinner at Trump's apartment in Trump Tower, a lavish penthouse awash in 24-karat gold that looks out over Central Park in Manhattan. The former American president was staying in New York City while he attended his criminal trial about the cover-up of hush-money payments to a porn star. Duda's impassioned argument to Trump about the importance of continued US support in Ukraine was the same I had heard earlier that day. According to aides, one aide said, "You could not hear the Polish president's 'save my country' arguments and not be moved and emotionally gripped by his description of the Russian threat, not just to Ukraine, but to Poland, to Europe, and democracies everywhere." Trump had asked Duda a lot of questions: What was Russia's intention with Ukraine? If Russia took Ukraine, was wider war likely? "We are next," Duda told Trump.

Over the next several days, Trump stayed unusually quiet on criticizing aid to Ukraine and this time did not fire up his base with the "America First" arguments. After the dinner with Duda, Trump said on his social media site, Truth Social, "Ukrainian survival and strength should be much more important to Europe than to us, but it is also important to us." Ukraine aid was, for at least a single moment, important.

President Duda had invited then-President Trump to speak in Warsaw on July 6th, 2017, before the monument to the Warsaw Uprising. Former Polish President Lech Wałęsa, who led the Solidarity labor movement that put Poland on the path to freedom from Soviet rule, attended. "We have to remember that our defense," Trump said, "is not just a commitment of money; it is a commitment of will. The fundamental question of our time is whether the West has the will to survive. Poland is in our heart. Just as Poland could not be broken, I declare today for the world to hear that the West will never, ever be broken." The crowd chanted, "Donald Trump! Donald Trump!" "The best speech of his presidency," Senator Lindsey Graham said. "Very much like Ronald Reagan."

President Biden, together with Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Democrat Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, had for months been intensely engaged with House Republican Speaker Mike Johnson on the Ukraine aid package. Johnson was trying to convince Trump to let the bill through. Strong national security had traditionally been the spine of the Republican Party, including the belief that America's national security was bound to global security. But the isolationist "America First" view, which Trump championed, had driven a wedge between Republicans in Congress. Johnson knew that if Trump gave the green light, Republican resistance in Congress would evaporate. Biden directed his team to lay off targeted attacks against Johnson as much as possible and broadly urge Republicans to act. "Stay in close touch with Speaker Johnson." Biden also called in Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes, CIA Director Bill Burns, and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan to secretly brief the House Speaker on the Ukraine intelligence picture and the national security risks of inaction. They provided Johnson with detailed examples of the consequences for Ukraine, Europe, and the free world if Ukraine lost the war and Putin marched on. "If Ukraine does not get aid, it will lose the war with Russia," Sullivan told Johnson. "That was the bottom line." President Biden also met with House and Senate leadership to personally push the same message.

Meanwhile, Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, was also pushing Trump on the Ukraine aid bill to at the very least agree to leave it alone. Graham wanted more support for Ukraine but had himself blocked versions of this Ukraine aid package in the Senate. In April, he pitched to Trump the idea of having part of the aid be in the form of a forgivable loan to Ukraine. "Mr. President," Graham said, "Ukraine's a good investment. Maybe they can pay us back, but you'll never regret helping them. You know, the last guy that did this wound up getting the world in a big war," Graham said, reminding Trump of Hitler in World War II. "Putin's not going to stop. He'll go to Moldova. He'll keep going. He's getting stronger, not weaker," Graham said. "Mr. President, this guy will not stop. If he gets rewarded for this, you can expect more of it, and Taiwan will go, as sure as I'm sitting here." Trump said he believed that weakness breeds aggression. The former president told Graham he was okay with a loan and okay with Speaker Johnson working on a bill that turned some of the aid into a forgivable loan. After multiple conversations with Trump, Johnson told his close aides that it was clear to him that the former president did not see value in funding Ukraine. Trump ultimately changed his tune after Johnson convinced him that the aid package was important to keep unity among the House GOP conference, and Trump, "it's beneficial for all," Johnson argued. Trump saw the benefit to himself and lifted his veto.

