President-elect Donald Trump stunned the Pentagon and the broader defense world by nominating Fox News host Pete Hegseth to serve as his defense secretary, tapping someone largely inexperienced and untested on the global stage to take over the world’s largest and most powerful military.
You say that like I should want the US military to be effective.
The military will be effective at what ever it’ll do. You should hope it maintains some sanity at least. Like a loaded gun won’t jam just because a crazy person picked it up.
Wrong. Give an ape a gun. They’re just as likely to kill themselves as anyone else.
Right…i think the metaphor train has derailed here.
What possible action do you think the military could be ordered to do, that will harm its capability to wage war, and will not result in even more innocent people getting killed than the regular levels of evil? Or is this a ‘acceptable collateral damage as long as its not me’ type of thing?
Privatize everything and lay off all government employees. Let the Department of War be run by the lowest bidder.
That sounds really bad. Apologies but if this is all sarcasm, that is lost on me. I got people arguing that Trump helping Isreal finish the genocide quickly with be good for the Palestinians who live through it, and so sarcasm is long dead.
Let me be clear then: the US military is a force for evil and anything that weakens it is positive for the rest of the world.
Ok… but to argue that to privatize war making to the lowest bidder sounds like the premise to a libertarian monkey paw nightmare. Like current mercenaries track record with human rights violations is…well poor would be an understatement. And what is the issue you have with NATO?
Disband 20% of it’s career leadership.
Zero out pentagon funding.
Withdraw from NATO.
And this is what you are arguing that trump will do? Or should do? And you are aware of its full consequences?
Withdrawing from NATO, I could see Trump entertaining that (wouldn’t actually happen).
Fire a bunch of the top leadership? For sure. That would both be something Trump could “order the military to do,” as well as something he might do, and it would also harm the US military’s capability to wage war.
Zero out Pentagon funding? Not possible for trump to do alone, but depending on the congressional make up, it could be done and would severely limit the ability of the US Military to wage war. They could even do it without affecting enlisted personnel enrollment. The Pentagon has their own funding 100% separate from military spending.
Could also deny all future discretionary spending for the military/pentagon.
Claudia De la Cruz’s 2024 platform included reducing military spending by 90%, which is exactly what I’ve been arguing for years. That’s more than enough to ensure “homeland security.”