If Elbridge Colby and his team did not threaten the Pope they should come out publicly and say so. But they haven’t.

Reports: Pentagon Delivered “Bitter Lecture” to Vatican Ambassador, Warning that the U.S. “Has the Military Power to do Whatever it Wants”

The newsletter Letters from Leo, which covers the Vatican, reported Wednesday that it had confirmed the Free Press account of the closed-door meeting. At one point during the meeting, the newsletter reported, a Defense Department official reached for a 14th-century weapon and invoked the Avignon Papacy, when the French monarchy forced the papacy into exile for nearly seven decades.

The reference alarmed some Vatican officials, who interpreted it as a threat to use military force against the Holy See, Letters to Leo’s Christopher Hale reported, citing unnamed Vatican sources.