On Saturday, April 21st, the US House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly, 312-2, to provide an unprecedented $6.8 billion in aid to Ukraine as part of a $95.3 billion foreign aid bill. Of the $6.8 billion aid to Ukraine, $1 billion took the form of a forgivable loan. As the House voted, Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, age 82, said in a television interview, "It is one of the biggest days in the time that I've been here." "At least on this episode, I think we turned the tables on the isolationists," McConnell said, referring to the "America First" wing of his party. The bill then passed the Senate in a 79-18 vote on April 23rd. "Tonight, a bipartisan majority in the Senate joined the House to answer history's call at this critical inflection point," President Biden said. Biden signed the bill the next day. "In the next few hours, we're going to begin sending in equipment to Ukraine for air defense, munitions for artillery, for rocket systems, and armored vehicles," Biden said. Zelensky confirmed on social media that the package also contained much-needed longer-range ATACMS missiles. If it wasn't already too late for Ukraine, it appeared this could be a turning point.

62. The Israelis were still planning a large-scale military operation in Rafah. Biden warned Netanyahu to carefully consider Israel's next move. "What happened the last two weeks is a game-changer," Biden said in a private, secure phone call. "We just helped defend you with Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and a West Alliance. What you do next will determine whether you nurture this alliance or whether you just fritter it away." The Saudis had just seen a US military alliance take down 100 ballistic missiles. They are eager to get back to talking about a deal with Israel. If Israel charged into Rafah, Netanyahu risked all the progress already made. "You're going to see the whole thing reverse," Biden told Netanyahu. "There's a risk of a break with us. Saudi Arabia won't touch it. There's a risk of a break with Egypt."

For weeks, Jake Sullivan had been pressing the same message with Ron Dermer and Israeli National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi. "Going into Rafah will be a bloody mess," Sullivan said on one video call. "We've got to go into Rafah," Dermer insisted. "It will only take three weeks." Sullivan, always skeptical and disbelieving of Israel's optimistic projections, urged Dermer and Hanegbi to slow down, focus on fixing the humanitarian situation and getting a hostage deal, work with Egypt to control the border with Rafah, go after the Hamas leaders like Sinwar, and put off a ground offensive into Rafah. "We'll think about it," Dermer said.

CIA Director Bill Burns and Brett McGurk were pushing Qatar's Foreign Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani for proof of life of one of the four Israeli-American hostages still held by Hamas. On April 22nd, Hamas sent a video to the White House of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, a 24-year-old who had been at the music festival with friends during the October 7th Hamas attack. He had tried to hide, but someone from Hamas threw a grenade at him. Hersh picked it up to throw it back, and it had blown off part of his left arm. McGurk watched the video of Goldberg pulling a rare emotional glimpse of life in the tunnels. The young man was seated in a chair against a white wall. "Hello, Mom and Dad. I'm here in Gaza almost 200 days. I love you and I am thinking about you every day. I want you to know that I'm okay. I'm alive, but it's not easy here. I think about you every day, and I want to return home, home as fast as I can. I'm thinking about you now, before the holiday. I hope, I hope, I hope, and I know that you're doing everything you guys can to bring me home as fast as possible. I miss you and I want to see you soon. Love you." Hamas later publicly posted the video. Al Thani said this was a sign there was still a chance to get the hostages out.

Two days later, on April 24th, President Biden hosted Abigail Edan, a four-year-old girl who was held hostage by Hamas for 50 days. Hamas militants had entered her family's home on October 7th and shot and killed her mother and father in front of her. Her older siblings, aged 6 and 10, had locked themselves inside a cupboard upstairs and hid for 14 hours. Abigail's father had been shot while shielding Abigail, who crawled out from under his body and went to a neighbor's house. Later that day, Hamas took her hostage. With that family of five now, Abigail crawled around the Resolute Desk, playing with her sister and brother in the Oval Office. The three children were now living with their aunt and uncle in Tel Aviv. Biden gave the family a tour out on the White House lawn. Brett McGurk was pushing the 4-year-old Abigail on a swing.

63. "I think it is very hard to argue that he has not been weakened," Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes reported about Russia's President Putin in May 2024. "That does not make him less dangerous," Haynes, age 54, the first woman to serve as America's top spy, overseeing all US intelligence agencies, warned that no one should be complacent about Russia. "Hundreds of billions of dollars spent in this war," Haynes said, "more casualties than we've seen since World War II, over 300,000. We've set back their ground forces by years." Haynes said that Ukrainian forces, through sheer blood and guts, backed by the US and European countries, had forced Putin to place Russia's economy on a war footing and redouble investment in their defense industry. "It's incredible to our military analysts what he's willing to lose in terms of people and equipment on the front lines for what he gains in territory."

