Until last summer, Donald Trump was talking about firing senior military commanders on the campaign trail. After the election, his transition team reportedly created a list of senior officers to be fired. Trump's Secretary of Defense Pete Hegses told the podcast a few days before he was nominated for his position. “First of all, you must fire the co-headed chairman.”
Still, the Friday night massacre that hit senior US military leaders came in shock. Those fired include co-chief Chairman General Charles Q. Brown, Naval Operations Chief, Prime Minister Lisa Francetti, Deputy Chief of Staff James Slife, and the judges were the Army, Navy and Air Force generals. I support it. Lt. Gen. Jennifer Short, top military assistant at Hegses, was relieved on Saturday.
Trump and Hegses certainly have the right to bring together a team of military leaders they trust, but the situation and timing of the purge is motivated by the White House not only national security but also by doing so. I raise awkward questions about whether they are seeking an army. The political agenda of the administration.
And laying off three top military lawyers along with senior commanders raised concerns that Trump and Hegses might try to challenge long-standing principles of war laws and class accountability. Masu.
Trump reportedly reconsidered the brown shooting after a positive meeting in December, and lawmakers, including some Republicans, have until recently, a move that could indicate major changes in relations between the administrative sector He still hoped the administration would be revealed. And the army, but no use.
Even critics of the decision have acknowledged that the president, as commander of the military, is within his legal right to replace these commanders.
“The president has the right, for some reason, to have a military leader he is confident in,” said the director of foreign and defense policy studies at the American Institute of Corporate Research and former White House and Pentagon staff. Kori Sheikh said. “That doesn't even have to be a good reason.”
The President, of course, has released military commanders in their posts in the past. Some of the most well-known examples include Abraham Lincoln's cycling through five Union commanders during the Civil War, and Harry Truman publicly criticised the administration's policies during the Korean War. He later publicly dismissed General Douglas MacArthur from his command.
The looting of General David McKiannan's US commander, General David McKiannan, in 2009, Barack Obama, may be the closest to recent precedents for the president to fire a general early in his term.
Some military officers and defense officials have argued in recent years that the president is more modest for military leaders and should try to withstand battlefield failure.
However, in this case, the difference is that these officers do not appear to have failed their duties in a significant way. Trump praised Brown this week as a “outstanding leader.” It was Trump who promoted him to Air Force Secretary in 2020, at least on paper. Brown focuses on preparing the US for conflict with enemies “near peers” like Russia and China, seeking “ruthless prioritization,” including cutting off established, expensive military programs. The decision was made, and the change in priorities held by some of Trump's top advisors was sought.
“The fact that General Brown has been nominated and has become the Air Force Chief of Staff is that we are not dealing with the war with China and that we need to focus more on missions lethality. It was a complaint,” Sheikh said.
In theory, this should appeal to the Secretary of Defense, who vowed to “make America deadly again,” but Brown and other crimes are: Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion (DEI) It appears that their perceived connections were Hegses's main target since he was appointed policy. “The fundamental argument is that while Day is there, you can't pursue modernization and combat,” said Jeffrey Edmonds, an Army veteran and former senior adviser.
Brown was the first African-American to chair the co-chief, and Hegses previously wrote that Brown may only have moved forward in his position “because of his skin color.” Ta. card. ”
Hegseth likewise criticized Franchetti. Franchetti is the first woman to serve as co-headed, whose four-year career included numerous command posts as “Dei Hire.” Srife, who was removed as Deputy Chief of Staff of the Air Force, was accused of providing priority treatment to female candidates in the Air Force's Selective Special Operations Division, which he denied.
“It's hard to see you're firing women, people of color, and people of color who say good things about women and people of color,” says Peter, a former National Security Council staff member and professor at Duke University. Fever said. Military relations. “I don't think Hegses would accept that, but it's hard to resist that interpretation because they don't provide much background to explain their decision.”
Big questions about firing an attorney
In Schake's view, it was a more worrying move for three judges to defend Army, Navy and Air Force generals. These top officials, known as TJAGS, oversee the military intrajudicial justice system and addressed both the issues of criminal and administrative discipline of Hegses, and in his past works, slandered these officials as “jagovs.” said his confirmation hearing would give him his priorities. A priority is “Attention is not someone who gets in the way.”
During Trump's final term, Hegses defended and supported the president's amnesty, two army officials accused of war crimes in Afghanistan, and the naval seal. Two officers were kicked out of the military during the Biden administration to break a cycle of orders to publicly criticize military leaders.
“We are reaching out to the institutions to signal that we want a different kind of approach to the laws of war,” Schake said. “I think we're misunderstanding that our military is not only accorded to orders, but is widely recognized as an army, which is in favour of the United States.
Hegseth said the new TJAG is a lawyer “not existed to give constitutional advice and attempt a disability” and described the fired people as “insulations that perpetuate the status quo.”
However, this raises questions about the new status quo he is hoping for.
“When you're firing an attorney, that's because you're ready to do something illegal,” Edmonds said.
Brown's replacement is Air Force Lt. Gen. John Dan Dan “Razin” Kane. It is a very unusual move as Kane is a three-star general and not a four-star commander of the combatant command or service branch as normally required. I will be resigning from active duty again due to work as a joint chief chair. (The decision by John F. Kennedy to leave retired Maxwell Taylor to duties is because his chair may be the closest parallel.)
Chair should be in a non-political position – this is one of the reasons it extends to the presidential administration, but Trump's comments on Cain do not suggest that it's not what he's looking for.
When the two met in Iraq in 2018, Kane was the deputy commander of the US Central Command special operations element. As Trump recalled in his 2019 speech, the common “central casting” “outside central casting” could wipe out ISIS “in a week.” Trump also says that Kane put on a Maga hat and told him “I'll kill you for you.”
Other officials recall the incident differently, describing Kane as “not a politician.” It's all about how Kane becomes a major topic when he faces a Senate confirmation hearing.
In all descriptions, Kane is a skilled and respected military commander with some well-known posts under his belt, although not traditional for this role.
The question that lawmakers would like to impose on him is, “if he is a partisan general who is committed to the partisan agenda of the military.”
The question of what will come to the lawsuit is what Kane and the other senior military commanders will do if they receive an unconstitutional order. Mark Mirei, Brown's predecessor as co-chief chairman who became Trump's outspoken critic, said he was concerned during his tenure. Unconstitutional. ”
This is not the first time Trump has appointed a “central casting” general to a senior role. (Remember “Mad Dog” Matisse?) It is possible he finally found his man in “Razin” Kane, but this president's standard of loyalty is not easy to meet.
