John Bolton gathered a 7am meeting at CIA headquarters last week with top intelligence, diplomatic and military advisers in the Trump administration to talk about Iran, reports NBC News. And if there's one consistent element in John Bolton's crazy-ass mustachioed career, it's wanting America to go to war with Iran.
NEW from @NBCNews Bolton convened an irregular 7am principals meeting at CIA HQ about Iran, on 29 April.
Apparently unconnected to recent military deployments.
More echoes of Iraq. https://t.co/rrVvsTvfyw— Julian Borger (@julianborger) May 9, 2019
This meeting at CIA was very unusual, officials say. It's extremely rare for senior White House officials or cabinet members to attend a meeting at CIA headquarters.
Excerpt from NBC News report by Courtney Kube, Ken Dilanian, Dan De Luce and Carol E. Lee:
The meeting was held at 7:00 a.m. on Monday, April 29, and included CIA Director Gina Haspel, Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Joe Dunford, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, five of the officials said.
National security meetings are typically held in the White House Situation Room. The six current officials, as well as multiple former officials, said it is extremely rare for senior White House officials or cabinet members to attend a meeting at CIA headquarters.
The officials said the discussion was not about the intelligence that led to the decision in the following days to surge a carrier strike group and bomber task force to the Middle East, but did not describe what the meeting covered.
Five former CIA operations officers and military officials said that in the past, such meetings have been held at CIA headquarters to brief top officials on highly sensitive covert actions, either the results of existing operations or options for new ones.