Before Russia's invasion, Putin had argued for a long time that overspending on defense was one of the great mistakes of the Soviet Union; it had destroyed Russia's economy. "Now he's basically making that same move," Haynes said with bewilderment. "It is pretty extraordinary to watch." And while they're managing better than we thought with respect to sanctions, Haynes noted, "there are critical fractures in their economy." According to Delip Singh, Deputy National Security Adviser for International Economics, who was the architect of many of the sanctions against Russia, the real squeeze was still to come. "Nosebleed inflation and interest rates will inevitably choke off Russia's growth," Singh said. "Less capital, less technology, and less talent implies a smaller, weaker, less productive Russian economy for a generation to come." Putin was also having to source.

Weapons and munitions from other countries like China, North Korea, and Iran to resupply his front lines. They're trying to reconstitute.

Hay said, "A lot of what we do is tracking all of that, trying to identify key opportunities to block." This was the shadow war of economics, technology, and intelligence where the United States could directly confront and weaken Russia with far less risk of catastrophic miscalculation. And yet, it was not without peril.

"Between the United States and Russia, we have over 90% of the world's nuclear weapons," Hayes said. "You do not want a country that has got that kind of a stockpile of nuclear weapons to feel as if it's slipping. As you push states that have stockpiles to the brink, you raise the risk that they end up using it."

Hayne said this was at the core of the dilemma President Biden and his principles faced in the Ukraine war. The more mistakes Russia made, the more Putin overreached, the more the war cost Russia's economy, its military, the more Putin appeared willing to sacrifice. President Biden had told his advisers, "Never put a man in a corner where his only way out is through you. You've got to give him another way out."

But Putin had climbed so far up the tree in pursuit of his vision to be the modern Czar, the savior of Russia as a great power. It was very difficult to see how he could climb down. "He can be weaker and at the same time even more dangerous as a result of the fact he has less to lose," Haynes warned.

Putin's autobiography, *First Person*, dictated to three Russian journalists in 2000, is an authoritative look inside the Russian president's mind. "I think that there are always a lot of mistakes made in war. That's inevitable," Putin told the journalists. "But when you are fighting, if you keep thinking that everybody around you is always making mistakes, you'll never win. You have to take a pragmatic attitude and you have to keep thinking of victory. A dog senses when somebody is afraid of it and bites. The same applies here. If you become jittery, they will think that they are stronger. Only one thing works in such circumstances: to go on the offensive. You must hit first and hit so hard that your opponent will not rise to his feet."

"Hey, tell me if I get convicted, it'll be even better for me in the election," Trump said on the phone to his former lawyer Tim Paratore in the midst of his hush-money trial in New York. "But Tim, Trump said, 'I don't want to get convicted.'"

Trump had been criminally charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal a hush-money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 presidential election. The trial had begun on April 15th, 2024. Paratore, who had represented Trump for over a year on the Justice Department's January 6th and Mar-a-Lago documents investigations, believed Trump's campaign was now driving decision-making in the Manhattan courtroom. It was one of the reasons he had quit being Trump's attorney back in May 2023.

"I had no problems with Trump. The reason I left him was because he surrounds himself with the wrong people," Paratore said, those who cared more about the 24/7 news cycle than the best interests of their client. Trump's comment grated at Paratore.

"This trial was a case in point. He thought hush-money payments to Stormy Daniels in and of itself is not illegal," Paratore explained to Trump. "It's unseemly, but it's not illegal. Your problem here is that Michael Cohen doesn't know how to run an invoice."

Paratore said, "There's no law that says how specific the line items on an invoice should be, as long as they are sufficient for you to understand what you're paying for." Michael Cohen was Trump's former fixer and a key witness against Trump in the trial.

"Let me tell you how a real lawyer would have invoiced you," Paratore said. "I could have written on it: $130,000 expense reimbursement, $220,000 expense reimbursement, $30,000 fee, and your entire invoice would have been $180,000. Nobody could have claimed it was a false business record, and you wouldn't be going through any of this. There's no business falsification with that."

