After breathing a sigh of relief, one cannot help wondering who got Trump to reverse and how he or she did it. Did, for example, FBI Director Christopher Wray threaten to quit? Did Trump’s lawyers warn him that this cavalier treatment of documents relating to the investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election might be evidence of “corrupt intent,” a key element in criminal obstruction of justice?

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As with Trump’s earlier release of documents intended to smear the intelligence community, the documents might have turned out to be a batch of nothing-burgers, or worse, from his perspective, demonstrated the professionalism of the FBI.

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We’ll have to wait for the next Bob Woodward book, it seems, to get the blow-by-blow.

Three things are clear, however.

First, Trump’s mercurial conduct is dangerous. This time he was able to call back the order (or national security officials were able to slow-walk their response). It’s hard to call back a nuclear strike order, or as Trump was apparently prepared to do, call back U.S. military forces in South Korea, which Pyongyang would regard as a precursor to war. He couldn’t call back his revelation to Russian officials in the White House highly classified intelligence obtained from the Israelis. And goodness knows what he told and cannot un-tell Russian President Vladimir Putin in a one-on-one meeting in Helsinki. (Note to Democrats if they win the majority in one or both houses of Congress: Subpoena those notes.)

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Moreover, Trump’s penchant for about-faces injects a high degree of uncertainty into our national security operations. When do military and intelligence leaders take him seriously, and when should they drag their feet? It’s hard to know and that by itself undermines our security and safety.

Second, this incident sure does corroborate the New York Times anonymous op-ed writer’s assertion that aides stand ready to snatch documents, delay responses and generally put up interference to prevent bad things from happening. That doesn’t justify subverting democracy through a coup of unelected aides, but in this case one or more of those aides did seem to effectively cut Trump off at the pass.