America's Culture War Goes Hot as Trump and Hegseth Convert the Military's Prime Mission to Enforcing a Police State
This is where America's long culture war can rapidly escalate into a full-on bloody civil war.
Apparently Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and President Donald Trump did not call all US generals and admirals to Washington, D.C., to discuss the broadening war with Russia. Based on what they made public today, they called the nation’s top military leaders there, as Hegseth originally said, to talk about the warrior ethos. Oh, and to completely re-orient the military to a different mission than they have historically ever carried out. Both men particularly focused on the new mission in their speeches. Of course, who knows if more—like Russia or China—was talked about that was not disclosed to the public?
One of the reasons the top brass were all brought together was because some were rebelling against word that was spreading about Hegseth’s new plans for the military, which turn out to be Trump’s plans as well. They were there to hear both men tell them, with no minced words, such rebellion would not be tolerated at all.
Leading military chiefs have lashed out at Pete Hegseth’s plan to overhaul the country’s defense strategy, according to a report.
Multiple Pentagon leaders, including Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have raised concerns about the proposals set out by the self-styled “secretary of war.”
Trump has been testing his new National Defense Strategy in a few well publicized field operations. The plan is to take the United State’s military off of foreign wars, as much as possible, and focus them on policing America. Yes, the plan is to establish martial law in America or, at least, to use the military to police the state with all the force necessary to get the people of this country in line.
The issue [that some generals had with Hegseth] stems from Hegseth’s plans to rewrite the National Defense Strategy (NDS) to list homeland defense as the nation’s top priority—rather than continuing to focus on global security threats from China, as it has for years—and to reduce the U.S. military presence in Europe and Africa….
There are growing concerns within the military that Hegseth’s proposals are short-sighted and “potentially irrelevant….”
Hegseth began his speech by tackling the woke aspects he despises in today’s military, as came about by President Obama and particularly President Biden, before going into his change of mission, making it resoundingly clear the Trump military will be woke no more. He even told them, if they don’t like it, get out now! The cleanup of culture the military will be enforcing in US cities must begin in the military.
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth reiterated his vow to purge the military of diversity and inclusion efforts and bring an end to “woke garbage” in the military in a blistering address to top commanders Tuesday.
Hegseth, a former Fox News host, cast his purge of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives as part of a broader cultural battle.
The military will be taking this battle to US cities, particularly those run by Democrats; so, it must clean up its own culture first.
“No more identity months, DEI offices, dudes in dresses,” he told the audience. “No more climate change worship, no more division, distraction or gender delusions, no more debris.”
He argued the military had “lost our way” under “foolish and reckless political leaders” who, he claimed, turned the Pentagon into “the woke department.” That era, he said, was over.
“You might say, we’re ending the war on warriors,” Hegseth told the assembled brass
He and Trump both made it clear this culture war is to be taken to the streets of America because America’s “dangerous cities” are to be the military’s new prime theater for action, according to the commander-in-chief, who also spoke at the pep rally.
President Donald Trump told top military brass that the US is fighting an “invasion from within,” as he used a highly unusual gathering of officers stationed around the world to deliver a largely political speech that highlighted border security and rooting out “woke” culture.
I’m all for seeing woke culture go away, as well as the new Republican conscription of cancel culture, but I thought it might happen by a shift in focus and practices within government political departments, not with military enforcement in US cities. If anything has the potential to turn our long cultural divisions into a civil war, inserting the full US military into the center of it, could do the trick. Of course, the military has overwhelming power, so resistance may be futile and feared so much it never begins (but I doubt it).
The military is also going to carry out a high-steroid version of immigration enforcement and border patrolling:
“After spending trillions of dollars defending the borders of foreign countries, with your help, we’re defending the borders of our country,” Trump said on Tuesday at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia.
“It’s the enemy from within, and we have to handle it before it gets out of control,” he added.
