Since arriving in Washington, D.C., to head up the Department of Government Efficiency earlier this year, billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk has taken a hatchet to a growing list of government institutions. The result has been mass firings, extensive furloughs and an expanding number of lawsuits challenging alleged governmental overreach.
For Musk and his colleagues, all this might simply be the cost of doing business. But Washington isn’t Silicon Valley, and the operating model of “moving fast and breaking things” being employed by DOGE has real national security implications. That’s because it is becoming increasingly clear the White House’s current approach to shrinking the government is rebounding to the benefit of adversary nations.
Take America’s public diplomacy enterprise, for instance. In recent weeks, administration officials have taken aim at the U.S. Agency for Global Media, its constituent federal services (Voice of America and the Office of Cuba Broadcasting), and “grantee” entities that rely on federal funds to carry out surrogate broadcasting in unfree societies.
