WASHINGTON — A bit-known counterterrorism official named Christopher C. Miller flew to the Center East final month to pursue a diplomatic thought:
WASHINGTON — A bit-known counterterrorism official named Christopher C. Miller flew to the Center East final month to pursue a diplomatic thought: asking Qatar to assist devise plans to purchase off or in any other case marginalize some senior leaders of the Shabab, Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Somalia, who’re extra dedicated to attacking the West.
Mr. Miller had obtained a blessing from Kash Patel, then a senior official on the Nationwide Safety Council. President Trump’s nationwide safety adviser, Robert C. O’Brien, was additionally conscious of the journey, officers mentioned. However they bypassed the nation’s chief diplomat, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo — and when he discovered, he deemed the thought half-baked and shut it down.
Now, management over American nationwide safety and international coverage has been upended. Mr. Trump abruptly put in Mr. Miller as appearing protection secretary this week — making him, at the least on paper, Mr. Pompeo’s equal for the administration’s final two months. Mr. Patel is turning into Mr. Miller’s chief of workers.
The appointment capped a shocking rise for Mr. Miller, a former Inexperienced Beret officer who 11 months in the past was a counterterrorism adviser on the Nationwide Safety Council and who lacks important expertise managing a sprawling group. The extraordinary energy and duty he’ll wield through the unsure endgame of the Trump administration — when Mr. Trump is refusing to acknowledge that he misplaced the election — instantly solid super consideration on the largely unknown new Pentagon chief.
Mr. Miller has displayed an irreverent demeanor that at instances clashes with the grave coverage issues he has dealt with, based on individuals who have labored with him. His background within the Military Particular Forces dovetails with a status for being hard-charging and never all the time respectful of bureaucratic vetting procedures which can be supposed to make sure that potential penalties are totally thought-about earlier than appearing.
Mr. Miller’s beforehand unreported journey to Qatar affords perception into the appearing secretary’s mind-set. The awkward shuttering of the hassle was an embarrassing final result for the U.S. authorities, partly as a result of Qatar’s emir had already apparently given his approval to discover Mr. Miller’s proposal.
It might additionally portend the sort of last-ditch initiatives or operations, whether or not overt or covert, that Mr. Trump and his high aides may pursue throughout his final weeks in workplace.
“The coverage course of on this administration has simply been so weird,” mentioned Tricia Bacon, a Somalia specialist at American College in Washington and a former State Division counterterrorism analyst.
The officers conversant in Mr. Miller’s aborted enterprise described it on the situation of anonymity due to its delicate diplomatic and intelligence nature. Spokesmen for the State Division, the Nationwide Safety Council and Mr. Miller declined to remark.
Mr. Miller appeared an unlikely emissary for such a fragile diplomatic foray. He spent most of his 31-year army profession in shadowy Particular Operations assignments. He commanded a Particular Forces quick-reaction workforce that flew to Afghanistan in December 2001 to assist a workforce by chance struck by an American bomb. They stayed to extend safety round Hamid Karzai, who had simply been named Afghanistan’s interim president. Through the Iraq battle, Mr. Miller hunted high-value rebel leaders.
In 2018, he grew to become a high counterterrorism official on the Nationwide Safety Council, the arm of the White Home that helps handle interagency issues involving the army, intelligence and international coverage.
Mr. Miller ceaselessly labored with Mr. Patel, a former aide to Consultant Devin Nunes of California, the highest Republican on the Home Intelligence Committee and an outspoken supporter of Mr. Trump.
Against this, Mr. Miller isn’t referred to as a partisan ideologue, based on interviews with officers who’ve labored with him. His counterterrorism and hostage-focused portfolio has permitted him to largely keep away from nationwide safety points which have attracted political furor through the Trump period, like Russia. His watch on the Nationwide Safety Council included conferences that led to the American commando raid in northwest Syria final yr to kill the chief of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and he has gained the belief of officers like Mr. O’Brien and Mr. Patel.
This yr, Mr. Miller briefly moved to a counterterrorism position on the Pentagon earlier than the Senate in August confirmed him to guide the Nationwide Counterterrorism Middle, an company created after the assaults of Sept. 11, 2001, that’s purported to function a clearinghouse for terrorism menace data and coordinate intelligence sharing between organizations together with the C.I.A., the F.B.I. and the Nationwide Safety Company.
