The Trump Strategy: Purely Legal Or National Security Based?

There's a split among those who support Trump's resistance to the Election Hoax, and in part it's a split as to how to view Trump's strategy. Some are absorbed in the legal challenges. Others believe that Trump has a national security ace up his sleeve.

The first view is typified by sundance's post this morning:

Sean Spicer Interviews Rudy Giuliani on Latest Developments and Legal Election Processes, Two Groups Have Distinct Approaches

I won't rehearse the long post--most of you have either read the post itself or have gathered the salient points elsewhere. Sundance is addressing the 'distinct approaches' of Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell. One aspect of the discussion that's somewhat bemusing is that sundance finds himself in the position of defending White House Counsel Pat Cipollone--a long time Bill Barr protege who has been savagely attacked by Sidney Powell's ally, Patrick Byrne. Overall, I have to say, I come down on sundance's side here. For those of you who aren't up on these developments, here's sundance's handy summary:

Wednesday Night – Michael Flynn recommended (Newsmax) impounding Dominion machines by order of President Trump; and noted military possibilities.

Thursday – The DC media stirred up the controversy around the insurrection act by painting Trump supporters as unstable.  Joint Chief’s General Milley said the military would not engage in any political effort.

Friday – Sidney Powell and Patrick Byrne meet with President Trump in the Oval Office.

Saturday – The New York Times framed the Powell/Byrne meeting as a radical effort to remain president.

Saturday night – President Trump pushed-back against the Martial Law narrative.

Sunday Patrick Byrne criticizes the White House advisory group, President Trump’s Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, and the office of White House counsel.

On the one hand, Trump apparently supports the continuing litigation efforts of Giuliani's legal team. On the other hand, Flynn and Powell certainly appear to have excellent access to Trump, which suggests that Trump is at least somewhat receptive to what they're saying.

On the other hand, Jen Dyer has published a lengthy article in which she argues that Trump may be simultaneously pursuing a national security resolution to the Election Hoax that's rooted in the turmoil we've been seeing at DoD and its cyber related components: NSA and Cyber Command:

The key supporting effort appears to be underway on Trump’s operational timeline

Dyer's argument relies heavily on the sweeping personnel changes at DoD that Trump instituted shortly after the election. The changes have been so sweeping--inserting trusted allies into key positions and streamlining the chain of command--that it's tempting to see these changes as long planned.

Dyer's martialing of the facts is complex, but this is the nub of her conclusion:

The key supporting effort is an adjunct to Trump’s main effort to, in effect, cure the 2020 vote and restore law and order to America.

The gist of the key supporting effort is that it involves intelligence collection, principally through IT/cyber means, on the entities behind the electronic vote-tampering via voting systems in the 2020 election.  ... it’s not about persuading courts to rule or government entities to investigate.

... this effort is about using the intelligence collected up to now to expose the actors, in appropriate venues, and unite what we know about their activities with what we can demonstrate about the outcomes in vote processing and tabulation across the country.

It's an interesting theory, but it's a theory that isn't susceptible to rigorous proof, the way we can identify the theory behind the actions of Trump's legal team. It relies, instead, on reasonable inferences drawn from reported facts. My one caveat is that, at some point, I don't see how Trump can avoid have "courts rule or government entities investigate." I think legal process of some sort--to include exercise of constitutional powers that could be challenged in court--is unavoidable.

My own attempts to construct similar arguments illustrate the difficulties involved in this approach. I argued strongly--or so I thought--in the wake of the news/rumors of seizures of CIA election related servers in Germany that such an operation would have been conducted through DoJ and the FBI. My reasoning was based on the idea that the evidence that had been gathered would be used in legal attacks on the election fraud. However, it seems pretty clear that I was totally wrong.

Now, Dyer doesn't address the German raid issue, but it could well fit within her overall scheme. Time will tell. I did hear rumors at the time that it was DIA that carried out the operation--if such an operation actually occurred. I still tend to believe that something of the sort did take place. The fact of the DIA related rumor and the fact that Michael Flynn (former head of DIA) seems to be in Trump's inner circle at this point suggests a possible connection. However, this remains speculative.

At the same time there have been other events that may play into the scenario that Dyer outlines, even though her article doesn't sketch out a straight line for this "key supporting effort". The meetings of Barr and the CIA's Gina Haspel with Mitch McConnell take on a possibly different complexion in light of subsequent events. Barr, of course, appears to have been pushed out of DoJ ahead of schedule. Haspel's CIA has been stripped of its paramilitary capabilities while Special Ops--70K strong--is now on the same footing as the other service branches. In that regard, Dyer states forthrightly:

I stress that [all this activity involving DoD and the armed forces] is not because [Trump is] planning to deploy armed force in the U.S.  I never saw that as likely and still don’t.

All this is speculative. However, my bottom line in this regard is that there needn't be a conflict between the legal and the national security approaches. Trump, I would argue, probably would prefer to see the election set to rights through the courts and/or the state legislatures. At the same time, if that approach--as seems likely at the moment--comes up short, the Cyber/IT approach that Dyer argues for will require careful preparation. Including legal preparation. Dyer herself posts the likelihood that such a "key supporting effort" is still in an embryonic stage--if it is in fact developing:

The key supporting effort looks to be emerging in outline, and it looks to be very big.  Don’t let the media spook you with terrors about what Trump may do.  But do hold fast.

As quite a few observers have pointed out, Trump at no time has even hinted at concession, at backing down. Thus his tweets about supposed big future developments are--given his track record of straight shooting--likely to have some substance behind them. What it is, however, must remain speculative for now. In the meantime, we need to keep our eyes open on both fronts: legal as well as national security.