U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth promised to revive military machismo with a “warrior ethos” before an audience of hundreds of stone-faced U.S. Armed Forces officers, admirals and generals earlier this week in Quantico, Virginia.
Ron Fogleman, a retired four-star general and Silverton resident, said “it was a very useful session” at a time the military is headed in an uncertain direction.
The meeting was held after Hegseth summoned top U.S. military officials from around the world to Marine Corps Base Quantico about 30 miles from D.C. on short notice and without explanation, prompting questions and security concerns about having so many high-ranking military officials in one place at one time.
The Washington Post reported some officials speculated the assembly might concern Hegseth’s plans for firings and command consolidations, while others thought the meeting might be about a new national defense strategy or a lecture about military standards.
What they got was Hegseth’s guarantee to revert the “Woke Department” back into the Department of War of decades’ past.
Hegseth railed against “beardos,” “fat” troops and generals, and “toxic leadership.”
He promised the military would have “no more identity months, DEI offices, dudes in dresses. No more climate change worship. No more division, distraction or gender delusions.”
“We are done with that (expletive),” he said.
Hegseth said he is reinstating daily physical training requirements, rescinding exceptions to grooming standards and initiating a full review of “toxic leadership.”
“We’re undertaking a full review of the department’s definitions of so-called ‘toxic leadership’: ‘bullying’ and ‘hazing,’” he said.
He immediately walked his statement back about half a step.
“Of course, you can’t do, like, nasty bullying and hazing. We’re talking about words like ‘bullying’ and ‘hazing’ and ‘toxic,’ they’ve been weaponized. And if that makes me toxic, then so be it,” he said.
Fox News’ “The Faulkner Focus” anchor Harris Faulkner described the meeting as “enormous, important” and the first of its kind.
CNN anchor Brianna Keiler scrutinized Hegseth’s comments about women not meeting adequate combat standards, stating the military is not “rampant” with women in combat roles they aren’t physically qualified for.
Politico reported one national defense official, speaking under anonymity out of fear of retaliation, said the meeting was “more like a press conference than briefing the generals” and it “could have been an email.”
Fogleman, who served in the U.S. Air Force for 38 years, said his last job before retirement about 30 years ago was U.S. Air Force chief of staff.
He said Hegseth’s meeting with generals and other high-ranking military officers was “a very useful session.”
“There’s been a lot of turmoil in the general officer ranks. There was a lot of rumors: ‘Where are we going? What are we doing?’” he said.
From that perspective, he said, it was useful to lay out before the general officer corps guidance on national military strategy and expectations of performance, conduct and focus on the primary mission.
“The primary mission with Department of Defense is to deter war, and if deterrence fails, to fight and win America’s wars,” Fogleman said.
He said President Donald Trump’s firing of U.S. Air Force Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in January is an example of turmoil rocking the military.
Rumors abound about why some people have been fired and not others, he said.
“This was an opportunity for the secretary to lay out the policies that he expects to be followed to execute the national security strategies and increase the forward fighting capabilities of the force,” Fogleman said.
He said the Department of Defense’s rebranding to the Department of War doesn’t seem necessary, but he’s no longer on councils that discuss such matters.
“(President Harry S.) Truman was the guy who decided after the Second World War that ‘defense’ was (a) better term to describe the complexity of the department, and he elected to change the name,” he said. “... If the department is trying to get people to focus on war – fighting – perhaps a name-change is appropriate.”
cburney@durangoherald.com
