Our Military is not great and has backed down in the past? Our military only backs down at the direction of civilian “leadership.” A true believer in America First is a disaster at DOD.

Wait, that makes him perfect.

I wonder what he's going to give ailing cannon.

Immediately makes someone a Secretary of Defense

SO tired of these maga comments

US military is a sprawling operation. Complex. It takes knowledge and experience to manage it.

My understanding of the Army tells me that a Captain is a rank that operates almost entirely at the tactical level, with limited responsibility of commanding relatively small units (Company/Battery) or serving as staff officers at somewhat larger units.

This does not prepare someone for managing the DoD as a whole while offering strategic vision and leadership.

On the other hand, 6 of 21 SecDefs have never been in the military and many others had limited and/or low-level military experience - Leon Panetta, for instance, mustered out as a First Lieutenant [source].

It is the civilian experience in government and/or industry that makes or breaks most SecDefs and Trump's pick seems even more lacking in that than in military qualifications.

Resume -
- Equity capital markets analyst
- Conservative policy wonk
- PAC/Advocacy group director
- Media pundit

Not quite comparable to Panetta or Gates or ... really anyone that has held the job.

Perhaps we can hope that his name is being floated so that when Trump names his actual pick everyone can say "at least s/he is not as bad as Hegseth!"

One can only hope/dread.