Comment: MAGA politics more damaging to military than 'wokeness'

Why does President-elect Donald Trump intend to nominate as his defense secretary Pete Hegseth, a 44-year-old Fox News host and former major in the Army National Guard who has no experience running a vast organization like the Defense Department and who is now embroiled in a sexual assault scandal? (He denies wrongdoing in the 2017 incident, and no police charges were filed.)

At least part of the explanation for the decision can be found in Trump’s desire to purge what he has described as “a woke military that can’t fight or win, as proven in Afghanistan.” In a book published earlier this year, Hegseth wrote: “Our generals are not ready for this moment in history. Not even close. The next president of the United States needs to radically overhaul Pentagon senior leadership to make us ready to defend our nation and defeat our enemies. Lots of people need to be fired.”

These criticisms might resonate with at least a portion of the public fed up with the costly futility of America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; and conditioned by relentless right-wing criticism into thinking that the armed forces have been hijacked by social justice activists. Although the military remains one of the most respected institutions in U.S. society, only 60 percent of those surveyed by Gallup in 2023 expressed confidence in the armed services; the lowest level in more than two decades.

Yet the blame for what went wrong with the post-9/11 wars rests more with politicians than generals. It was America’s political leaders who gave the armed forces the thankless task of transforming Afghanistan and Iraq into Western-style democracies. That was probably a mission impossible, especially given the limited commitment Washington was willing to make in both countries. For example, when President Barack Obama announced in 2009 that he was sending 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan, he also said they would begin coming home within 18 months; a timeline that encouraged the Taliban to wait them out.

https://www.heraldnet.com/opinion/comment-maga-politics-more-damaging-to-military-than-wokeness/