Mattis has repeatedly made clear that diplomacy – backed by a credible military option – is the only way to prevent the North Korea crisis from escalating into a potentially devastating conflict.
When asked about Mattis’ comments on Wednesday, chief Pentagon spokesperson Dana White said: “Secretary Mattis provides the President with his best advice. It is the President who makes the ultimate decisions.”
Leon Panetta, who served as defense secretary and CIA director under former Democratic President Barack Obama, said the airing of differences inside the Trump administration had its roots in the president’s habit of sharing his opinions in Twitter posts.
“I think the problem is that they (advisers) are now dealing with a president who tweets his thoughts to the country,” said Panetta, who has said he had his own policy differences with Obama.
“He’s not the kind of individual who sits down with his national security team and tries to work these issues out in a policy process that is confined to the White House.”
Earlier this month, a video posted on social media showed Mattis telling U.S. troops that the United States has problems that its military does not have. “You just hold the line until our country gets back to understanding and respecting each other and showing it,” he said.
The impromptu speech, believed to have been made during an Aug. 21 visit to Jordan, came after the violence in Charlottesville in which a woman was killed and many people were injured.
Cohn clearly distanced himself from Trump’s comments on the violence, and officials said he considered resigning.
“Citizens standing up for equality and freedom can never be equated with white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and the KKK (Ku Klux Klan),” he said in an interview with the Financial Times on Aug. 25.
Jennifer Lawless, a professor of government at American University, said it was significant that several of Trump’s advisers distanced themselves from Trump’s comments on Charlottesville.
“That makes it very difficult for him” to retaliate against individual advisers, she said. “You can’t go after every single member of your Cabinet. That makes it look like maybe you’ve made wrong choices.”