It was obvious from the start that appointing Pete Hegseth — a former Fox News weekend host — as secretary of defense was a spectacularly bad idea: He was, by far, the least qualified person ever to lead the Pentagon. So, too, was it obvious that Hegseth’s decision to fire more than two dozen senior officers and to block the promotions of at least 45 officers — for reasons he never explained — was a spectacularly bad idea that would deny the armed forces the veteran, apolitical leadership they need.
What was not so apparent, until now, was the consequences of those decisions. They have created a dangerous leadership vacuum that is jeopardizing national security and military readiness. Critical posts in the armed forces are either not being filled or are being filled with officers seemingly appointed more for political than professional reasons.
The most alarming evidence is the Iran fiasco. Now six months old, President Donald Trump’s military campaign has failed to end either Iran’s regime or its nuclear program, but it has taken a heavy toll on the world situation and on the U.S. armed forces. Recent Washington Post headlines tell the story: “Putin sees U.S. as weakened by Iran war, intelligence reports say.” “U.S. weapons shortage from Iran war alarms allies confronting China.” “Democrats seek answers after reports of poor conditions on USS Abraham Lincoln.”
Trump, of course, bears ultimate responsibility for launching this unsuccessful and unnecessary conflict. Yet the Pentagon leadership can’t escape blame. A Wall Street Journal investigation published last week found that the intelligence community accurately warned of the risks and Vice President JD Vance counseled against the conflict. But Trump was apparently won over by Hegseth, Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine and Adm. Brad Cooper, head of U.S. Central Command, who briefed him on plans to cripple Iranian forces. According to the Journal, Hegseth and Caine assured the president “they would navigate any complications.”
I am dead certain that if Jim Mattis, one of Trump’s first-term secretaries of defense, and Gen. Mark Milley, his first-term chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, were still in office, we would never have gotten into this quagmire. Both men actively and wisely resisted pressure to attack Iran.
But in his second term, Trump made sure to appoint more pliant leaders. He fired the previous chairman of the Joint Chiefs and appointed Caine, a retired three-star, because he had the (probably wrong) impression that Caine was a MAGA supporter. Hegseth chose Cooper to run Centcom over the front-runner — Army Gen. James Mingus — apparently because Mingus had worked for Milley, whom Trump loathes.
Hegseth subsequently fired Mingus as Army vice chief of staff and then got rid of his widely respected boss— Gen. Randy George. The Army now has no confirmed chief of staff. The post is filled on an acting basis by Gen. Christopher LaNeve, Hegseth’s former military assistant who won Trump’s favor by calling in to congratulate him on his inauguration. Bipartisan concerns in the Senate are blocking LaNeve’s confirmation to the top job.
The Post just reported that, before George was fired, LaNeve had warned him not to investigate the helicopter pilots who recklessly hovered in front of Trump supporter Kid Rock’s house. Then, one of LaNeve’s first actions as acting chief was to disband a drone battalion that George had organized — a move that former House speaker Newt Gingrich (R) called a “terrible mistake.”
Another terrible mistake was LaNeve’s decision to reassign III Armored Corps — which comprises three heavy divisions — from focusing on the Russian threat in Europe to the new Western Hemisphere Command. Are these armored units supposed to invade Mexico? Greenland? Canada? It makes no sense and sends a dangerous signal of irresolution to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Hegseth’s purges have created a vacuum in Army leadership. As the New York Times notes, the Army has gone from having 10 four-star generals to having only five. Some key jobs have been empty for months. And the vacuum at the top will only get worse because Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, who worked closely with George but clashed with Hegseth, is reportedly leaving.
The Navy is also in dire shape, with Trump’s Iran war rapidly draining its budget and munitions and hurting readiness. The crisis is being exacerbated by Trump’s inexplicable demands to replace electromagnetic catapults with steam catapults and to move the location of the command post on future aircraft carriers. As former naval officer Bryan Clark warned in a Post op-ed, redesigning carriers will be a lengthy and costly process that “risks crippling fleet readiness — already at its lowest point in decades.”
A normal chief of naval operations should have pushed back strongly against such an ill-considered change. But there is no indication that Adm. Daryl Caudle did so. The New York Times reported that Caudle and his aides lobbied for him to get the post — in breach of military decorum — after Hegseth fired the first female chief of naval operations. The report said that one of Caudle’s officers told Hegseth’s team that the admiral was sympathetic to Hegseth’s anti-“woke” fulminations. Caudle wasn’t recommended by senior Navy officials but got the job anyway.
And then there are the Pentagon’s lawless attacks on alleged drug boats. For the past year, the military has been killing noncombatants without having any appreciable impact in slowing the flow of cocaine into the United States. The previous head of U.S. Southern Command, Adm. Alvin Holsey, expressed concerns about the attacks, so he was forced into early retirement. Hegseth replaced him with the more obliging Marine Gen. Francis L. Donovan. Southern Command announced another boat strike last week, killing four more people without trial.
While all this is going on, the administration is trying to expand the defense budget to $1.5 trillion. But all the money in the world can’t make up for the crippling loss of leadership caused by Hegseth’s purges. Trump and Hegseth may be buying more hardware, but they are endangering the apolitical professionalism — the operating system — that once made the U.S. military the envy of the world.
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