Given how laden Trump’s speech was with jabs at his Democratic opponents, one might reasonably conclude Trump intends to focus the military on “Blue” cities in order to usurp local authority from his political enemies, as he has already made his focus with D.C., L.A., Portland and all the other cities where he has taken up police action.
“If you don’t like what I’m saying, you can leave the room,” Trump said to laughter from the crowd of hundreds — nearly all uniformed military brass. “Of course, there goes your rank. There goes your future. But you just feel nice and loose, OK? Because we’re all on the same team.”
Trump’s speech once again highlighted how he has sought to involve the military in his political agenda, waging cultural fights that top officers have long worked to steer clear of over fears that it could erode public support for an institution that’s meant to be apolitical.
“It’s shocking to see the president and secretary engaged in this kind of dangerous and politicized incitement,” said Kori Schake, director of foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute.
“But it was reassuring to see the quiet professionalism” of the military leaders, just as the Joint Chiefs of Staff during State of the Union speeches, and “they deserve enormous credit for maintaining their integrity,” said Schake, who has previously held high-level roles at the Pentagon, State Department and National Security Council under Republican administrations….
“I’m not saying the whole emphasis on the homeland is bad by any means but it’s probably not going to be the main thing we want our military to do,” given obligations to key allies that help prevent a threat to the homeland, said Michael O’Hanlon, Philip H. Knight Chair in defense and strategy at the Brookings Institution. “It’s more Trump’s overall political anger writ large that troubles me.”
Many in military leadership have, in the past, warned that using the military to police US citizens in their daily life is a lot like using an atom bomb to dig a ditch. The military has enormously powerful tools that it is trained to use in broadly destructive ways, and it doesn’t tend to act with a lot of finesse or nuance because the warrior ethos is to destroy the enemy, not to make sure he behaves.
Like Trump, Hegseth also urged his top leaders to quit the service if they were not aligned with his vision. In fact, Trump no doubt said his part to make it clear he stands behind Hegseth on that. Form any verbal opposition, and you may see the end of your shiny career.
“If the words I’m speaking today are making your heart sink, you should do the honorable thing and resign,” Hegseth said, though he predicted most would agree with his remarks.
Some of his ire appeared to be personal:
In his speech, Hegseth underscored strict physical standards for the entire force and said he would change how inspectors general process complaints and move away from a range of diversity practices.
“No more frivolous complaints, no more anonymous complaints, no more repeat complainants, no more smearing reputations,” Hegseth said. “No more walking on eggshells.”
Hegseth is the subject of an investigation by the Pentagon’s inspector general, an independent oversight authority, for leaking classified information in a Signal messaging chat that inadvertently included a journalist….
He announced plans to change how information in personnel records is retained — something he said would “allow leaders with forgivable, earnest, or minor infractions to not be encumbered by those infractions in perpetuity.”
For the most part, Hegseth focused on his culture war, and our Peace President made it clear that our inner cities are …
a big part of war now.
He also said …
defending the homeland [from within] was the military’s “most important priority.” He signaled the leaders in the room could be tasked with aiding in federal interventions in Democratic-led cities such as Chicago and New York City.
“They’re very unsafe places, and we’re going to straighten them out one by one,” Trump said. “And this is going to be a major part for some of the people in this room. That’s a war, too. It’s a war from within.”
So, we will be at war with our own cities, quite literally, by putting our generals and their heavy munitions into the center of the conflicts that divide us as a nation. Maybe it will turn out to be a great clean-up act. I certainly believe a lot of cultural cleanup is due; but I doubt it will go well.
“I told [Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth], we should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military — National Guard, but our military, because we’re going into Chicago very soon,” Trump added. “That’s a big city with an incompetent governor.
So, the big meeting, as far as anything made public about it, was all about shifting the US military’s mission predominantly toward fighting the culture war and the border war from within the nation. That turns the culture war into an actual hot war with the heaviest of armaments available, for which Trump already authorized “full force” yesterday, and the focus throughout was on Democrat-run cities.
