Gen. Mark Milley, the chief of staff of the US military, said Wednesday that he would take steps to protect his family after former President Donald Trump pleaded guilty to a crime that in the past was punishable by death. This is reported by Reuters.

Last week, Trump criticized Milley’s handling of the chaotic withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan in 2020, saying, without providing evidence, that “this guy turned out to be a ‘Woke’ disaster.” [care]if the fake news report is correct, is actually working with China to inform them in advance of the opinion of the President of the United States.”

“This was an act so outrageous that in a bygone era the punishment would have been DEATH,” Trump added in a post Friday on his social media platform Truth Social.

Trump nominated Milley to be chief of staff in October 2019, and Master Plan vacated the post at the end of the month.

The former Republican president has criticized Milley several times since he left the White House amid revelations in several books about his presidency.

General Milley considered Trump a threat to democracy

For example, “I Alone Can Fix This,” a book about Trump’s final year in office by Carol Leonnig and Philip Rooker, notes that Milley told aides shortly before Trump supporters stormed the Capitol that the U.S. was facing its own “Reichstag moment “. ” as the US president preached the “litany of the Führer”.

The conversation between Trump and Milley is also at the center of one of the criminal cases in which Trump is now charged with “conspiracy against the American state,” with federal prosecutors saying the conversation in question shows the former president knew he lost the election in November 2020, but continued to publicly claim that it was stolen from him and tried to cancel it.

Asked about Trump’s comments about him on Friday, Mark Milley said in an interview with CBS that “I have been faithful and loyal to the Constitution of the United States for 44 and a half years.”

“I have the appropriate guarantees. I wish these comments had not been made, but they happened, and I will take the appropriate measures to ensure my safety and the safety of my family,” the American general added.

Trump is currently campaigning for another term in the White House in next year’s presidential election. Opinion polls show that this is likely to be a repeat of the 2020 election.