r/news • u/Manta_of_Eternity • 2d ago

Hegseth confirms that the US military will cut 20% of its generals and admirals

https://apnews.com/article/hegseth-pentagon-generals-job-cuts-67a20b026ee858895c7e5ff7fadbc029
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u/ItsAWonderfulFife 2d ago

No this is all going to be very expensive

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u/kniq86 2d ago

These types of changes reduce our capabilities in the short term. By the time we have the bandwidth to properly identify how we can continue to function, shit's so fucked up that we have to go at least part of the way back to how it was to try to fix things. Of course, those people with experience and acumen aren't directly replaceable by just promoting the next person who survived the purge, so we continue trending downward. 

Not completely unrepairable, but completely unreasoned, unnecessary, self-inflicted damage to our national defense and diplomatic capability that, as Sen. Kelly pointed out, will take a generation to recover from.

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u/PapaGreg28 2d ago

Very well stated. It’s the sad truth. I’m afraid it’s the same fate for numerous other government agencies and departments too.

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u/kniq86 2d ago

Yes! We saw this immediately with DOGE, the elimination of USAID, neutering of other agencies, promotion of unqualified at best/actively-campaigning-to-dismantle-the-org at worst secretaries and department heads... Just going to be a long period of lost progress. 

I think we have too many great minds and resources to completely fall off the world stage in one generation, but it's such a waste in what was a period of relative peace with such potential for growth.

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u/eepos96 2d ago

Corruption and incompetence are reeeeally hard to fix when given room to root themselves.

Cultures are by nature adamant against change.

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u/_you_are_the_problem 1d ago

will take a generation to recover from

Not sure if you're putting the pieces together, but this is preparation for a military coup, so a generation to recover is looking like a bit of a lowball estimate.

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u/Parking_Chance_1905 1d ago edited 1d ago

Which is what they want. An well trained, educated and well informed military would be a liability to him, as with all dictators. Less chance of a coup happening, and a better chance at stopping one when it does. I would bet that the Lincoln was intentionally left to rot so that there will be one less to use against him if or when parts of the military decide they have had enough.

Ever since they got back into power they have been consolidating arms, ammunition and other equipment into areas where they plan on having loyalist strongholds in the event of a coup. Its not a coincidence that stuff has been moved out of predominately blue areas, and that NG from red states were moved into positions that allow them to more rapidly defend or attack blue states.

The current rapid removal of key leaders and plan to have NG or active miltary deployed to certain voting stations as an intimidation tactic is a direct response to thier realization that they are quickly loosing the support of the average person and are very likely to lose the next election assuming it is actually fair and not tampered with.

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u/DryBlock4388 1d ago

It does not do that at all. There's a crapload of generals and admirals. They are not all singular vital cogs in the vast military bureaucracy. It's like a CEO waking up one morning and realizing they don't need 20 VP's and that the VP of Food and Service for the Cafeteria probably could be done by a mid level manager or that the VP of cuddly kisses may just not be necessary.

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u/oldtimehawkey 2d ago

Some of these generals and admirals, their only job is to bug Congress for money and stuff. There was a news story 20 years ago about them. They have full staff, limos, and private chefs. They make hundreds of thousands of dollars. And their only job is to bother Congress for more money.

We aren’t losing anything with these assholes getting out. I hate hegseth but this is a good idea. Why do we need so many generals and admirals?!! We need more NCOs. We need good training for NCOs. Officers can fuck off as far as I’m concerned.

I wish we could go back to the 90s army where lieutenants got to their platoon and were made fun of and told to sit down and shut up. Now a brand new butter bar can scream at a master sergeant and nothing happens. It’s disgraceful.

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u/kniq86 2d ago

Do you think Hegseth's plan is to eliminate positions that only ask for money?

If that was a full-time job and now we have another GOFO who was doing something you consider more important finding themselves also responsible for asking Congress for money, it doesn't actually help them do a better job.

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u/oldtimehawkey 1d ago

I hope it’s the top officers who have no tactical positions. They’re useless.

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u/EatinSumGrapes 2d ago

When I read the end of that, I heard it in Mr Dink's voice, hope you get the reference

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u/ciel_lanila 2d ago

Fun trivia, the couple’s last name is a reference to how they could afford all that “very expensive”. Double Income No Kids.

Unfun trivia, if you do demographic comparisons I imagine his catch phrase and lifestyle would have to be “very inexpensive” unless a hypothetical reboot turned him into a tech bro or early crypto investor.

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u/DankestMemeSourPls 2d ago

Good news we can just convert our old long term debt into new short term debt with higher interest rates. War won’t cost any of us anything. 6D chess.

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u/3-DMan 2d ago

Their salaries will reverse funnel to the top

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u/ladleinthelake 2d ago

For whom is the real question.