While I think our nation’s culture has become disgusting, forcing cultural change with the military, may make this as bloody a battle as the last US Civil War. It certainly wasn’t what Jesus did. It will turn brother against brother or sister against sister, cousin against cousin, because who doesn’t have both liberals and conservatives in the same family? Those who take up the sword will die by the sword, fighting their own nation, and a house divided against itself, as Jesus also first said, cannot stand. Now, instead of arguing at Thanksgiving, families could wind up shooting out their differences in the streets of our dangerous cities.
Maybe it won’t get anywhere near that bad because maybe the overwhelming force of the military right from the get-go (or the threat of it) will curb even thoughts of rebellion; but I doubt that, too. This is an experiment in culture wars that has never been tried. Even Ancient Rome didn’t war much over cultural concerns. (Have all the drugs and prostitutes you want, and cheap migrant labor was the rage of the day in the form of slavery.)
Or maybe the high emphasis on culture war at today’s meeting was just intended to be within the military, and the military will just focus on upholding the laws on drug use and immigration and … loitering and homelessness (vagrancy laws if they even exist any more) with bullets and the other tools the military uses. If so that wasn’t made clear. Use of the military also provides pathways to avoid civil courts under martial law, and Trump will find that handy.
If you’re a conservative, and you are a hundred-percent in favor of this method of cleaning up our often ugly, crime-infested, drug-addled, homeless, frequently Democratically-run, violent major cities, just remember payback will come! It always does. Whatever door gets opened here may easily be used from the other side to walk in the opposite direction—by liberals to fight to regain and replant their culture as soon as they get back in power, forcing vaccines, forcing LGBTQ inclusion in school programming, or whatever they want to force, just as Trump will be forcing whatever he wants to force.
Either side may even get comfortable enough with this to eventually use the military to force cooperation with a new digital currency system. Trump has his own digital currency system he is developing very quickly on our behalf. Just make that system the law along with a digital ID system, and then use the often court-free, military process to enforce obedience to the law.
Don’t think this Pandora’s box, once opened, doesn’t have powers for any side that is in control of it to make use of it for their objectives. That is why the military has always been kept out of law enforcement. Its existing warrior ethos makes it not at all gentle in enforcement, and Hegseth made it clear he expects a more full-throated warrior ethos.
This is the start of US citizens being policed on a daily basis by the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard and National Guard. Suddenly, all those “Hitler” warnings about Facism and authoritarian government taking over are not looking all that far off because once you start using the military to enforce the way you think America should be, you find more and more occasions and concerns where deploying that powerful shortcut and military gulags like Guantanamo is tempting; and, thus, absolute power corrupts absolutely.
I mean, why use the military and pound out a message about needing a stronger warrior ethos, if you are not going to use the full force of the firepower and training the military has available? Surely, Trump and Hegseth are not going to re-orient the military to internal policing of US cities and then hamstring them from using their best stuff and all their muscle and combat training! That would be self-contradictory to all that warrior-ethos talk! You’d be turning the military into mean-looking babysitters if you make them hold back the use of their weaponry. Hence, Trump already said to “use full force.”
How humiliating will it be if Trump and Hegseth hold them back from showing what they can really do? How conflicted will they be if they find themselves gunning down their own countrymen or even their own families? Is that what they signed up for?
Has this been thought through? Or will it be like DOGE, which I said was entirely ham-fisted in its first week of operation, being run by mere boys, and looking like no thought was being given to whom should be fired … to such extent that I said repeatedly the government would have to hire back many of those fired. Sure enough, time and time again, the government has had to hire back a great many of the people DOGE fired and is simply months behind on the work. Having paid those people to do nothing as apart of their severance for the last several months, the government now has to pay them to get caught up.
So, will the greater damage be to US cities and US citizens AND RELATIVELY PEACEFUL LIFE AS WE HAVE ALWAYS KNOWN IT, or to a deeply demoralized military being tasked with a new mission far beneath a soldier’s training and far from what any of them believed they were signing up for?