Washington: US President-elect Donald Trump confirmed on Thursday he had chosen James Mattis, a hard-charging retired general who led a Marine division to Baghdad during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, to serve as his secretary of defence.
Trump made the announcement at a rally in Cincinnati, saying "We are going to appoint 'Mad Dog' Mattis as our secretary of defence" and calling Mattis "the closest thing we have to General George Patton".
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Trump to name Mattis as secretary of defence
US President-elect Donald Trump holds a rally in Cincinnati as part of his "USA Thank You Tour 2016" and gives up a "little secret" that he will name James Mattis as his secretary of defence.
Mattis, 66, led the US Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East and Southwest Asia, from 2010 to 2013. His tour there was cut short by the Obama administration, which believed that he was too hawkish on Iran.
But his insistence that Iran is the greatest threat to peace in the Middle East, as well as his acerbic criticism of President Barack Obama's initial efforts to combat the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, made him an attractive choice for the incoming president.
After retiring from the military, Mattis told Congress that the administration's "policy of disengagement in the Middle East" had contributed to the rise of extremism in the region. The US, he told lawmakers in 2015, needs to "come out from our reactive crouch and take a firm, strategic stance in defense of our values".
But in some important policy areas, Mattis differs from Trump, who last week began filling the top ranks of his national security team with hard-liners.
Mattis believes, for instance, that Trump's conciliatory statements toward Russia are ill informed. Mattis views with alarm Moscow's expansionist or bellicose policies in Syria, Ukraine and the Baltics. And he has told the president-elect that torture does not work.
Despite his tough stance on Iran, Mattis also thinks that tearing up the Iran nuclear deal would hurt the United States, and he favours working closely with allies to strictly enforce its terms.
![Then Marine General James Mattis testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington in 2013.](/web/20161204094326im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/2/r/e/u/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gt2qm2.png/1480679745905.jpg)
After Trump met with Mattis at Trump National Golf Club in New Jersey on November 19, the president-elect said on Twitter that he was "very impressive" and "a true general's general".
On Thursday, Trump surprised the Cincinnati crowd with the announcement, saying: "I gave up a little secret." He added that he would formally announce Mattis' appointment on Monday. His aids had earlier denied the reports in US media.
![Still campaigning: US President-elect Donald Trump in Cincinnati, Ohio, on Thursday.](/web/20161204094326im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/2/r/f/q/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gt2qm2.png/1480798254158.jpg)
Mattis, whose radio call sign during the invasion of Iraq was Chaos - reflecting the havoc he sought to rain on adversaries - has been involved in some of the United States' best-known operations. As a one-star general, he led the first Marine force into Afghanistan a month after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and established Forward Operating Base Rhino near Kandahar.
At times, Mattis' salty language has gotten him into trouble. "You go into Afghanistan, you got guys that slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil," he said in 2005. "So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them".
![James Mattis speaks to embedded journalists at Camp Matilda in the Kuwaiti desert south of Iraq in 2003.](/web/20161204094326im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/2/r/m/d/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gt2qm2.png/1480679745905.jpg)
But the retired general, a lifelong bachelor who has said that he does not own a television and has often been referred to a "warrior monk", is also famous for his extensive collection of books on military history. "Thanks to my reading, I have never been caught flat-footed by any situation," he wrote to a colleague in 2003. "It doesn't give me all the answers, but it lights what is often a dark path ahead."
Mattis is also known as "mad dog" and is renowned for his tough talk.
He would be the first former ranking general to assume the post of defence secretary since George Marshall in 1950-51. He would need a special congressional waiver to serve as he retired from the Marines in 2013, and federal law stipulates that the Pentagon chief be out of uniform for seven years.
But Mattis has strong support in Congress, especially from Republican Senator John McCain, who is chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. In a recent phone call, McCain urged Trump to consider appointing Mattis or General Jack Keane, a retired Army vice chief of staff, as defence secretary. But Keane has decided against returning to government in a full-time capacity.
McCain said in a statement that Mattis was "without a doubt one of the finest military officers of his generation and an extraordinary leader who inspires a rare and special admiration of his troops." He added, "America will be fortunate to have General Mattis in its service once again."
But Democrat Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, also a member of the Armed Services Committee, said that while she respected Mattis' service, she would oppose a waiver to allow him to serve. "Civilian control of our military is a fundamental principle of American democracy," she said in a statement.
The selection of Mattis is a boost for the Marines. If confirmed by the Senate, he would be working with Joseph Dunford, the four-star Marine general who is the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It would also create an unusual situation at the Pentagon because the new defence secretary would be Dunford's former commanding officer. During the Iraq invasion, Dunford was a colonel who led a Marine regiment that reported to Mattis.
Mattis led the 1st Marine Division during the 2003 invasion to topple Saddam Hussein. He later commanded US troops during the hard-fought battle to retake Fallujah from Sunni insurgents in 2004. As head of the Central Command, Mattis was heavily involved in plans to counter Iran's military and protect the sea lanes in the Persian Gulf.
William Kristol, editor of the conservative magazine The Weekly Standard and a staunch opponent of Trump's, sought to persuade Mattis to mount an independent presidential bid. And he was courted by both the campaigns of Trump and Hillary Clinton to speak at the political conventions, but declined.
In a new book, Warriors and Citizens - which Mattis edited with Kori Schake, a Hoover Institution fellow who served in the George W. Bush administration - he complained that politicians had relied too much on military commanders to make the case for their policies.
"President Bush left to General David Petraeus the task of overcoming congressional opposition to the 2006 Iraq surge," Mattis and Schake wrote. "President Obama has been mostly silent on the war in Afghanistan since 2009; the case for continuing American troop presence has been made entirely by the military."
Military commanders, they wrote, have a responsibility to carry out and advocate the president's policies. "This does not remove elected officials from the responsibility to win political arguments instead of depending on the military to do so," they added.
New York Times
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