As noted in previous posts, newly christened Secretary of War Pete Hegseth called every general or admiral in a command position and their senior enlisted advisors to Marine Corps Base Quantico for unspecified reasons last week. He addressed them in a location familiar to me, Warner Auditorium in the building where I work when it’s not occupied by VIP visitors.
While the base was closed for the last two days for security reasons, I was able to listen to most of the speech via a live stream. The whole 48-minute, 31-second video is available at war.gov.
Stars and Stripes (“Hegseth addresses top commanders at Quantico, puts focus on warfighting: ‘The era of the Department of Defense is over’“):
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth jumped into his roughly 45-minute speech Tuesday morning to the top military brass after being introduced by Air Force Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
“Good morning, and welcome to the War Department because the era of the Department of Defense is over,” Hegseth told hundreds of generals and admirals gathered at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Northern Virginia.
[…]
“Today is another liberation day, the liberation of America’s warriors,” Hegseth said. “You are not politically correct and don’t necessarily always belong in polite society. We are purpose built.”
[…]
Hegseth, a 45-year-old Army National Guard veteran and former Fox News host, did not stand behind the podium on stage. He walked around the stage draped by a giant American flag behind him, along with flags of military branches.
Since taking charge of the Pentagon in January, Hegseth has ordered reviews of physical fitness, body composition and grooming, reverting back to the base names of Fort Benning and Fort Bragg, and restoring the “warrior ethos.”
Hegseth said the U.S. military has promoted too many leaders for the wrong reasons based on race, gender quotas and “historic firsts.”
“Political leaders set the wrong heading, and we lost our way. We became the Woke Department but not anymore,” the secretary said.
He said he is loosening disciplinary rules and weakening hazing protections.
Hegseth said he was ordering a review of “the department’s definitions of so-called toxic leadership, bullying and hazing to empower leaders to enforce standards without fear of retribution or second guessing.”
The secretary told the top military brass that 10 directives would arrive in the inboxes of commands Tuesday. Some of the initiatives include adding combat field tests for combat arms units, every member of the joint force including four-star generals must take a physical test twice a year and meet height and weight requirements.
“Frankly, it’s tiring to look out at combat formations, or really any formation, and see fat troops. Likewise, it’s completely unacceptable to see fat generals and admirals in the halls of the Pentagon,” Hegseth said.
The secretary said the Pentagon is empowering drill sergeants to instill “healthy fear in recruits.”
“Yes, they can shark attack. They can toss bunks. They can swear and yes, they can put their hands on recruits,” Hegseth said. “This does not mean they can be reckless or violate the law, but they can use tried and true methods to motivate new recruits to make them warriors.”
The Pentagon has been thinking about bringing back shark attacks after the Army decided to move away from the practice in 2020. Hegseth shared a story in August that he was considering allowing Army drill sergeants to swarm on trainees and shout in their faces again. Pentagon spokeswoman Kingsley Wilson told reporters last month “shark attacks are going to be something” Hegseth looks to reinstate.
The directives would include “gender-neutral” or “male-level” standards for physical fitness.
It is not about preventing women from serving, Hegseth said.
“But when it comes to any job that requires physical power to perform in combat, those physical standards must be high and gender neutral,” he said. “If women can make it excellent, if not, it is what it is. If that means no women qualify for some combat jobs, so be it. That is not the intent, but it could be the result.”
The event initially raised concerns that Hegseth was gathering the group to inform them of mass firings or layoffs. The secretary in May signed a memo to reduce the total number of generals and admirals by 20%.
[…]
“If the words I’m speaking today are making your heart sink, then you should do the honorable thing and resign,” Hegseth said. “We should thank you for your service. But I suspect I know the overwhelming majority of you feel the opposite.”
The secretary continued that “these words make your heart full.”
“You love the War Department because you love what you do. You are hereby liberated to be an apolitical, hard charging, no nonsense, constitutional leader,” Hegseth added.
Given how much controversy the hastily-called gathering created, this is likely to raise more questions. Since the event was lived-streamed, it’s not obvious why it was necesary for hundreds of senior leaders and their staffs to travel to Quantico on short notice. Perhaps Hegseth simply believed that this would galvanize their attention.
Fears of loyalty oaths and the like were unfounded. The closest we came was the above-quoted line, “If the words I’m speaking today are making your heart sink, then you should do the honorable thing and resign.” However, generals and admirals follow the lawful orders of the elected commander-in-chief and the presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed Secretary. There’s not likely to be much pushback.
The emphasis on fitness and grooming standards is usually the province of enlisted leaders rather than the highest levels of the Pentagon. But this was simply an emphasis of a message Hegseth has been sending since he was nominated for the post.
Similarly, I don’t believe I’ve ever heard a general officer, much less a Defense Secretary, getting into the details of how basic training is run. I’m not aware of any evidence that eliminating “shark attacks” has hindered lethality. And swearing at recruits was already verboten when my late father was a basic training first sergeant circa 1980, roughly the time Hegseth was born.
Still, I suspect many in the audience welcomed the broader message: military leaders should be focusing on training for combat and maintaining vehicles and equipment. To the extent there’s a sense standards have been lowered to achieve diversity goals, particularly the integration of women into ground combat roles, being clear that combat readiness is the only goal that matters will be reassuring.
