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When I worked at Dell, we got a new vice president over the Dimension line of the business. He was a nice man, fairly smart, likable, and effective. But his first week on the job he annoyed me because he announced to us all in an email that building more computers was easy: All we had to do was get rid of the bottlenecks in the process.
That's like telling a race car driver that to win a race, all he needs to do is drive faster.
Pete essentially told the general and flag officers yesterday that all they need to do is get rid of bottlenecks. His speech was not very original, and indicates that he has the myopia of a company grade officer.
What's a company grade officer? A lieutenant or a captain in the military rank system. The naval ranks would be called junior grade officers, if I'm not mistaken. He expressed absolutely no understanding of what the Navy does, nor any interest in that branch. In fact, though he doesn't intend it, his decision to change the name of the military organization from the elegant "Department of Defense," which was a way to bring together the Department of War and the Department of the Navy, could be taken as an insult to the latter. I think this speech shows it's just his ignorance and a facile acceptance of an old joke told by Robert Heinlein — that no Department of Defense ever won a war — as some sort of real truth.
Our nation is primarily a maritime nation. We won WWII because of our navy. But yesterday I don't think Pete even mentioned a ship, let alone acknowledged that manning a ship is not the same as fighting in the infantry. How are you going to get men in a submarine to do strenuous exercise every day?
Pete has the vision of an army infantry lieutenant. I find army lieutenants to be laudable people, and I like them. But there is a lot more to what the military does than merely being an infantryman. Yes, every Marine is a rifleman, but that is just the starting point. We also need Marines to fix airplanes, cook chow, and deliver parts. One is not more important than the other. They are all there to support the commander in conducting the campaign.
But the really pathetic part of the presentation is that Pete, vapid as he is, is exactly right. Everything he said needed to be said. He is the right man for the job at this time. Let's just hope that this focus on the basics is not the full extent of his agenda. I don't want any more Rumsfelds, MacNamaras, or Colin Powells, but we will need more than just a call to return to the basics in order to defend this great nation.
Discussion (37)
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I appreciate your perspective, Skyler. I does occur to me that if what Hegseth said is "exactly right" then we'd expect a less "vapid" man to say pretty much the same thing. There may be reasons to be skeptical of Hegseth but, based on the argument you present, this speech seems not to be one of them.
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Thank you for your post; I recommend it for promotion to the Main Feed.
As a retired Colonel (US Army Reserve and Army National Guard, 1983 - 2013) with experience in Mechanized Infantry, Transportation Corps (Army Boats) and the Chemical Corps, perhaps I can offer some context to SEC Hegseth's comments and his stated intent to return the US Military to a higher war-fighting capability.
1. You are 100% correct that SEC Hegseth tends to speak like a company-grade officer. He rose to the rank of O-4 (Major or Lieutenant-Commander), and served honorably in combat in a variety of direct action and counter-insurgency roles. But prior to his appointment as SECDEF, he has had zero formal training or experience regarding working at the senior officer level. Everything he knows about generals and admirals he knows only from first-hand experience
2. To be promoted to Major, in addition to serving in range of troop leading and staff assignments, he would have to complete two military education requirements: the Infantry officers basic course, required for promotion to O-3 (Captain, or Lieutenant), and then an officers advanced course, required for promotion to O-4. Neither of these courses address the senior ranks or how any of the services function administratively in any way.
EDIT: There were additional points I thought might be useful, but I had a student arrive to make up a quiz. I had to decide in the moment whether or not to post what I had, incomplete though it was or come back to it later and find it had been overcome by events. I decided to hit "post," and see where the conversation would go.
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Wow. Posts like this remind me of how much I don’t know about the military.
But if the military is like everything else, sometimes a bold feint is a gamble worth taking, a sideways distraction/strategy to shake up a complacent, ingrown, hide-bound situation. You take all the inevitable flak, because your move is not meant to be taken completely seriously. But it gets results, and, of course, throws your enemy into distracting convulsions.
Plus, would it be so hard to do a couple of situps, you complacent effs?
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One is tempted to ask if professionally trained senior officers are like professionally trained journalists, but that would be to bury the lede: the US still has a Navy, apparently.
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A Navy that is in terrible shape but, yeah, we have one. And my son filed his commissioning papers last week and hopes to join the fleet in June of next year, so I don't say that with any glee.
We need more ships and the manpower to sail them. Exhibit A:
This is the USS Stout (DDG-55), aka a "rust bucket." She looks that way because she deployed with the USS Harry S Truman (CVN-75) in October of 2024 and didn't return home to Norfolk until mid-June of 2025. Her paint is supposed to be more "eco-friendly" but it doesn't handle salt as well as the what the Navy used to use. And 215 consecutive days at sea doesn't help. It makes for a tired ship and a tired crew.
There was a period after WWII when the SecDef was just as likely to have served in the Navy as the Army. But that isn't the case anymore. Since Bush 41 the only Navy vet in that post has been Don Rumsfeld.
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