As the White House mows more than 100 aides from National Security Council staff, some former staff and analysts are asking whether small teams can meet the demands of a fast-moving, dangerous global security environment.
Approximately half of the NSC’s 350-person team leaves what the White House calls the “right size” of a historically bureaucratic body made up primarily of career diplomats.
Originally, it was loaned out by agencies such as the State Department and the Department of Defense. Political appointees placed on administrative leave are said to have the White House find other roles elsewhere in the administration.
Some former NSC officials told Fox News Digital it was too early to determine whether the overhaul would become a more efficient agency or someone not equipped to provide timely intelligence in national security decisions.
The Trump administration is planning to overhaul the National Security Council a few weeks after the waltz departs
Marco Rubio, now the national security advisor, oversees more than 100 staff cuts to the National Security Council. (Julien de Rosa/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)
Personally, national security sources questioned whether Secretary of State Marco Rubio, now interim national security adviser, had blocked agents to avoid internal power struggles after returning to his original post.
Michael Allen, former senior NSC director, said the staffing changes reflect President Donald Trump’s desire to directly control key decisions.
“I think he wants people to make decisions for him sooner than the previous president,” Allen told Fox News Digital.
The NSC has charted Rocky Waters since losing national security advisor Mike Waltz following an inadvertently published signal chat. His agent, Alex Wong, also recently left the agency, pushing out other aides who had a major impact on the administration’s early foreign policy decisions in a restructuring on Friday.
Eric Trager, senior director of Middle East affairs, who traveled with envoy Steve Witkov for some of the Iranian negotiations, is out. European senior directors Andrew Peak and Eurasia also helped coordinate approaches to the conflict between Russia and the Ukrain.
Additionally, the restructuring will move National Security Adviser Andy Barker to Vice President J.D. Vance and Policy President’s assistant, Robert Gabriel, to the role of deputy national security adviser.
The NSC has been facing Rocky Waters since losing national security adviser Mike Waltz following an inadvertently published signal chat. (Reuters/Evelyn Hockstein)
“This happens naturally in the NSC. The ridiculous kind you saw in the Biden administration is not very typical,” said Victoria Coates, Trump’s former deputy national security adviser.
She said President Ronald Reagan has six national security advisers, besides two acting NSAs, as well as two terms as president.
“For the President, he has had legitimate concerns about the NSC since the first semester, knowing that, he will not sugar it. The situation at Signal Gate was a problem for NSA Waltz,” Coates continued. “The President is taking action to guide the NSC to conditions of complete confidence.”
With the slimmer NSC, the president is expected to lean more strongly towards Rubio, CIA director John Ratcliffe, and director of National Intelligence Tarcigabad for his daily intelligence briefing.
“One of the things that make this administration unique is that it is the president himself, a small circle of really important and decision-making advisors,” said Brian Caturis, a former NSC employee and fellow at the Middle East Institute. “They just don’t see the need for an ongoing interagency meeting like in previous administrations.”
Katulis added that the biggest risk is not necessarily a lack of intelligence, but a lack of adjustment.
“It’s not the Intel or the knowledge gap, but what worries me is whether different institutions are singing from the same sheet of music,” he said.
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House to comment on Friday’s cuts and their intent.
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Others claim that the NSC has grown bloated and requires a reset.
“The NSC will grow to 300 or 400 under the Democratic president,” said Alex Gray, a former Trump NSC official. “It will be its own division.”
“When I was there, we had a policy on it to about 110 people. Maybe another 50 people fell and it could still be effective,” he said.
“Do you want an NSC that develops and directs a policy, or an NSC that can provide the advice of the president, make decisions on him, and implement it? You don’t need hundreds of people to do that.”
However, the NSC is the main body that is tasked with ensuring that other agencies are in line with the president’s agenda.
“Instead of preparing options for him, they should take his direction and implement it,” Coates said. But she added, “If you go too far, you won’t have the talent to implement those instructions from the White House in a department or institution that is always bigger and better funded than the NSC.”
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“Do we need to bash together to get them to do what the President wants? Our experience was the first semester where we needed a fair amount of weight at the end of the day to do things they didn’t want to do, such as designating the IRGC as an FTO, for example,” Coates added.
Even with lean staff, the NSC is responsible for managing key global challenges, from Iran’s nuclear talks and wars in Ukraine to military competition with China.
It puts additional pressure on Rubio.
“The big problem is that national security advisers need to ensure that all the information the president needs to make decisions,” Allen said.
Diana Stancy of Fox News contributed to this report.
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