Most of all, Trump was furious that the charges created so much bad publicity for himself, a sort of guilt by association. The president urged his lawyers to point out publicly that the charges had no connection to him or his campaign.
“Why don’t the papers report that?” Trump groused. “This was when he worked for President Reagan!” He added, “I barely knew him. I need you to tell the press that.”
Trump’s advisers had seen him fall into this pit before. He couldn’t sit still and ride out the storm. He always wanted to be on offense. Cobb had to explain to him that the White House should never say anything about Manafort.
“Nothing Manafort’s charged with involves the White House and it’s very defensive,” Cobb said. “It suggests some anxiety about Manafort.”
Trump often raised his voice at other aides but not to Cobb. He seemed to respect Cobb’s calm, matter-of-fact tone. He slumped in his chair and complied with his lawyer’s advice. Cobb reminded Trump and his political advisers that Manafort’s lawyers had already addressed the media from the federal courthouse steps and made clear Manafort had no unflattering information about Trump to share with prosecutors.
“You should just let that be the record rather than muddying the record,” Cobb told him.
That was welcome news to Trump. But unbeknownst to the president, Mueller was working to secure another cooperating witness. The special counsel’s team would next move in to talk to Trump’s former national security adviser.
Eleven
WINGING IT
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson worked to advance the U.S. relationship with India throughout the first year of the Trump administration. The South Asian republic, the world’s most populous democracy and one of its fastest-growing economies, was a natural ally to the United States. Tillerson felt strongly that America needed to fortify its alliances and block rivals, chief among them China, from taking advantage of any gaps or friction between the United States and its strategic partners. To that end, he believed that if the United States strengthened its transpacific alliance with India, Japan, and Australia, with open trade and shipping routes, it could keep China at bay.
In October 2017, Tillerson telegraphed the administration’s hopes for the region and India in a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and then jetted to New Delhi to discuss the alliance in person with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Tillerson was immediately impressed by Modi. The prime minister was a serious person, an experienced deal maker who was motivated by the prospects of a strategic partnership with the United States. Modi was candid with Tillerson about his challenges. He was operating in a tough neighborhood. On one border was Pakistan, India’s greatest threat, and on another was China, which had been trying to partner with Pakistan. To the north was Afghanistan, which was ravaged by war, highly unstable, and vulnerable to Russia and other countries. As he considered allies for India, Modi had options. He was inclined to deal with the United States, but if things ever went sour, Russia was knocking on his door.
The second week of November, President Trump took his first trip to Asia, a five-country, ten-day journey that concluded in the Philippines, where he attended a global summit of leaders. On November 13, Trump sat down with Modi in Manila on the sidelines of the summit. Tillerson had high hopes for the meeting—even though, back at the White House, Trump was known to have affected an Indian accent to imitate Modi, a sign of disrespect for the prime minister.
As with most of his foreign leader meetings, Trump had been briefed but didn’t appear to have retained the material and instead tried to wing it. He took a hard right turn into a nitpicky complaint about trade imbalances. Modi tried to refocus on the threats India faced from Afghanistan, China, and Pakistan. His mention of Afghanistan led Trump off into a lengthy tangent about how stupid it had been for the United States to maintain its military presence in Afghanistan for so many years. When Modi mentioned his concern about China’s ambitions and aggression in the region, Trump revealed a stunning ignorance about geography.
“It’s not like you’ve got China on your border,” Trump said, seeming to dismiss the threat to India.
Modi’s eyes bulged out in surprise. Aides noticed him giving a sidelong glance at Tillerson, who accompanied Trump as part of the U.S. delegation. The Indian prime minister considered Tillerson among the best-versed Americans on the region’s security challenges, and together they had been plotting a new partnership. Tillerson’s eyes flashed open wide at Trump’s comment, but he quickly put his hand to his brow, appearing to the Indian delegation to attempt not to offend the president as well as to signal to Modi that he knew this statement was nuts.
Trump did not appear to notice their silent exchange. He just kept rolling, droning on about unrelated topics. Modi tried to keep the conversation on an elevated plane, hoping to follow the path Tillerson had laid out for them in the previous weeks to work together to protect India and fend off China’s Belt and Road Initiative. But each time Modi tried to get Trump to engage on the substance of U.S.-India relations, the American president veered off on another non sequitur about trade deficits and the endless war in Afghanistan. Those who witnessed the meeting that day in Manila were disheartened. Modi’s expression gradually shifted, from shock and concern to resignation.
“I think he left that meeting and said, ‘This is not a serious man. I cannot count on this man as a partner,’” one Trump aide recalled. After that meeting, “the Indians took a step back” in their diplomatic relations with the United States.
The meeting with Modi was a major setback not only for U.S.-India relations but also for the administration’s hopes of checkmating China in the region. The meeting came at a time when Tillerson’s influence with Trump was growing simply because the president had tired of others in his orbit. In preparation for the Asia trip, John Kelly asked Tillerson if he could add another duty to his already-full portfolio: Could he give Trump his national security briefings on the road?
This request was odd. Briefing the president was normally the responsibility of the national security adviser. Tillerson asked Kelly why.
“He doesn’t want to see McMaster,” Kelly responded.
The signs of Trump’s fraying patience for H. R. McMaster had been painfully obvious throughout the fall. McMaster’s loyal staff hated to admit it, but they knew this relationship was no longer working.
A military intellectual and policy maestro, McMaster was widely respected in Washington’s foreign policy establishment and on Capitol Hill, but he did not easily fit into Trump’s orbit. This much was evident right away. In his first town-hall meeting of the National Security Council staff after being appointed in February 2017, McMaster emphasized that as a nonpartisan army officer he did not vote. He wanted the professional staff to know that he valued their input, but his admonition about voting unwittingly sent a message to Trump, who demanded political loyalty from everyone in his administration.