SECWAR calling in the Stars for a "talk"

[2018commo]

Originally Posted by PRB

SMA Tilley did that when he had all of the GO CSM's at his conference in El Paso / Ft. Bliss.... show up in pt uniform and a surprise weigh in etc. There were some sweating dudes in line.

I liked/respected him a great deal in that position ... he never lost his sense of humor nor himself, if you know what I mean...

He walked down the line and tapped a few of us on the soldier and said 'You guys can go home...see you at the conference room' I liked that.

Good stuff, he addressed a gathering at APG, seemed like he was squared away.
Standards, no compromise.

[Joker]

There are some ancient mofos in that photo that have their walkers just out of view. A room full of polititians, 90% should be fired.

[PRB]

I agree with everything SECWAR (I like that) said.

[Sigaba]

Today, Secretary Hegseth said:

And that's why today, at my direction, the era of unprofessional appearance is over.

No more beardos. The era of rampant and ridiculous shaving profiles is done. Simply put, if you do not meet the male level physical standards for combat positions, cannot pass a PT test or don't want to shave and look professional, it's time for a new position or a new profession.

So if Big Army decides SOF needs to dress and groom like everyone else?

He also said:

We are not civilians.... We are professionals in the profession of arms.

FWIW, 10 U.S. Code sec 113 puts it this way.

(a)

(1)There is a Secretary of Defense, who is the head of the Department of Defense, appointed from civilian life by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate.
(2)A person may not be appointed as Secretary of Defense—

(A)within seven years after relief from active duty as a commissioned officer of a regular component of an armed force in a grade below O–7; or
(B)within 10 years after relief from active duty as a commissioned officer of a regular component of an armed force in the grade of O–7 or above.

He also said:

Finally, as President Trump rightly pointed out when he changed the department name, the United States has not won a major theater war since the name was changed to the Department of Defense in 1947. One conflict stands out in stark contrast, the Gulf War. Why? Well, there's a number of reasons, but it was a limited mission with overwhelming force and a clear end state.

But why did we execute and win the Gulf War the way we did in 1991? There's two overwhelming reasons. One was President Ronald Reagan's military buildup gave an overwhelming advantage, and two, military and Pentagon leadership had previous formative battlefield experiences. The men who led this department during the Gulf War were mostly combat veterans of the Vietnam War. They said never again to mission creep or nebulous end states.

The same holds true today. Our civilian and military leadership is chock full of veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan who say never again to nation building and nebulous end states. This clear eyed view all the way to the White House, combined with President Trump's military buildup, postures us for future victories if, and we will, and when we embrace the War Department.

And we must. We are preparing every day. We have to be prepared for war, not for defense. We're training warriors, not defenders. We fight wars to win, not to defend. Defense is something you do all the time. It's inherently reactionary and can lead to overuse, overreach and mission creep. War is something you do sparingly on our own terms and with clear aims. We fight to win. We unleash overwhelming and punishing violence on the enemy.

We also don't fight with stupid rules of engagement. We untie the hands of our warfighters to intimidate, demoralize, hunt and kill the enemies of our country. No more politically correct and overbearing rules of engagement, just common sense, maximum lethality and authority for warfighters.

If FID is now a forbidden activity, what's the future of SF? If it's all about killing bad guys, then why not fleets of drones operated by people from red or blue states?

MOO, President Kennedy's comments on 6 June 1962 when he championed the urgent need for Special Forces specifically remain valid.

He said:

The nonmilitary problems which you will face will also be most demanding, diplomatic, political, and economic. In the years ahead, some of you will serve as advisers to foreign aid missions or even to foreign governments. Some will negotiate terms of a cease-fire with broad political as well as military ramifications. Some of you will go to the far corners of the earth, and to the far reaches of space. Some of you will sit in the highest councils of the Pentagon. Others will hold delicate command posts which are international in character. Still others will advise on plans to abolish arms instead of using them to abolish others. Whatever your position, the scope of your decisions will not be confined to the traditional tenets of military competence and training. You will need to know and understand not only the foreign policy of the United States but the foreign policy of all countries scattered around the world who 20 years ago were the most distant names to us. You will need to give orders in different tongues and read maps by different systems. You will be involved in economic judgments which most economists would hesitate to make. At what point, for example, does military aid become burdensome to a country and make its freedom endangered rather than helping to secure it? To what extent can the gold and dollar cost of our overseas deployments be offset by foreign procurement? Or at what stage can a new weapons system be considered sufficiently advanced to justify large dollar appropriations?

In many countries, your posture and performance will provide the local population with the only evidence of what our country is really like. In other countries, your military mission, its advice and action, will play a key role in determining whether those people will remain free. You will need to understand the importance of military power and also the limits of military power, to decide what arms should be used to fight and when they should be used to prevent a fight, to determine what represents our vital interests and what interests are only marginal.

IRT the comparison of himself to Secretary Stimson, in his memoir, On Active Service in Peace and War, Stimson details how he went from thinking that only war fighters should be officers to understanding that the complexities of modern war required skills found in the public and private spheres. And that these practioners could only do their jobs if they held ranks commensurate to their jobs.

The differences between Mr. Hegseth and Marshall and Stimson on the optimal calibration of American military power in the nuclear age are vast. For him to invoke their names without regard to these differences is cynical.

My $0.02.

[5thgrp"C"]

After such a killer, spot on speech I don't think this belongs in the comedy zone. Time to shape up. Almost same visualization and intent as 1970 Patton speech.

This comes from a guy who chose to walk away after 15 years in 2016. Kinda the target audience for the speech so I may be biased.

[Box]

I must have missed the part when it was said that FID is a forbidden activity - pretty funny.

[Trapper John]

Originally Posted by 5thgrp"C"

After such a killer, spot on speech I don't think this belongs in the comedy zone. Time to shape up. Almost same visualization and intent as 1970 Patton speech.

This comes from a guy who chose to walk away after 15 years in 2016. Kinda the target audience for the speech so I may be biased.

Absolutely!