Gen. Mark Milley took a parting shot at former President Trump during a ceremony marking his stepping down as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the highest-ranking officer in the U.S. military. “We are unique among the world’s militaries,” the retiring general said Friday in Arlington, Virginia. “We don’t take an oath to a country, we don’t take an oath to a tribe, we don’t take an oath to a religion. We don’t take an oath to a king, or a queen, or a tyrant or a dictator.” “And we don’t take an oath to a wannabe dictator,” he said. “We take an oath to the Constitution, and we take an oath to the idea that is America – and we’re willing to die to protect it.” While the general was tapped for the role by then-President Trump in 2018, their relationship fractured after Gen. Milley apologized for appearing with the president for a photo-op in Lafayette Square during the George Floyd protests in the summer of 2020. Later that summer, he backed a Pentagon proposal to rename military bases named after Confederate generals, something Mr. Trump opposed. Their relationship became even more contentious in the wake of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, which prompted the general to take extraordinary steps to safeguard the country’s nuclear weapons and reassure his Chinese counterpart that the U.S. was not considering a military strike on the country. While Trump administration officials were aware of his actions, Mr. Trump said he viewed the moves as treasonous. “This is an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH!” Mr. Trump wrote last week on his social media platform, Truth Social. “A war between China and the United States could have been the result of this treasonous act.” Air Force Gen. Charles “CQ” Brown, who was confirmed by the Senate in an 83–11 vote last week, is now serving as the 21st chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. #markmilley #milley #jointchiefsofstaff #pentagon #defensedepartment #dod #usmilitary #donaldtrump #cspan - @cspanofficial