"Are you kidding me?" Trump said furiously. "I could have paid $180,000 instead of $420,000?"

"Yes, Mr. President," Paratore said. "I can put fees and expenses on the same invoice. And the way that my accountant handles that is the fees are considered income, the expense reimbursements are not."

"Holy..." Trump said on May 30th, 2024. Trump was convicted by a unanimous jury in Manhattan of all 34 counts of falsification of business records, becoming the first former U.S. president to be a convicted felon. Trump and his campaign immediately attacked the trial judge, Merchan, President Biden, and Democrats.

"This was a rigged, disgraceful trial," Trump declared after leaving the courtroom. "The real verdict is going to be November 5th, by the people."

Paratore waved off the rhetoric. He had firsthand experience with New York State Judge Juan Merchan and thought he did an excellent job presiding over Trump's trial. The former president's problem was not the legal system, Paratore believed; it was poor decisions during lawyer selection.

"It's more politically advantageous to say, 'Oh, this is all Alvin Bragg and the DNC and, you know, this is Biden and all that kind of stuff,' than to look inward and say, 'I got convicted because I hired the wrong lawyers,'" Patori said. Alvin Bragg was the New York district attorney who prosecuted the case against Trump.

Pator pointed to Todd Blanche, Trump's lawyer in the criminal case, who, following the verdict, said publicly that they had expected a conviction. "It's clear to me he had no plan to win," Parator said.

In the 24 hours after the verdict, Trump's conviction raised more than $50 million for his presidential campaign. "I'm a very innocent man," Trump said in a statement. "And it's okay. I'm fighting for our country. I'm fighting for our Constitution. Our whole country is being rigged right now."

"To hear trying to destroy a presidency," Hunter Biden said in a December 2023 interview about Republican efforts to obsessively go after him, rehashing and re-hyping his struggle with alcohol and crack cocaine addiction. "They're trying to kill me, knowing it would be a pain greater than my father could be able to handle."

According to one of President Biden's closest associates, the Republican attacks on Hunter were eating the president alive with anguish. He called to check in with Hunter almost every day. "Hey son, how you doing, buddy?" President Biden asked him on one such call. "Are you hanging in there? Are you doing okay?"

Hunter Biden, 54, was at the center of two high-visibility criminal trials over the summer and fall of 2024. Hunter had pleaded not guilty to criminal charges of lying about his drug use when he purchased and possessed a firearm, a violation of federal law. His trial began in Delaware in June. A second trial involving tax charges was scheduled for September, a month before the election.

"The bond between Hunter and his father was real and lasting," another close associate said. The president had lost his first wife and daughter to a car accident and later lost his elder son, Beau, to a brain tumor. The Republicans' relentless public campaign against Hunter was often having a more profound impact on the president than political and policy issues.

"I think Joe's biggest worry, and I would say Jill's biggest worry, isn't just the criminal indictments or the laptop ridiculousness or the hearings from the oversight committee. I think it's trying to make sure that Hunter's mental health and his physical health stays to a point where he can actually move forward in his life when this is all over," the associate said.

Hunter feels like he is trapped, the friend said of Hunter's struggle to escape his past, like there was no path back to a stable life. "He's literally, and I think he sort of knows it."

President Biden privately voiced fury at his Attorney General Merrick Garland, who had appointed a special counsel to investigate Hunter. "Should never have picked Garland," President Biden told an associate. But his inner circle had pushed hard for Garland's appointment. President Biden had pledged publicly to keep his hands off the Justice Department's investigation of Hunter. On occasion, he checked in with Hunter's lawyer, Abbe Lowell, and thanked him for representing his son.

"Let me talk to Abby," Biden said to Hunter, taking his phone to speak to Lowell in December 2022. "I love what you are doing. Keep doing it. Keep doing it."

Tensions were rife between the White House lawyers and Hunter's legal team. The White House lawyers wanted Hunter to stay quiet and keep his head down publicly, let the adjudication happen in court. His dad's communications team wanted Hunter just to go away.

"Hunter was focused on surviving right now," an associate said. "He is absolutely committed to not only never again falling to his addictions, but he wants a normal life, and I think that's why he's fighting so hard," the associate said about the trials.

