Pompeo Warned Russia About Bounties On US Troops

The New York Times reports:

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has warned Russia’s foreign minister against Moscow paying bounties to Taliban-linked militants and other Afghan fighters for killing American service members, U.S. officials said.

Mr. Pompeo’s warning is the first known rebuke from a senior American official to Russia over the bounties program, and it runs counter to President Trump’s insistence that the intelligence from U.S. government agencies over the matter is a “hoax.” The action indicates that Mr. Pompeo, who previously served as Mr. Trump’s C.I.A. director, believes the intelligence warranted a stern message.

Mr. Pompeo delivered the warning in a call on July 13 with the minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, choosing to do so during a conversation that, officially, was about an unrelated topic — the possibility of a meeting of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, the U.S. officials said in the past week.

Read the full article.

Glad that @SecPompeo warned Lavrov, but this further debunks Trump/ the WH’s nonsense claim that Trump wasn’t briefed bc it was not fully verified intelligence.

This isn’t a hoax. Trump choosing to wear blindfolds and earmuffs just empowers Putin.https://t.co/pWVurUgYGK

— Sam Vinograd (@sam_vinograd) August 7, 2020

Why are we reading leaks about @SecPompeo warning Russians against paying bounties to kill US troops? Because Pompeo knows @realDonaldTrump is traitorous for calling it a hoax & Pompeo doesn’t want to go down with the ship. But he’s too spineless to confront @POTUS publicly. https://t.co/bfAs0KDHoT

— Ted Lieu (@tedlieu) August 7, 2020