Mike Pompeo is a blowhard and a fabulist

Mike Pompeo testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for the first time in a year yesterday. Many of the senators challenged him over the recently announced withdrawal of approximately 12,000 troops from Germany, and Pompeo defended the decision with his characteristic dishonesty.

The Guardian reported on one of Pompeo’s exchanges:

When pressed by Shaheen on the impact of the withdrawal on the relationship with Berlin, Pompeo did not directly respond, but said: “This is personal for me. I fought on the border of East Germany when I was a young soldier. I was stationed there.”

There was no fighting along the border with East Germany at any point. Since WWIII didn’t erupt in the late ’80s, one would think this would be hard to miss. Pompeo’s service in the Army in Germany never once involved anything that could be described as fighting. It is obvious that Pompeo just made this up to embellish his service record and to deflect criticism, but as with so many blatant lies that Pompeo tells he wasn’t called out for it.

Daniel Larison, Pompeo’s East German War (Eunomia)