Pentagon in turmoil as Trump moves to replace senior military leaders
1 month ago

Pentagon in turmoil as Trump moves to replace senior military leaders

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The removal of the officers has pushed the Pentagon into the political spotlight, with Democrats accusing Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth of seeking to politicize the military and ensure it is led by people personally loyal to the president President Donald Trump has launched a sweeping shakeup of the Pentagon, firing top officers and moving to lay off thousands of civilian workers as he seeks to align the US military with his priorities. Nothing about this is unprecedented.” Trump “deserves to pick his key national security and military advisory team,” Hegseth told “Fox News Sunday.” But Senator Jack Reed – the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee – argued that “what Trump and Hegseth are trying to do is to politicize the Department of Defense.” “It’s the beginning of a very, very serious degradation of the military,” Reed said on ABC’s “This Week.” Trump announced late Friday that he was firing top US military officer General Charles “CQ” Brown less than two years into his four-year term as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Hegseth then said he was The shakeup of senior personnel came after the Pentagon announced it aims to cut at least five percent of its more than 900,000-person civilian workforce, saying the decision was taken “to produce efficiencies and refocus the department on the president’s priorities.” Undermining ‘competence and capability’ Representative Adam Smith, the ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, said Trump fired Brown as well as thousands of federal employees “not because they weren’t competent or good at their jobs, but because Trump wants sycophants.” “Anyone who doesn’t pledge loyalty has to go,” Smith said in a video posted on X, adding: “That really undermines the competence and capability of the people serving our country.” Trump administration officials have defended the firings, with Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson arguing that the removal of the senior officers is in keeping with past presidential actions. No accusations of misconduct have been made against the recently removed officers, with Hegseth saying Brown is “an honorable man” but “not the right man for the moment.” Seth Jones, president of the Defense and Security Department at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that while there are various examples of senior officers being relieved, “it has generally been for competence issues.” “This does not appear to have been, at least to a significant degree, about the competence of General Brown, for example,” and if the removals were not based on performance, “then this is uncommon.” Jones said he does not however think that “at this point… the vast majority of the uniformed military has been politicized.” It is when civilian and uniformed leaders disagree that “you judge whether the military has been politicized.

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Trump's Pentagon shakeup puts military in political spotlight
1 month ago
Hegseth defends Trump’s firings of Pentagon leaders and says there may be more dismissals
Trending News
1 month ago
Hegseth defends Trump’s firings of Pentagon leaders and says there may be more dismissals
1 month, 1 week ago

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