The middle isn’t purported to play an operational position. However as Mr. Miller studied intelligence experiences concerning the Shabab’s senior management and Somalia, he informed colleagues that it is likely to be potential to vary the equation that has saved the US locked in irregular warfare with the Shabab — together with periodic drone strikes concentrating on suspected militants and the lethal Shabab assault on an American air base at Manda Bay, Kenya, in January.
American officers have lengthy struggled with how to consider the Shabab — a loosely organized assortment of factions, most of whom are centered on the parochial purpose of controlling Somalia however a few of whom need to take part in Al Qaeda’s world jihad, finishing up terrorist assaults past its borders.
Close to the tip of the Obama administration, the chief department deemed your entire group an enemy within the battle on terrorism, and Mr. Trump eased limits on army strikes in Somalia. However years of pretty common bombings have did not carry the Shabab to heel, and in its fourth yr the Trump administration has flirted with the thought of pulling again from the Horn of Africa.
Amid that churn, Mr. Miller questioned whether or not it will be potential to separate key Shabab factions from Al Qaeda to cut back its menace to American pursuits past Somalia’s borders. He centered on a gaggle of about 10 older leaders with robust private ties to Al Qaeda, fairly than youthful, extra nationalistic Shabab leaders.
It was tough to acquire correct, well timed intelligence to focus on and kill the Qaeda-linked Shabab leaders. Mr. Miller raised concepts for isolating or eliminating them: Maybe the youthful leaders could possibly be persuaded to insurgent in opposition to them, or the older cohort could possibly be purchased off to sideline themselves from the battle, the officers mentioned.
It made sense that Mr. Miller could be interested in the thought of hanging an unorthodox take care of parts of an Islamist militant group to attempt to diminish the terrorist menace, given his earlier expertise as a Inexperienced Beret officer in Afghanistan and Iraq, mentioned Luke Hartig, a former senior director for counterterrorism on the Nationwide Safety Council through the Obama administration who has labored with Mr. Miller.
“Based mostly on Chris Miller’s army background within the Particular Forces, he would definitely have a variety of curiosity in working with irregular forces or others to defeat our terrorist enemies,” Mr. Hartig mentioned.
The Qataris had expertise because the middleman for peace talks with the Afghan Taliban. Mr. Miller went to Mr. Patel along with his thought of enlisting them for the same outreach effort. With the Nationwide Safety Council’s blessing, Mr. Miller approached Qatar’s ambassador to the US to acquire the blessing of the nation’s emir to pursue the thought.
Then, over the Columbus Day weekend, Mr. Miller and aides flew to Doha to open talks with senior Qatari officers, together with its international minister and high counterterrorism leaders. The Qataris had been mentioned to have expressed curiosity in among the concepts however had been cautious about easy methods to proceed. As a preliminary step, they proposed looping in Norwegian diplomats who had additionally served as go-betweens with the Taliban.
Mr. Miller returned from his journey with a proposal to schedule three-way talks with Qatar and Norway to flesh out the proposals, based on the officers. At that time, nonetheless, Mr. Pompeo and his high aides grew to become conscious of his efforts.
The transfer was seen inside the State Division as freelance diplomacy — an intrusion into Mr. Pompeo’s turf — and, extra broadly, many counterterrorism coverage officers considered it as insufficiently thought out.
Among the many issues: determining whom to speak to within the Shabab, whose leaders are likely to kill each other after they have ideological disputes; determining what the hassle would imply for the fledgling Somali authorities the US is supporting; and vetting the public-relations dangers of negotiating with Qaeda-linked figures.
Mr. Pompeo insisted that the State Division take over the initiative from Mr. Miller. He referred the matter to the division’s Africa Bureau, the place officers mentioned it was broadly seen as bureaucratically lifeless even earlier than Mr. Trump misplaced the election — and a reversal that has uncovered the American authorities to trying flighty within the Center East.
“This story is unusual on so many ranges,” Ms. Bacon mentioned. “Lowering the menace to U.S. pursuits by eliminating 10 Shabab operatives doesn’t maintain up. The menace from Shabab isn’t that straightforward. We’ve got already tried that, and it hasn’t labored.”
Thom Shanker contributed reporting.