America's secretary of defence under Donald Trump. A former army major and Princeton graduate, Hegseth ran veterans' organisations after his military service before becoming a Fox TV host. He never attended war college, worked at a think-tank or served in Congress before becoming defence secretary. On September 5th 2025 Hegseth, newly retitled "secretary of war", said America's armed forces should aspire to "maximum lethality, not tepid legality".
He takes a hard line on counter-terrorism. "Africa is very much the front lines of a fight from Islamists," he said after assuming office. "We're not going to allow them to maintain a foothold, especially to try to strike at America."
Hegseth has warned that "China's activity in the Western Hemisphere is for military advantage and unfair economic gain" and that "China's military has too large of a presence in the Western Hemisphere."
Hegseth has gutted the Pentagon's Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response Office—slashing staff by 90%—railing against policies he says were "tying the hands of our warfighters". Under his leadership, the administration devolved authority to conduct strikes outside "active" war zones from the president or national security adviser to the combatant commands—the headquarters responsible for geographical areas.
In the name of restoring the "warrior ethos", Hegseth has fired prominent black and female commanders, banished transgender soldiers and banned books promoting "woke" ideas. He has described himself as a "recovering neocon". Before becoming defence secretary he once wrote: "Our military runs on masculinity. It's not toxic at all, it's necessary." To win confirmation by the Senate he moderated his views, affirming that all combat roles remain open to women.
At the 2025 Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, Hegseth reaffirmed American security commitments to the region and suggested a Chinese attack on Taiwan was imminent. He described allies as "force multipliers" and insisted "America First certainly does not mean America alone." China's defence minister stayed away, and Hegseth sought to capitalise on the absence: "We are here this morning—and somebody else isn't," he said. But he did not address the most pressing regional concern: American trade tariffs. Some participants noted that his position in America's political order was now more akin to that of China's defence minister, who holds little power in a system dominated by one man.
On August 22nd 2025 Hegseth removed Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse, the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, after the agency produced a preliminary damage assessment of America's bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities that infuriated the administration.
Hegseth has been accused of mishandling classified information. Many of his aides have been fired over alleged leaks, accusations they deny.
On September 30th 2025 Hegseth summoned hundreds of senior military figures to Quantico, Virginia, for an address on restoring the "warrior ethos". He advocated relaxing rules of engagement, toughening basic training and demanding "hard" physical training from all ranks, commanders included. Women would not be excluded from combat units but would have to meet the same physical standards as men. Donald Trump, a late addition, delivered a partisan speech calling for the military to be deployed at home against migrants and leftists, and suggested that "dangerous cities" be used as "training grounds". The commanders' stony silence seemed to unnerve him.
In November 2025 Hegseth said the Pentagon would buy things faster, speeding up its Byzantine processes. He gave front-line commands a greater say in what gets bought and promised to draw more on commercial, rather than bespoke, technology. The changes should create the conditions in which upstart defence-tech firms can compete with the legacy primes to forge a more diverse and dynamic industry.
The Trump administration's national defence strategy prioritises the Americas over Asia, risking a diversion of resources from the Indo-Pacific.
On April 30th 2025 Hegseth issued a memo setting the army two priorities: defend the homeland and deter China in Asia. No mention was made of Europe, where America still has more than 80,000 troops. The army was told to achieve "electromagnetic and air-littoral dominance" by 2027, meaning out-jamming and out-droning the enemy. By the end of 2026 every division is to field sizeable numbers of drones (perhaps 1,000 per division), with AI-driven command and control for divisions and larger formations.
To free up money, Hegseth ordered the retirement of "obsolete" equipment, including the Humvee, the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (its replacement) and the M10 light tank, which had only just come into service but was deemed too big and heavy. The army is replacing crewed attack helicopters—which have fared badly in Ukraine—with cheaper drone swarms. Dan Driscoll, the secretary of the army, lamented lawmakers' "parochial" insistence on keeping unwanted weapons, calling it "a welfare system for certain congressional districts".
Five major commands are being streamlined into two, and 1,000 staff positions are being cut from the army's headquarters.
In late October 2025 Hegseth ordered the USS Gerald Ford, the world's largest aircraft-carrier, to sail from Croatia to the Caribbean as part of a vast military build-up near Venezuela—the largest American naval deployment in the region since the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, according to the CSIS. He announced a new counter-narcotics task-force led by one of the marines' three expeditionary forces. Speaking to his generals and admirals, he praised the Gulf War of 1991 as a model "limited mission with overwhelming forces and a clear end state" and criticised "mission creep" in Vietnam. Admiral Alvin Holsey, SOUTHCOM's commander, said he would leave his post; he is said to have disagreed with Hegseth over the air strikes on boats allegedly linked to drug-smugglers, of which 14 had killed an estimated 61 people by late October.
