New: Pentagon officials are having informal conversations about how the DOD would respond if Donald Trump issues orders to deploy active-duty troops domestically and fire large swaths of apolitical staffers, officials tell @NatashaBer Pentagon officials discussing how to respond if Trump issues controversial orders
CNN --- Pentagon officials are holding informal discussions about how the Department of Defense would respond if Donald Trump issues orders to deploy active-duty troops domestically and fire large swaths of apolitical staffers, defense officials told CNN.
Trump has suggested he would be open to using active-duty forces for domestic law enforcement and mass deportations and has indicated he wants to stack the federal government with loyalists and “clean out corrupt actors” in the US national security establishment.
Trump in his last term had a fraught relationship with much of his senior military leadership, including now-retired Gen. Mark Milley who took steps to limit Trump’s ability to use nuclear weapons while he was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The president-elect, meanwhile, has repeatedly called US military generals “woke,” “weak” and “ineffective leaders.”
Officials are now gaming out various scenarios as they prepare for an overhaul of the Pentagon.
“We are all preparing and planning for the worst-case scenario, but the reality is that we don’t know how this is going to play out yet,” one defense official said.
Trump’s election has also raised questions inside the Pentagon about what would happen if the president issued an unlawful order, particularly if his political appointees inside the department don’t push back.
“Troops are compelled by law to disobey unlawful orders,” said another defense official. “But the question is what happens then -- do we see resignations from senior military leaders? Or would they view that as abandoning their people?”
It’s unclear at this point who Trump will choose to lead the Pentagon, though officials believe Trump and his team will try to avoid the kind of “hostile” relationship he had with the military during his last administration, said a former defense official who served under Trump.
“The relationship between the White House and the DoD was really, really bad, and so … I know it’s top of mind for how they’re going to select the folks that they put in DoD this time around,” the former official said.
Defense officials are also scrambling to identify civilian employees who might be impacted if Trump reinstates Schedule F, an executive order he first issued in 2020 that, if enacted, would have reclassified huge swaths of nonpolitical, career federal employees across the US government to make them more easily fireable.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said on Tuesday that “I totally believe that our leaders will continue to do the right thing no matter what. I also believe that our Congress will continue to do the right things to support our military.”
SAUCE: https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/08/politics/pentagon-officials-discussing-trump/index.html
https://www.historyandheadlines.com/10-generalsadmirals-got-fired/ 10 Generals/Admirals That Got Fired Major DanBy Major DanApril 11, 2016 Updated: March 10, 2023 7 Mins Read
On April 11, 1951, President Harry Truman had had enough, and fired General of the Army (5 star general) Douglas MacArthur. Firing the senior American general during a war, especially one that had been awarded the Medal of Honor (in World War II) and that was a national hero is not to be taken lightly; however, Truman had no choice and “Dugout Doug” was out. Sometimes during the emergencies of war even senior officers are found to be lacking in brains, skills, or character necessary to win the war. When officers of exalted rank get fired, it is unusual enough to be big news and often controversial. Here are 10 notable high ranking officers relieved of command during wartime. So many more could have been included.
Digging Deeper 10. Brigadier General Janis Karpinski, 2005.
Relieved of command and reduced in rank to colonel, the only female general on our list was in charge of the prison at Abu Ghraib in Iraq during the war in Iraq. Karpinski was fired when information and photos leaked to the press showing mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners by US jailers. Karpinski bitterly refutes the charges against her for poor leadership having allowed the infractions, and has blamed then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld for allowing civilian contractors trained at Guantanamo Bay and Afghanistan to work in the prison. Is she a political scapegoat? Read her book and decide for yourself.
A Union division commander under Gen. U.S. Grant at the battle of Shiloh, Wallace was the scapegoat for the failure of the Union forces to win a decisive victory. Relieved of his command, Wallace later served well in other roles, including as Governor of New Mexico Territory. Wallace was bitter his entire life about being blamed unfairly for the Shiloh debacle and he later wrote the famous novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, a story of a man wrongly accused that achieves redemption, which presumably is how he saw himself. (Note: Ben-Hur was made into a motion picture 4 times, most notably the 1959 version with Charlton Heston, as well as plays and a television miniseries.)
