Is General Mark Milley now off the hook?

It has been a tough two days for General Mark Milley, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, and also but less so for Lloyd Austin, US defence secretary, and General Frank McKenzie, commander of US Central Command. Milley has been the one really on the spot, not just for his remarks about what he advised Biden on Afghanistan but also why he rang his Chinese counterpart to let him know Trump was not plotting to attack China. He seems to have got away with it because despite some pretty brutal questioning by Republicans on the Senate and House armed services committees, his responses to their questions were always given in an unemotional and pragmatic way, as you would expect of a four-star general. But there remains one big question mark. Milley went on at length about all the people he consulted in the Trump admnistration before he rang General Li Zuocheng in Beijing about Chinese fears of an American attack. He said he discussed his proposed phone call with everyone from the then defence secretary Mark Esper, the CIA director, national security adviser etc etc and presumably they all agreed it would be a good idea. No one told Trump. But that was for the call Milley made to General Li in October 2020. What about the second call he made the following January? We know he didn't discuss it beforehand with Chris Miller, the new acting defence secretary after Esper's sacking, because Miller has already said he knew nothing about it. I don't think either of the congressional committees focused on that discrepancy. Perhaps Milley thought that as he had had approval from within the Trump administration for the first call, he could make the second one without going through all the consultation rigmarole again. Especially as it was to the same Chinese general and was on the same subject. But I think Milley got away with that and he must be very relieved. I liked it when he waved a whole sheaf of papers in the air as he was being interrogated about the intelligence he claimed showed how worried the Chinese were about a Trump-ordered military attack in the dying days of his presidency. He promised to show the committees the juicy intelligence but not, unfortunately, to the press and public. So we'll never know whether the whole thing was wild surmising or genuine intel leaking out of the high-ups in Beijing.