US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth summoned hundreds of America’s senior military officers to a meeting to declare an end to “woke” culture and diversity initiatives in the military.
A former Fox News host, Hegseth called the meeting last week without an explanation and told the audience that if they don’t agree with what he has to say, then “resign”.
“The sooner we have the right people, the sooner we can advance the right policies.. But if the words I’m speaking today are making your heart sink, then you should do the honourable thing and resign,” Hegseth said, as he laid out his ideas to change military policy and philosophy.
Announcing 10 new directives aimed at shifting the military from “woke garbage” toward a “warrior ethos”, Hegseth decried efforts made over the last decade to diversify leadership in the US military and stamp out harmful behaviours like harassment.
“This administration has done a great deal since Day 1 to remove the social justice, politically-correct, toxic ideological garbage that had infected our department,” Hegseth said. “No more identity months, DEI offices or dudes in dresses. No more climate change worship. No more division, distraction of gender delusions. No more debris. As I’ve said before and will say, we are done with that shit,” Hegseth said.
Pointing his finger at the military’s appearance, Hegseth criticised overweight troops saying he doesn’t want “to see fat generals and admirals” and that there should be “no more beardos”.
Moving forwards, Hegseth said all fitness tests would be set to male benchmarks only.
During his 45-minute address, Hegseth also defended his firing of two of the highest-ranking women in the Armed Forces and the second Black man to serve as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen CQ Brown Jr.
In February this year, Hegseth fired the Navy’s chief of naval operations, Admiral Lisa Franchetti. She was the first woman to lead the Navy and the first woman to serve on the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Hegseth also abruptly fired Adm. Linda Fagan, who led the Coast Guard and was the first woman to lead a branch of the military.
He said he’d chosen to fire these previous generals because they’d been personally invested in progressive ideas about diversity.
“It’s nearly impossible to change a culture with the same people helped create or even benefited from that culture,” Hegseth said, decrying “the insane fallacy that diversity is our strength”.
Following Hegseth’s speech to the silent audience of top US generals, Donald Trump took the stage to give a speech embracing Hegseth’s calls for changes in the military.
Trump suggested that the officers and senior listed advisers should consider targeting US cities and civilian populations as a training exercise.
“We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military – national guard, but military – because we’re going into Chicago very soon, that’s a big city with an incompetent governor,” Trump said, referencing JB Pritzker, the Democratic governor of Illinois.
Trump also made comments that he would fire military leaders on the spot if he didn’t like them.
“If you don’t like what I’m saying, you can leave the room, of course, there goes your rank, there goes your future,” Trump said.
While the US president is the Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy, the US military is meant to be loyal to the country’s constitution and independent of any party or political movement.