Why, in his own words, Hegseth is an unqualified candidate for secretary of Defense

The nomination of Peter Hegseth as secretary of Defense represents a clear and present danger to America's national security.

He does not possess the leadership or management experience to successfully manage a workforce of 2.9 million people and a more than $800 billion budget. He has expressed alarmingly poor judgment across a broad range of policy and political issues. Finally, he has demonstrated a number of moral failures in his personal life.

The U.S. military operates at four levels: tactical, operational, strategic and geopolitical. All of his military experience is as a part-time National Guard officer, solely at the tactical level. I applaud him for his service, but the gap between the tactical and the geopolitical level is too great to close through on-the-job training. Nor does his service as a television commentator does not qualify an individual to serve as secretary of Defense.

Beyond his professional inexperience, I have found that his own commentary solidifies his lack of qualification for the position. As expressed through numerous interviews and his own book, there are a plethora of examples that represent what I believe to be politically poor and divisive judgment.

In his book “American Crusade: Our Fight to Stay Free,” he said he believes there are “irreconcilable differences between the left and the right in America leading to perpetual conflict that cannot be resolved through the political process.” He called for an “American Crusade,” which he described as “a holy war for the righteous cause of human freedom.” He also said in May 2024, “Democracy, democracy, defend the democracy. Do you know what our founders did not want us to be? A democracy.” He added that he supports gerrymandering to “screw Democrats.”

Back in 2018, Hegseth said that if the Democrats won the 2020 elections, there would be a “national divorce,” that “The military and police ... will be forced to make a choice,” and that “yes, there will be some form of civil war.” He also stated that conservatives must “mock, humiliate, intimidate, and crush our leftist opponents” to deal with a left that he equates with “sedition.” He claims his book “lays out the strategy we must employ in order to defeat America's internal enemies.”

This rhetoric is divisive, dangerous and should be considered disqualifying.

Hegseth’s poor judgment extends further, into military policy specifically. When Hegseth was the chief executive for Concerned Veterans for America, an advocacy group funded by the Koch brothers, the group advocated for greater privatization of the Department of Veterans Affairs — a move that veterans and veterans organizations vigorously objected to.

In mid-2019, while serving as a commentator on Fox News, Hegseth urged Donald Trump to pardon soldiers convicted of war crimes in Iraq, without disclosing to his audience that he had advised Trump to pardon them. He thus demonstrated contempt for a bedrock of U.S. military ethos, the Uniformed Code of Military Justice. He has also vehemently defended the January 6 rioters, labeling them patriots who had been “re-awoken to the reality of what the left has done” to the country. Storming the Capitol to overturn an election is a treasonous act; to laud it as patriotic is certainly misguided.

Hegseth stated baldly that he wants to fire Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He wants to purge the military of “woke” generals and DEI programs, saying that “any general that was involved, general, admiral, whatever, that was involved in any of the DEI, woke s--- has got to go.” This then invites the question: would those who remain be similarly purged if a Democratic administration wins the White House in 2028?

If this started a snowball effect of politically purging military leaders, who would then lead our military? It would constantly be in flux, changing with the whims of the parties themselves.

Hegseth also opposed including women in combat roles, stating this year that “I'm straight up just saying that we should not have women in combat roles.” This is an alarming position, given the current recruiting crisis in our military. Today, women comprise 22 percent of our active All-Volunteer force. The immediate effect would be that more than 4,000 fully qualified women now in combat billets, many of them pilots, would have to be reassigned to positions and be retrained.

Would women be willing to join a military led by an individual who denies them the opportunity to serve in roles for which they are fully qualified, simply because of their gender? And would Democrats, whom Hegseth has also disparaged, be disinclined to enlist? In a 50-50 nation, close to 75 percent of the population may be disinclined to volunteer to serve in a Hegseth-led military. A recruitment crisis could then turn into a recruitment catastrophe.

His moral failures are informed by a 2017 rape allegation. Although no charges were filed, he paid his accuser as part of a nondisclosure agreement in 2020. Additionally, in August 2017, while still married to his second wife, he had a child with a Fox executive producer. These actions are inconsistent with the espoused values of the U.S. military.

By no means am I an apologist for the Defense Department. I believe there are many failing policies and procedures in the department, and that greater accountability is necessary. However, the confirmation of Hegseth would not fix these failures — it would only add to and compound them.

Maj. Gen. (ret.) Dennis Laich served 35 years in the Army Reserve. He held various command positions, most recently as commander of the 94th Regional Readiness Command in Ft. Devens, Mass. Laich is a senior fellow at Eisenhower Media Network and author of “Skin in the Game: Poor Kids and Patriots.”

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