Hi, I'm Orman Alney here with To the Point.

Before we get to President Trump and his generals, I want to take note.

The day we recorded this broadcast, Greta Tunberg, was named Times Person of the Year for 2019.

Now, you know, of course, she is a Swedish teenager publicly mocked by President's Trump

and Putin, now recognized by time as a leader of her generation, end quote, a reminder that the

people in charge now will not be in charge forever. What's called the Greta Effect includes our climate change updates on To the Point.

We want to know how you'll like them.

But in the spirit of Greta Toonberg, we'll continue them.

Whatever you have to say.

Now to America's current commander-in-chief and his failed romance with the nation's top military leaders. That's the subject of the latest

book by Peter Bergen. He's with CNN, the New America Foundation, and Arizona State University,

and Peter, great to have you back on our program. Thank you, Warren. The book is Trump and his

generals, The Cost of Chaos. That's a very editorial subtitle, it seems to me. What's the thesis of this book?

Well, President Trump was the first president in American history who had neither served in the military

nor served in public office. And when he came in, he didn't know much about the world.

He, part of the pool of people that he could have chosen to be part of his war cabinet

was much, much smaller because so many senior Republican national security figures

had signed on to these never-Trump letters, which basically wrote them out of getting a job. And so he fell back on the

military. And the military, of course, generally speaking, doesn't take political positions.

Serving military officers certainly wouldn't have signed never Trump letter. And even retired military

officers like Jim Mattis and John Kelly wouldn't have signed these letters because of the kind

of general view that the military should stay out of politics.

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