On November 1st 2025 Hegseth met his Chinese counterpart, Admiral Dong Jun, on the sidelines of a security conference in Malaysia—a first meeting between the two men. They spoke again by phone the following day. The meeting came amid high tensions over Scarborough Shoal in the South China Sea, where the USS Nimitz was deployed.
The boat-strike campaign's first attack, on September 2nd 2025, provoked a scandal. An initial missile strike left two survivors clinging to the wreckage. Admiral Frank Bradley, the JSOC commander overseeing the operation, ordered a second strike that killed them. Hegseth watched the operation live on video but claims he did not "stick around" for the second strike. He denied authorising "no quarter" for survivors, but acknowledged his execute order demanded lethal action. The incident drew bipartisan congressional scrutiny. By early December 2025 the campaign had carried out 21 confirmed strikes, killing at least 83 people. Hegseth has fired prominent senior JAGs and replaced them with lawyers whom critics say reverse-engineer legal justifications for the administration's preferred outcomes.
On December 6th 2025 Hegseth addressed defence and foreign-policy figures at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California, declaring: "Out with Utopian idealism. In with hard-nosed realism." He said the Pentagon would guarantee "US military and commercial access to key terrain", naming the Panama Canal, the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico (or the Gulf of America), the Arctic and Greenland, and warned that neighbours who did not co-operate would find the Pentagon "stands ready".
Hegseth wants to "accelerate like hell" on military use of AI. In January 2026 he used SpaceX's base in Texas as the backdrop to release a new artificial-intelligence strategy, promising that the Department of War would draw inspiration from Elon Musk's management approach. He issued a mock recruiting poster of himself in an Uncle Sam pose instructing soldiers, "I want you to use AI." He ordered "experimentation with America's leading AI models" throughout the armed forces.
On February 24th 2026 Hegseth gave Dario Amodei, boss of Anthropic, an ultimatum at the Pentagon: agree to the Department of War's terms on military use of AI or face severe penalties by February 27th. Hegseth has stipulated that companies providing the Pentagon with AI models must give it carte blanche, provided the actions are lawful. Anthropic has insisted its Claude model must be used neither for mass domestic surveillance nor for autonomous weapons. On February 27th Hegseth declared Anthropic "a supply-chain risk to national security"—a designation hitherto reserved for foreign firms—barring any Pentagon contractor or partner from conducting commercial activity with Anthropic. He praised Israel as a capable partner in the Iran fight with a clear mission, "unlike so many of our traditional allies, who wring their hands and clutch their pearls." He also gave xAI authorisation to handle classified military data.
In the American-Israeli war on Iran that began in February 2026, Hegseth declared there are "no stupid rules of engagement" and promised "no nation-building quagmire, no democracy-building exercise". He enjoys the highest favourability rating among self-described MAGA Republicans of any administration official.
On May 5th 2025 Hegseth ordered the army and other services to cut the number of four-star generals and admirals by at least 20%, and the total number of general and flag officers by 10%. America has 817 generals and admirals, including 38 four-star officers; the ratio of generals to troops has risen steadily. Robert Gates, the defence secretary in 2010, attempted a similar pruning after a post-9/11 surge in general-officer numbers. In a podcast in 2024, Hegseth complained that a third of officers were "actively complicit" in allowing diversity initiatives to undermine combat standards.
Since taking office Hegseth has ousted at least 21 generals. Many appear to have been dismissed for no reason beyond their race, sex or suspected political leanings. On April 2nd 2026, amid America's biggest war in decades—a 38-day air campaign over Iran involving more than 13,000 combat sorties—he sacked General Randy George, America's most senior army officer, along with two other senior leaders. George is reported to have opposed Hegseth's decision to remove four officers—two black men and two women—from a promotion list. Admiral Nancy Lacore, forced into retirement, is running for Congress in South Carolina.
George's replacement, General Christopher LaNeve, had been Hegseth's military assistant. LaNeve had thin experience for the role of army chief of staff but had called Donald Trump hours after his inauguration to welcome him back to office.
Before becoming defence secretary, Hegseth served as a National Guard lieutenant and captain. He once described the army as having "spit me out" after fellow service members flagged him as an "insider threat" because of the Deus Vult tattoo on his arm, a symbol used by white nationalists. Pentagon insiders say the secretary can sometimes appear bemused during briefings on strategic matters.
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