Opinion

Trump's chaotic response to COVID-19 reveals major national security weakness

If the world is high school, The United States is the most popular girl: hated by many, worshipped by some and watched by all. Nothing goes unnoticed. This nation's response to the COVID-19 virus has been broadcast to the world and closely observed. Each misstep, every reversal of policy and each statement of misinformation, along with the ways in which our states and the federal government are not in communication or cohesion, projects highly valuable information to the world, and to our enemies in particular. 

When I worked undercover as a CIA officer assigned to the Counterterrorism Center, specifically the biological weapons group, I was acutely aware of what information the administration was broadcasting to the terrorists I was tracking. In order to fully understand these terrorists I had to fully understand how and why they saw the United States and Americans as the enemy. Knowing exactly what they perceived as our vulnerabilities helped me suss out their plots to kill massive amounts of people with singular and simple deployment. My thinking as I sought to shut down chemical plans was not only to know the enemy but also to know how the enemy knows us.