In his memoir, *Beautiful Things*, Hunter recounts the story of his addiction with crack cocaine: the highs and lows, the chaos, temptation, and depravity. "Cooking crack took practice, but it wasn't rocket science," Hunter said in chapter 7, entitled "Cracked." "I experienced what's called a bell ringer, crack's holy grail. The sensation is one of utter, almost otherworldly well-being. I chased that high on and off for the next 3 years," he said, 2017 to 2020.

Hunter and his wife, Melissa Cohen, had a young son, Beau Biden Jr., who they called Bowie for short, named after Hunter's late brother, Beau. President Biden, guilt-ridden over the constant, years-long Republican attacks on Hunter, told his close associate, "That's all on me. None of this would be happening to Hunter if I weren't president. This is never going to go away."

Hunter was convicted on all three federal felony gun charges on June 11, 2024. President Biden said, "I will accept the outcome of this case and will continue to respect the judicial process as Hunter considers an appeal. Setting himself apart from Trump, Jill and I will always be there for Hunter and the rest of our family with love and support. Nothing will ever change that."

Secrets always exist, and often the secrets have immense weight, especially in human relations. What do the main characters really think of each other? What is going on behind the scenes that others might not notice nor imagine? What might be the driving forces that are not articulated or visible?

President Biden's frustrations and distrust of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu had been building for years and in the spring of 2024 finally erupted. "That son of a b****, Netanyahu. He's a bad guy. He's a bad guy," President Biden declared privately to one of his closest associates. "A bad guy. He doesn't give a s*** about Hamas. He gives a s*** only about himself."

The president was preoccupied with bitterness and distrust of Netanyahu, who he said had been lying to him regularly. Netanyahu was destroying the entire region of Gaza, pounding one of the most densely populated places on Earth with an estimated 45,000 bombs. Almost half (47%) of Gaza's population of 2.2 million were children under the age of 18. Hundreds of the bombs dropped on Gaza had been the massive 2,000-pounders. The carnage resembled some of the worst bombing during World War II.

Netanyahu was continuing to say he was going to kill every last member of Hamas. Biden had told him that was impossible, threatening both privately and publicly to withhold offensive U.S. weapons shipments to Israel. Netanyahu promised Biden that Israel would change strategy and pursue Hamas with more carefully targeted and sophisticated operations. They would replicate the more systematic and patient year-long hunt to eliminate the Black September Palestinian militants who killed 11 Israeli Olympic team members in Munich, 1972. "No more battalions going in, firing rockets and artillery without strategy. No more dropping huge bombs on urban areas." But Netanyahu continued to issue precisely those orders.

Before October 7th, Netanyahu's political leadership was in tatters. He faced criminal charges of fraud and bribery that had been delayed multiple times, and he was widely criticized for pushing legal and judicial reforms that weakened the independence of Israel's Judiciary. Netanyahu was close to being ousted as prime minister, but after the large-scale October 7th Hamas attack on his watch, Netanyahu pushed aside questions of Israel's catastrophic intelligence and security failures and resurrected himself as a strong wartime leader. Israel had rallied around their prime minister.

"Ongoing war shielded Netanyahu," President Biden told a friend. "That Netanyahu was now working hard to save himself politically and stay out of jail." Biden was amazed that "Bibi's leadership had lasted. Why hasn't there been an internal revolt?" Biden said. "A strong internal revolt about just voting Bibi out of office, somehow, someway, just get him out of there."

President Biden complained bitterly that Netanyahu had spent no time on a plan for Gaza and the region after the war ends. He knew this because of multiple secure calls with Netanyahu and several meetings Blinken had reported back on over the last six months. The White House would issue brief readouts of the Biden-Netanyahu phone calls to the media, suggesting they were fruitful, cordial, and productive.

"I think he is somebody that believes that he is, first of all, the savior for Israel," DNI Avril Haynes said about Netanyahu. "Secondly, he does not want to lose his legacy on what he's done thus far and does not want to be remembered, remembered as the Prime Minister for October 7th. His politics are definitely, in my view, factoring into his decision-making at this point," Haynes reported.

