Hegseth’s Views May Clash With Reality at Defense Department

Pete Hegseth, the newly confirmed defense secretary, has pledged to restore “the warrior ethos” to the U.S. military, which he believes has been weakened by its diversity.

His view that the military has diminished standards in welcoming women and racial minorities to the armed forces might run into resistance as he takes the reins at the Pentagon, which sees its diversity as an asset and has tried to build a force that mirrors America.

Mr. Hegseth has said that standards were “lowered” as women began serving in combat positions. But he will be met by the more than 10,000 women who currently fill combat roles, from artillery and infantry positions to combat engineers and even a few Green Berets and Army Rangers.

He has vowed to “address the recruiting, retention and readiness crisis in our ranks” and to bring “lethality” back to the Pentagon. But the military that has been focused on those issues for years.

“The whole Department of Defense will be ready to focus on lethality when he walks through that door, and is not going to fight him on that,” Peter Feaver, a political science professor at Duke University who has studied the military for decades, said in an interview.

Mr. Hegseth, an Army combat veteran and a former Fox News host, has delivered right-wing talking points in his criticism of the military in podcast appearances and in his book, “The War on Warriors.”

“Affirmative action posts have skyrocketed, with ‘firsts’ being the most important factor in filling new commanders,” he wrote in his book, criticizing the military for being too “woke.” “We will not stop until trans-lesbian Black females run everything.”

But in his aim to reshape a military with three million employees, Mr. Hegseth, 44, faces a daunting challenge. The $849 billion enterprise has 1.3 million active-duty service members and 750 military bases around the globe. People of color make up about 43 percent of the work force.

“He may quickly discover that to retain the high caliber of people he wants, that he will have to reach out to women,” Mr. Feaver said. “He may find that some of his best people are women and Black males.”

In a message to the Defense Department on Saturday, Mr. Hegseth outlined his main priorities. In addition to reviving “the warrior ethos,” he emphasized strengthening of the nation’s industrial base and streamlining the military’s cumbersome processes for buying new weapons.

He also said the Pentagon would “re-establish deterrence by defending our homeland” and working with allies to confront a rising military threat from China.

In his Senate hearing, Mr. Hegseth acknowledged that he has never managed more than a few hundred people at a time. But he cast his unconventional background — his predecessors have been former generals, lawmakers or government officials — as an advantage in President Trump’s drive to shake up the establishment.

Mr. Hegseth also made clear that he believed that Mr. Trump’s electoral and popular-vote victory gave the president a mandate to carry out his agenda. Indeed, even before the Senate vote on Friday night approving his nomination, the Pentagon had rushed 1,500 active-duty Marines and Army soldiers to the southwestern border to help thwart migrants entering the country, one of Mr. Trump’s main policy objectives.

Mr. Hegseth was confirmed on a vote of 51 to 50, the smallest margin for a defense secretary’s confirmation since the position was created in 1947, according to Senate records. Vice President JD Vance had to cast a tiebreaking vote after three Republicans joined all Democrats in voting no.

One of those Republicans, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, cited Mr. Hegseth’s lack of strategic insights as among his reasons for opposing him. “Mr. Hegseth provided no substantial observations on how to defend Taiwan or the Philippines against a Chinese attack, or even whether he believes the United States should do so,” Mr. McConnell said in a statement on Friday. “He failed, for that matter, to articulate in any detail a strategic vision.”

Mr. McConnell also took a dim view of the claim that Mr. Hegseth would restore “a warrior culture” to the armed forces. “The restoration of ‘warrior culture’ will not come from trading one set of culture warriors for another,” he said.

Most defense secretaries, with the exception of Chuck Hagel in 2013, have sailed through their confirmation votes. President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s defense secretary, Lloyd J. Austin III, was confirmed on a 93-to-2 vote. The Senate voted 98 to 1 to confirm Jim Mattis, Mr. Trump’s first Pentagon chief, and 90 to 8 for his successor, Mark Esper.

Traditionally, both parties espouse the belief that the military should be nonpartisan. Commanders in chief usually appoint defense secretaries who have the ability to gain support from Democrats and Republicans at Pentagon budget time, as well as from the public.

But for 30 minutes on Friday night, after all 100 senators had voted, Mr. Hegseth’s confirmation tally stood at 50 to 50, a stark display of the demise of the apolitical military.

And many of the Democrats who voted against him insist he is unfit for duty.

Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the Armed Services Committee’s top Democrat, said he was unswayed by Mr. Hegseth’s testimony at his confirmation hearing, which focused on a sexual assault allegation and accusations of alcohol abuse and financial mismanagement.

“He lacks the requisite character, competence and commitment to do this job,” Mr. Reed said after the hearing. “Indeed, he is the least-qualified nominee for secretary of defense in modern history.”

Mr. Hegseth has denied the sexual assault accusation, saying the encounter was consensual, and he was never charged with a crime. He labeled the allegations against him “anonymous smears.”

Mr. Hegseth’s remarks have already had a chilling effect on the military’s highest uniformed ranks.

In his confirmation hearing, he pledged that “every single senior officer will be reviewed based on meritocracy, standards, lethality and commitment to lawful orders they will be given,” opening the door to a political purge of generals and admirals.

The first to fall under Mr. Trump was the Coast Guard commandant, Adm. Linda L. Fagan, the first female uniformed leader of a branch of the armed forces. Among the reasons she was pushed out was an “excessive focus on diversity, equity and inclusion,” according to a statement from the Homeland Security Department.

The admiral was told on the evening of Inauguration Day that she had been fired, as she was waiting to have a photo taken with Mr. Trump at the Commander in Chief Ball, a military official said.

Even some of Mr. Hegseth’s staunchest congressional supporters have warned against a witch hunt in the senior ranks that could cause morale to plunge.

“There’s been a lot of talk about firing ‘woke’ generals,” said Senator Kevin Cramer, Republican of North Dakota. “I would say give those men and women a chance under new leadership.”

Republican leaders embraced Mr. Hegseth’s outlook as they cheered his confirmation. “Peace through strength is back under President Trump and Pete Hegseth,” Senator Roger Wicker, Republican of Mississippi and the chairman of the armed services panel, said in a statement after the vote.

Mr. Feaver, the Duke professor, suggested that Mr. Hegseth would find a military that has not run away from the lethality, recruitment and readiness issues that he has highlighted.

In fact, Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has prioritized those issues for years. Mr. Hegseth has suggested that General Brown, a four-star fighter pilot with decades of military experience, should be fired.

General Brown, known as C.Q., was the Air Force chief of staff before becoming the chairman, and he spoke about lethality and readiness in a 2021 recruiting video. “When I’m flying, I put my helmet on, my visor down, my mask up,” he says, to footage of American fighter pilots strapping into warplanes. “You don’t know who I am, whether I’m African American, Asian American, Hispanic, white, male or female.”

“You just know I’m an American airman, kicking your butt,” he continues. “I’m General C.Q. Brown Jr. Come join us.”