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DONALD TRUMP AND his defence secretary Pete Hegseth have berated hundreds of the US military’s top leadership regarding diversity measures and fitness levels in their military.
In lengthy speeches both the President and the self titled Secretary of War both spoke about their vision for the US military.
The Generals and Admirals were abruptly called back to the US from around the world to convene at the Marine Corps base in Quantico, near Washington, without publicly revealing the reason until this morning.
Hegseth’s address largely focused on his own, long-used, talking points of a military struggling to cope with what he claims are politically correct ideologies.
He also said that military leaders should “do the honourable thing and resign” if they do not like his new approach.
His speech also declared that senior leadership must also do two fitness and height tests per year and that overweight leadership sets a bad example.
In Ireland, the Irish Defence Forces, has strict fitness standards and all personnel, including the most senior General Staff, must pass a test annually.
Meetings between US top military brass and civilian leaders are nothing new, but the gathering had fuelled intense speculation about the summit’s purpose given the haste with which it was called and the mystery surrounding it.
What the admirals and generals from conflict zones in the Middle East and elsewhere got was a lecture on race and gender in the military.
In his hour long diatribe Hegseth claimed the US military has promoted too many leaders for the wrong reasons based on race, gender quotas and “historic firsts”.
“The era of politically correct, overly sensitive don’t-hurt-anyone’s-feelings leadership ends right now at every level,” Hegseth said.
In another move he said he was loosening disciplinary rules and weakening hazing protections, putting a heavy focus on removing many of the guardrails the military had put in place after numerous scandals and investigations.
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”.
He called for “changes to the retention of adverse information on personnel records that will allow leaders with forgivable, earnest, or minor infractions to not be encumbered by those infractions in perpetuity”.
“People make honest mistakes, and our mistakes should not define an entire career,” Hegseth said. “Otherwise, we only try not to make mistakes.”
Bullying and toxic leadership has been the suspected and confirmed cause behind numerous military suicides over the past several years.
Hegseth claimed that his department has been told from previous administrations that “our diversity is our strength”, which he called an “insane fallacy”.
“They had to put out dizzying DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) and LGBTQE+ statements. They were told females and males are the same thing, or that males who think they’re females is totally normal,” he said.
Hegseth said this is is not about preventing women from serving.
“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,” he said.
During his speech to the military leaders the Donald Trump spoke for an hour and 13 minutes on a variety of subjects.
Although the military is designed to handle foreign threats, the president emphasised his vision of using it for domestic purposes.
“It’s the enemy from within and we have to handle it before it gets out of control,” Trump said.
Trump’s remarks referred to criminals and immigrants who are in the country illegally. He also complained about “insurrectionists” who are funded by “the radical left”.
“Many of our leaders used our military to keep peace,” he said.
Pete Hegseth served as a commissioned officer in the US military with the primarily part-time Minnesota National Guard – he volunteered for trips to Afghanistan, Iraq and also worked in the military base where the controversial Guantanamo detention centre is located. He came to prominence as a Fox News commentator.
Donald Trump never served in the military citing an issue with bone spurs and attendance at college as reasons not to be drafted for service during the Vietnam War.
With reporting from Niall O’Connor.
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