Biden had pushed Netanyahu in the immediate aftermath of October 7th not to conduct a ground invasion into Gaza. Israel plowed ahead anyway. Biden pressured Netanyahu to allow sustained humanitarian aid into Gaza, but Israel's military blitz made delivering the aid almost impossible. The humanitarian catastrophe continued to escalate in Gaza. Secretary of State Blinken had been working almost 24/7 for months. He was exhausted, emotionally and physically drained by Netanyahu's dealings and maneuvering.

Biden warned Netanyahu not to conduct a military offensive in Rafah. Netanyahu delayed, debated, produced a plan to move civilians out of harm's way, but ultimately Netanyahu sent Israel's military in. "He's a liar," Biden said privately of Netanyahu. "18 out of 19 people who work for him are liars." Biden believed if he were to firmly and publicly break with Netanyahu, it would risk Israel's security, something he was not prepared to do. After October 7th, Iran and Hezbollah were watching.

Netanyahu expanded Israel's military assault and in late May was forced to apologize after a ground attack in the south, near the heavily populated Rafah Crossing, killed dozens of civilians in tent camps. He called it a "tragic accident." U.S.-made munitions were used by Israel in the deadly strike. Israel had designated the area as a safe zone. By the end of May 2024, at least 35,000 people had been killed in Gaza.

Benny Gantz, a key official in the war cabinet and Netanyahu's top political rival, resigned from Israel's emergency government on June 9th, leaving the Prime Minister more dependent on far-right members of his coalition. "Unfortunately, Mr. Netanyahu is preventing us from achieving true victory, which is the justification for the painful ongoing crisis," Gantz said. He called on Netanyahu to set a date for Israel's elections. Polling showed that Gantz would beat Netanyahu.

"The October 7th Hamas attack on Israel was the most colossal intelligence and operational failure in the history of the state of Israel," Sullivan said. "Israeli intelligence should have known about it. Even if they didn't know about it before it happened, they should have stopped it. It was not the Wehrmacht," he added, referring to the German Armed Forces. "It was a couple thousand guys in tennis shoes coming across open land."

The war in Gaza had done very little to rebuild the reputation of the Israeli Defense Forces. In June, Israel's military rescued four more hostages held by Hamas in Gaza but killed at least 274 Palestinians in the rescue operation. Hundreds more were wounded. Israel blamed Hamas for surrounding the hostages with civilians in Jabalia, a densely populated refugee camp.

President Biden had successfully deterred wider Middle East war for now but failed to rein in Israel's government to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza. He would not alter U.S. policy toward Israel and continued to provide billions of dollars in military aid to Netanyahu. Biden was walking a rapidly fraying tightrope with Israel.

In the political war for the presidency, violence was also a top concern for many Americans in the lead-up to the 2024 election. "If there's a terrorist attack on the Homeland, game, set, match, for Biden," Senator Lindsey Graham told others with worry. "Trump wins. That's a real vulnerability. We all remember 9/11. Biden has got problems at the border. He's got a world that's very fragile that can spill over and hurt us here at home."

Trump was using the southern border crisis as the centerpiece of his fear campaign. "A lot of people coming in from Iran, a lot of people coming from China, a lot of people coming from Russia. It's interesting," Trump said at a rally in South Carolina on February 10th, 2024. "They're almost all men, 18 to 25. That means fighting age. That's fighting age. So they have something planned, and we're not going to stand for it. They are destroying our country."

"This group of fascists," Trump said, referring to the Biden administration, "they're destroying our country."

"Trump is becoming more erratic," Graham observed. "These court cases, I think they would rattle anybody." Trump's language was becoming more violent and aggressive, pledging payback against those investigating and prosecuting him like Alvin Bragg and Jack Smith, and former officials who spoke out against him. It was shaping up to be one of the most perilous, unpredictable runs to an election in American history.

"Biden has lost control of his fate," Graham said. "His fate is sort of in the hands of fate. A single event could change the election. It's the strangest election cycle I've ever seen," Graham added. "But what I'm telling people, you're worried about November, I'm worried about tomorrow morning. I'm worried about getting hit."

"You're number one on our target list," a man sneered, putting his face several inches from former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Mark Milley at a public event in the spring of 2024. "I don't have time for this," Milley replied and walked away. This was not the first threat he had received, nor would it be the last.