In charge of American forces in the Northwest during the War of 1812, Hull bungled an invasion of Canada and then surrendered Fort Detroit to an inferior force. For his ineptitude, Hull was court-martialed and sentenced to be shot, but was spared only by a reprieve from President Madison.
Patton was taken out of combat in 1943 after 2 incidents where he had slapped junior enlisted men surfaced and became public. General Eisenhower had General Patton apologize to both men, the others present during the incidents, and then his entire command, but when word of the incidents became public in the US the outcry was severe. Although members of congress wanted Patton thrown out of the Army altogether, Patton was kept in non-combat roles for a year following the incidents. Apparently having done his penance, Patton was once more allowed to command troops in combat after the Normandy D-Day invasion. The German High Command considered Patton to be the best of the Allied generals.
In charge of the British North African and Middle East war effort early in World War II, Auchinleck was relieved of command and replaced by Generals Alexander and Montgomery. Auchinleck had actually been a replacement himself when General Wavell was relieved. Auchinleck was accused by the Britiish General Staff of losing battles due to “nothing less than bad generalship.” Sadly, Auchinleck was also fired by his wife, who left him in 1944 for Air Chief Marshall Pierse.
Despite his name, French was in charge of the British forces in Europe during World War I and had survived an attempt to fire him in 1914 only because French General Foch interceded on his behalf. Obviously, the war did not go well (for either side) while French commanded the British army, and as happens so often French did not hesitate to blame other people for his lack of success, including his allied forces and politicians back home. Finally, French was given the opportunity to resign his field command instead of getting publicly relieved and was reassigned to non-combat duties in the homeland.
One of if not the most respected of the German generals during World War II, The “Desert Fox” was in charge of defending the Western Front from the allied invasion of France. Fed up with meddling by Adolf Hitler and the Nazi hierarchy, Rommel became enmeshed in the plot (“Valkyrie”) to assassinate Hitler in 1944. When the plot failed, anyone remotely connected to it was rounded up and executed. Rommel’s status as a national hero would have devastated public morale if he had been publicly shown to have been a conspirator, so he was allowed to commit suicide without a trial or public humiliation.
The officers in charge of American Army and Navy forces in Hawaii at the time of the Pearl Harbor attack, both were relieved within days of the attack and were later found derelict in their preparations for war, despite ample warnings. Many times over the years relatives and admirers of these two officers have tried to clear their names and have claimed that they were sacrificed for public relations reasons, but most military analysts agree that both men should have taken more proactive measures for the defense of Hawaii. Conspiracy theories abound that Washington deliberately withheld information from this pair to ensure a catastrophe when the Japanese attacked in order to force the American public into a war frenzy.
Bearing the lofty title, General-in-Chief, McClellan was in charge of the Union forces for the first part of the Civil War. His indecision and slow reactions, combined with a seemingly reluctance to prosecute the war drove President Lincoln to distraction. Humiliated by his firing, McClellan sought the office of President in the 1864 election but of course, Lincoln was reelected. McClellan did achieve some political success, as he was elected governor of New Jersey in 1876.
Pompous and egotistical, MacArthur earned the nickname “Dugout Doug” from his troops during the loss of the Philippines in 1942 when he chose to “hide” in a bunker and not visit the front lines. Still, for political and public morale purposes he was awarded the Medal of Honor even though he could easily have been fired for blundering the defense of the Philippines. As the senior allied commander during the Korean War, MacArthur had spectacular success and advocated seizing all of North Korea and even entering China, as well as wanting to use nuclear weapons. Insubordinate to the president and alarming our allies, as well as ignoring intelligence that indicated massive Chinese intervention was imminent, MacArthur had to fired and he was. Rather than “just fading away” as he said old soldiers do, MacArthur publicly continued his diatribes and considered a run for president, which of course went nowhere.