Peter Principle poster boy Pete Hegseth had reached the zenith of his intellectual career as a talking head for FOX.  His hawkish-military machismo persona, bravado and, brazen-pretty-boy face got the attention of our President.  If you haven’t noticed, good-looks ranks as high on Trump’s “must-have” list as actual credentials.  Now, as Secretary of War, Hegseth is in so far over his head that the US Navy can’t even save him.

The role of what was traditionally called the Secretary of Defense, (now War), was specifically meant to provide a clear demarcation between civilian management of the US armed forces and the fighting forces themselves.  According to the National Security Act of 1947,” “There shall be a Secretary of Defense, who shall be appointed from civilian life by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate: PROVIDED, That a person who has within ten years been on active duty as a commissioned officer in a Regular component of the armed services shall not be eligible for appointment as Secretary of Defense.”

Civilian control of our military is a fundamental principle of American democracy.

In 2018, eight years ago, the National Defense Strategy Commission said, “…civilian voices have been relatively muted on issues at the center of U.S. defense and national security policy, undermining the concept of civilian control…It is critical that DOD—and Congress—reverse the unhealthy trend in which decision-making is drifting away from civilian leaders on issues of national importance.”  The appointment of Hegseth does nothing except exacerbate this issue.

Hegseth is a bully.  He vented his spleen while addressing Generals and flag officers at Quantico marine base in September of 2025, in a tone many found condescending.  His sentiment remained me of someone who has had a chip on his shoulder for some time and now has discovered the opportunity to vent with impunity.  This is what the Center for Strategic & International Studies had to say about his remarks.  “Hegseth could not restrain himself from getting personal. He criticized Generals Mark Milley, Peter Chiarelli, and Frank Mackenzie by name, the latter two because of their association with the Afghanistan withdrawal; despite their having criticized the Obama administration’s handling of the operation. Belittling officers by name smacks of pettiness.”

And once again, Hegseth doesn’t disappoint with demonstrating just how petty one can get.  After Senator Kelly and five other congressmen issued a public statement suggesting that military personnel have a right to disobey an unlawful order, Pete went right to the internet and accused Senator Kelly of sedition and reckless misconduct, threatening to degrade his retirement allowance.  How clearly vindictive.  This is, in part what the statement from Kelly and the others said:

“Our laws are clear. You can refuse illegal orders. You must refuse illegal orders. No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our constitution”. 

The words above are statements of FACT.  The words are TRUE and our soldiers need to know where that line is.  Equating the utterance of these statements with acts of sedition is preposterous.  While not saying so directly, it would seem that this statement might refer to the extrajudicial assaults and murders of alleged drug runners on the high seas being conducted by the military under Hegseth’s orders.

We are not at war.

Simply declaring certain boats in the Caribbean as “narco-terrorists” doesn’t magically create some kind of legal authority to blow them up.  Putting video all over television of US forces blasting boats out of the water and killing people every other day serves to harden the hearts of viewers and reduce the human element to the status of a video-game.  These boats were in international waters.  We have no legal authority over them.  We killed over 100 people without a clue as to who they were or how they found themselves in those situations.  Telling the American public that the boats are running drugs and coming to our shores is really quite a stretch.  Are we to take it all in and believe it as an article of faith?  Is the unrelenting mantra of “fentanyl is killing our kids” justification for anything and everything we do?  If we know all of that, why can’t we simply interdict these boats once they are in our jurisdiction?  Could it be that we needed a pretext to go after Maduro and overtake the Venezuelan oil supply?  Trump always has bigger plans.

Hegseth is a henchman, only better than those he pursues by virtue of his own sense of his virtue above yours.  Pete is the kind of guy that measures the mark of a man by how many pull-ups he can do, a warrior not a statesman, a useful idiot for the Trump agenda, and that agenda may have many highlights, good things and great outcomes, but at what a price when we begin to ignore the ends and means arguments in favor of just getting what we want.

While Lailah Gifty Akita, tells us that “A warrior walks alone in the dark.”   Henry Kissinger reminds us that, “It is imperative that the statesman bridges the gap between his nation’s experience and his vision.”

What the United States of America needs immediately, is that heretofore unacknowledged leader that can take us into the future with the balance, freedom, understanding and moral surety that God demands from a nation that sets the example for the rest of the world.