Milley had retired as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs at the end of September 2023. Media coverage had recognized Milley's efforts to protect the Constitutional order of the United States during Trump's final year in office. Incensed by the coverage, former President Trump cited a back-channel phone call Milley had made to General Li Zuocheng, his Chinese counterpart, two days after the January 6th insurrection at the Capitol.

I reported on this call in my book *Peril* with Robert Costa. "Things may look unsteady," Milley said, reassuring General Li that the U.S. was stable and not collapsing. "We are 100% steady. Everything's fine." Milley also testified under oath to Congress that the call was to assure the Chinese, "We are not going to attack you," and reinforce stability in a moment of extraordinary instability in the United States.

But Trump referred to Milley's call as "an act so egregious that in times gone by the punishment would have been death." A war between China and the United States could have been the result of this "treasonous act."

Since retiring, Milley had received a nonstop barrage of death threats that he, at least in part, attributed to Trump's repeated aggressive attempts to discredit him. "He is inciting people to violence with violent rhetoric," Millie told his wife. "But he does it in such a way, it's through the power of suggestion, which is exactly what he did on the 6th of January."

As a former Chairman, Milley was provided round-the-clock government security for two years, but he had taken additional precautions at significant personal expense, installing bulletproof glass and blast-proof curtains at his home.

"I will order them back to active duty and then I will court-martial them," Trump yelled in the Oval Office back in 2020, the last year of his presidency. Then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mark Milley and Secretary of Defense Mark Esper had been in the Oval Office and looked at President Trump in shock. Two retired four-star military officers were making searing personal criticisms of Trump in the press.

"They're so disloyal!" Trump shouted. The first retired officer making the comments was Navy Admiral William McRaven, who was the U.S. Special Operations commander who oversaw the raid that killed Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden a decade earlier. In an op-ed in The Washington Post in February 2020, McRaven said, "As Americans, we should be frightened, deeply afraid for the future of the nation. When good men and women can't speak the truth, when facts are inconvenient, when integrity and character no longer matter, when presidential ego and self-preservation are more important than national security, then there is nothing left to stop the triumph of evil." In an earlier piece published in The New York Times, McRaven said, "It is time for a new person in the Oval Office. Republican, Democrat, independent, the sooner the better. The fate of our Republic depends on it."

The second high-profile Trump critic was retired General Stanley McChrystal, who had commanded U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan a decade earlier. McChrystal had recently appeared on CNN and called Trump "immoral and dishonest." Trump was furious. Here were four-star ghosts from the distant past who had served under both Republican and Democrat presidents, reemerging to hammer Trump.

Trump never liked to leave criticism unanswered; he wanted payback. As Commander-in-Chief, Trump had extraordinary power over retired commissioned officers. It was within his authority to recall them to active duty and court-martial them, but it had only been done a few times in American history and for very serious crimes. For instance, when a retired two-star was charged in 2017 with six counts of raping a minor while on active duty in the 1980s.

Milley and Esper advised Trump not to pursue that route. Taking such aggressive action against distinguished officers would backfire on him. McRaven and McChrystal, by tradition and by law, had a right to voice their opinion. Recalling them would be historically unprecedented and only draw attention to their comments about Trump. The president didn't want to hear it.

"Mr. President," Milley said, "I'm the senior military officer responsible for the good order and discipline of general officers, and I'll take care of this."

"Trump's head whipped around. 'You really will?' he asked skeptically."

"Absolutely," Milley assured him.

"Okay, you take care of it," President Trump said. Milley then personally called McRaven and McChrystal and warned them what Trump was talking about doing. "It was time for them to step off the public stage. Dial it back," Milley said. If Trump actually used his authority to recall them to duty, there was little Milley could do.

In June 2024, Milley was concerned that if reelected, Trump could try again this time to recall him and other retired commissioned officers to court-martial them for disloyalty. "He is a walking, talking advertisement of what he's going to try to do," Millie warned former colleagues. "He's saying it, and it's not just him, it's the people around him. We're going to hold him accountable." Steve Bannon, the outspoken Trump loyalist and former Chief Strategist, said about Milley on his podcast *War Room*. Bannon, who had been convicted of contempt of Congress for defying subpoenas from the House January 6th Committee, was about to begin a four-month prison sentence.