Gen Milley was 'one of the happiest people' at Biden's inauguration: new book

According to the upcoming book "Peril," by The Washington Post's Bob Woodward and Robert Costa, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley was elated at President Joe Biden's inauguration due to the fact that Donald Trump had lost the 2020 election.

Milley "thought he might be one of the happiest people up there. Not because it was President Biden, but because Trump was out of the presidency and it looked like another peaceful transfer of power," Business Insider reports, citing an excerpt from an advanced copy of the book.

In the wake of the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, Milley issued a rare public memo to the military calling the event "a direct assault on the US Congress, the Capitol building, and our Constitutional process."

"The rights of freedom of speech and assembly do not give anyone the right to resort to violence, sedition and insurrection," the memo said, adding that on January 20, "President-elect Biden will be inaugurated and will become our 46th Commander in Chief."

According to the book, Milley took the memo to the joint chiefs and told them he would sign it on his own "or we can all sign it."

Five days after Biden was the official winner of the 2020 election, the book says Milley described the state of the country as "a plane with four engines and three of them are out."

"Just steady," he was quoted as saying. "Breathe through our noses. Steady as a rock. We're going to land this plane safely. We've got a plane with four engines and three of them are out. We've got no landing gear. But we're going to land this plane and we're going to land it safely."

Read the full report over at Business Insider.