I spent the first 20 years of my legal career at a Big Law firm in Los Angeles, the darkest blue. I stay in touch with some of my former colleagues, and it was at one of our periodic get-togethers that I was asked the following question:
What do you think of Hegseth? He seems to be firing all the women and minority generals. Firing so many top leaders during a war can't be good.
A little background before I give my answer.
First, my former colleagues aren't stereotypical Los Angeles attorneys who hand a valet the keys to a convertible Mercedes-Benz sporting a “Bernie” bumper sticker. They are married men with children, all of whom played contact sports. They went to state schools.
And like 95 percent of Americans, none of them served in the military. I may be the only veteran they know personally. Their question showed their depth of understanding, which, unfortunately, probably aligns with what most civilians exposed to the media believe.
Because these were my friends, my answer was this:
Hegseth is doing what needs to be done. He’s changing the culture before it becomes too rotten.
They looked at me a little bit confused, but nobody asked a follow-up question.
Had they pressed further, I would have told them there was nothing unusual about the military’s civilian masters firing generals and admirals for any reason, or for no reason. Presidents from Lincoln to Truman to Obama fired generals. Lots of them. The President is the Commander-in-Chief and can pick who he wants.
I would have explained that past administrations fired generals for insubordination or ineffectiveness; the Obama and Biden administrations used this power to deliberately reshape military culture by installing ideologues at the top of the armed forces. Traditional military values were out; “woke” was in. General Mark Milley, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (“JCS”), best exemplified this when he testified to Congress about teaching Critical Race Theory at West Point and his desire to “understand white rage.” Admiral Michael Gilday, the Chief of Naval Operations (“CNO”), signaled that the U.S. Navy's culture had moved in the same direction by defending the inclusion of Ibram X. Kendi’s How to Be an Antiracist on a recommended reading list for young sailors. Kendi’s book broadly argues the remedy for past racism is prospective racism. Milley’s successor on the JCS, Air Force General CQ Brown, put those ideas into practice by implementing racial quotas for the Air Force’s officer applicant pools.
The ideas espoused at the top filtered down through the ranks. The Navy, showing a particular enthusiasm for “diversity,” had a sailor who was a “drag queen influencer” make recruiting videos. The Army released an animated short film featuring a corporal raised by lesbians in San Francisco who was inspired to serve because her country defended gay rights. The ads reveal much about who military leadership thought its target audience was and who it wanted serving in Army units and crewing ships in the fleet. This likely correlates with the military’s recruiting problems during this era.
The military academies followed suit, offering academic minors in Diversity and Inclusion, providing the pseudo-intellectual foundation for the toxic idea that people should be segregated according to race, sex, and political orientation. Soon-to-be young officers from the nation’s primary commissioning sources would carry these ideas into Air Force squadrons, the fleet, and operational Army units, ensuring the cultural changes pushed down from the top were also driven up from below.
It is no coincidence these same military leaders steeped in diversity and inclusion presided over the catastrophic withdrawal from Afghanistan.
And as tragic as the Afghan fiasco was, the more damaging long-term aspect was the unmistakable message it sent to the military: ideological conformity outweighed battlefield success. The military had been reoriented to look inward and root out ideological noncompliance instead of looking outward to project American power. No generals responsible for the humiliating retreat were fired, and, more tellingly, none felt enough shame or had the honor to resign. This reflected the prevailing culture: defeat was tolerable (and professionally survivable) as long as the defeated force was sufficiently inclusive and diverse.
Which brings us back to Hegseth.
If my colleagues had asked, I would have explained that, as a veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Hegseth saw firsthand the leaders the Obama/Biden years cultivated and promoted. He saw the consequences of a military distracted from its core competencies and led by people chosen for reasons other than merit.
Hegseth first expunged Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Eliminating DEI offices dismantled programs that sorted service members into oppressor and oppressed categories. The change reaffirmed that military advancement should depend on merit and competence rather than ancestry or identity.
Next, and probably equally important, he set a personal example for leadership. Hegseth is a comparatively young, fit, secretary of defense, and he immediately began showing the vigor he expected at all levels of leadership. Photos show him running with special operators in Germany and doing push-ups in the snow with American troops stationed in Poland. Hegseth bench-pressed 315lbs during a workout with the 101st Airborne at Ft. Campbell. Wearing a cadet-issue USAFA T-shirt, Hegseth shot 9-of-10 three-pointers at Clune Arena during the Air Force Academy football game against Navy in early October.
The secretary of defense’s range from the three-point arc and willingness to do push-ups in the Polish snow at dawn aren’t themselves important and are easily dismissed as political parlor tricks. But anyone who has ever led soldiers, sailors, airmen, or Marines knows that within hours of his racking the weight, every private on Ft. Campbell knew how much Hegseth could bench. Push-ups in pre-dawn PT formations send an unmistakable message: physical fitness matters, and the standards are high. It shows what Hegseth expects of his subordinate commanders and the culture he wants them to instill in their units. Through his actions, he also communicates the most foundational element of military culture to every level of leadership: This is important, and I’m not asking you to do anything I’m not doing myself.
Most importantly, however, Hegseth is re-establishing combat effectiveness as the military’s focus. Superficial and irrelevant “firsts” are out as a qualification for leadership positions and promotion (e.g., the “first” half-Jamaican, half-Indian officer to lead a destroyer squadron, or the “first” non-binary service member to complete Airborne training). Demonstrated competence as a warfighter is back in.
In the coming promotion cycle, Hegseth has instituted the “Joint Warfighting Evaluation,” essentially graded wargames, to help select senior officers for promotion. This represents a profound cultural shift because it says demonstrated capability should count as much (or, hopefully, more than) candidates who spent careers checking the right boxes.
Hegseth understands the military exists to win wars. Period. It’s not a tool to advance ideological agendas or to reward political conformity. Restoring a warfighting culture – we used to call this the “warrior spirit” - where leaders are judged by their competence, character, merit, and aggression is not merely desirable; it is essential.
And from everything we’ve seen, Hegseth understands this.