(JustPatriots.com)- Last week, the Central Intelligence Agency released a new chapter to its free publication “Getting to Know the President” which is a highly critical account of what it was like to brief candidate and President-elect Donald J. Trump.
The new chapter titled “Chapter 9: Donald J. Trump – a Unique Challenge” is the latest update to the book authored by retired intelligence officer John L. Helgerson. In the chapter, Trump’s transition is described as the most difficult since Richard Nixon.
The chapter does concede that Hillary Clinton and the DNC poisoned the relationship between President-elect Trump and the intelligence community with their garbage dossier. It also described Trump as a serious and engaged consumer of intelligence during his intelligence briefings.
In the introduction to Chapter 9, Helgerson portrays the intelligence community as being “caught up in partisan political disputes” as if the intelligence community itself wasn’t an active participant in these partisan political disputes.
The chapter portrays Trump as combative toward the intelligence community, claiming that his “uniquely rough way of dealing” with the IC made it a struggle to conduct briefings with him. Helgerson claims Trump was harder to work with than Richard Nixon because he was “suspicious and insecure about the intelligence process.”
Gosh, wonder why.
Unlike Richard Nixon who shut out the intelligence community, Helgerson explains Trump engaged with the IC, “but attacked it publicly.”
Again, is it any wonder?
“Getting to Know the President” was first published in 1996. Since then, Helgerson has updated the book to include each additional President. Though it is published by the CIA for US officials, the Central Intelligence Agency argues that the book reflects the author’s opinion and is not the official position of the CIA or any other government agency.
So why post a PDF of it to the CIA’s official website?
In a Twitter thread last week, former senior Trump intelligence official Cliff Sims blasted the CIA calling the chapter on Trump “inappropriate.” Sims argued that releasing this publication “contributes to the perception” that there are those within the intelligence community who act as “partisan attack dogs” against Donald Trump. Sims points out that some current intel officials are privately saying “Trump—A Unique Challenge” is nothing but a hit job.
