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Stevenson’s army, September 27

This looks to me like an excellent case study of the interagency process, where the “deep state” of career professionals shares concerns about unsettling behaviors and someone develops a formal “medical log” like the one for Captain Queeg in the Caine Mutiny.

The whistleblower, identified as a CIA person assigned to the White House by NYT, was probably part of an interagency working group on Ukraine. They probably met regularly in NSC offices and discussed various matters. “What is Giuliani doing in this?” “What do we tell Kyiv about their request for a meeting?” “How do we follow up on the president’s phone call?” “I was really troubled by that.” “Did you see what they did with the MemCon?” “Where do we stand on the aid?” “Why did they recall the ambassador?”

NYT’s Peter Baker got more details and confirmation of the whistleblower’s narrative.
Giuliani made his case to the WSJ.
NYT has more on the US ambassador.
Amy Zegart defends the process.
Although the congressional focus has been on Trump’s seeking political ammunition against Biden, some lawyers note that his “favor” request came just after Zelensky mentioned buying Javelin antitank missiles, perhaps raising other legal questions.
BTW, Chairman Schiff has indicated his members may need to return to DC before the end of the recess.

Despite the looming impeachment fight, the committee trying to find ways to “modernize” the Congress and make it more collegial offered some suggestions yesterday.

My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. If you want to get it directly, To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).