During Saturday’s West Point commencement speech, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth preached to the graduates that if they commit war crimes and or illegal acts, he and Trump will have their backs.
That’s shocking.
To Pete Hegseth, there are no military standards, only his whiskey-infused ego, coupled with Trump’s narcissism.
During Trump’s first term, Hegseth stumped for several U.S. service members accused or convicted of war crimes.
Most of Whiskey Pete’s speech defended the actions taken after Trump came into office and appointed the former Fox News host in charge of the military.
He repeatedly attacked diversity and wokeism, and not being fat, while promoting the homophobic views of the late Charlie Kirk and injecting his personal views on religion into the speech.
However, this small section raised more than the eyebrows of many current and former military leaders.
HEGSETH: Lawyers don’t run companies, lawyers don’t run battalions, commanders do.
No more walking on eggshells; order is being restored.
And that’s all I ever wanted from my chain of command: people who let me do my job, empowered me to do it, and then supported me when it was done.
No matter what, President Trump and I will have your back when tough decisions are made, especially decisions made in a split second in the heat of battle that air-conditioned offices in Washington, D.C. will never understand. Your hands are untied.
Hegseth’s words are a direct assault on the Geneva Conventions and every moral and ethical outlook the US military has preached and believed in since WWII.
Former commanding general of the U.S. Army in Europe, Gen. Mark Hertling was similarly dismayed by Hegseth’s words.
“When you’re talking about just disregarding all legal implications and expecting the president, the commander-in-chief, the secretary of defense, his primary adviser for defense matters to say, ‘No matter what, we have your back’ — it’s just not true,” Hertling said. “And we’ve seen that in a couple of situations so far in this administration, where … war criminals, people who murdered civilians, were allowed to go free and were paroled.”
“That, to me, will create a lack of discipline within the force and will cause problems, which will put our nation at risk,” he added.
