Learn their communications and then apply "Game Theory" if you are really interested in what is going on. But we were told how many people have the "WHOLE" picture. The key word is "whole" picture.
This is the correct question. The answer is simple. Trump uses bluffs to test the capabilities of his opposition, introduce doubt and create an atmosphere where his enemies aren't sure what is true and what will happen next.
Some Trump political, intelligence and counterintelligence strategies:
Trump "leaks" fake information to his enemies intentionally through compromised backchannels. This creates confusion and causes the media to lose credibility as their reporting turns out to be false. Trump laughs and calls them fake news for these glaring errors. Brennan himself was leaked false information that Trump and his family would be indicted weeks before the Mueller investigation closed. He was shown to be wrong and now claims he was given bad intel. "The leaks are real, the news is fake" - Donald J. Trump
Trump publicly feuds with people he sends out of his camp to "sever ties" and free them up to independently pursue an objective without raising public awareness. For the media to tie him to these "burned bridge" actors, they would need to allege elaborate conspiracy narratives, and they are already stretched thin with the mainstream offensive.
Trump manages damaging releases of information by his enemies by pushing a counter narrative his own team's carefully designed "damaging" information which ends up proving to be false and defuses the original harmful situation by sewing seeds of doubt against "anti-trump lies".
Trump leaks information about what events might happen next or certain threats through to his enemies and even his base. Some he follows through and some he does not. The GOAL is to never allow any one person outside his closest circle to be able to predict the next move. Yes this also makes it very difficult for his enemies to counter, prepare or preempt anything they believe he is going to do next because they simply never truly know.
^^^ This is the part that is so frustrating for straightforward patriotic supporters of Trump. They project their principles on to Trump and who they believe he should be and HOW he should go about winning his objectives.
Trump benefits from noc (unofficial) agents utilized in a controlled opposition capacity. These help to push the focus back onto his opponents in an opportune moment. He can brand them by creating a story manufactured by his agents and immediately use his bully pulpit to shine the light on these damaging events. I stopped counting at how many times I witnessed this simple game playing out.
Trump uses a myriad of sequential behavioral and semantic strategies to create a news cycle to his advantage, damaging his opponent's credibility, and ultimately pilfering his enemies' lukewarm supporters by stealing their platform issues one at a time. An example:
1-Trump makes outrageous inflammatory statement designed to outrage a targeted opponent.
2-Trump allows time for his opponent to begin a news cycle of outrage, now inflaming the loudest fringe of their tribe.
3-Trump immediately targets a KEY issue he wants to steal from his opponent and performs a notable action directly and positively affecting that issue. (Think Kim K with the prison reform PR stunt, Syria withdrawal etc).
The opposition media cannot deal with the suddenly introduced confusion in the midst of the outrage mob. They are forced to ignore the new positive event or, in the worst cases, actually claim it is another terrible decision by Trump. Many people conflate the ridicule Trump is receiving in that news cycle with the highly agreeable positive action they are observing and assume his opponents actually oppose it instead of the original inflammatory action. Trump effectively lays claim on many of his opponents' trademark issues in this way.
All of these are adaptations of very basic, well known military and intelligence strategies. All major political administrations make earnest attempts to dominate the field with their execution. The difference is in their typical restraint of overt action in favor of a more one dimensional public presentation of their primary asset.
Trump, in contrast, becomes an active participant in the subversion itself which is highly unconventional. I believe students of military and political strategy will study the Trump administration's acute weaponization of COMINT and HUMINT for years to come.
