West Point, the military training institution, has something called “Constitution Corner” where various plaques celebrating the principles of the Constitution are posted. This one is outright seditious.
The United States boldly broke with the ancient military custom of swearing loyalty to a leader. Article VI required that American Officers thereafter swear loyalty to our basic law, the Constitution
While many other nations have suffered military coups, the United States never has. Our American Code of Military Obedience requires that, should orders and the law ever conflict, our officers must obey the law. Many other nations have adopted our principle of loyalty to the basic law.
This nation must have military leaders of principle and integrity so strong that their oaths to support and defend the Constitution will unfailingly govern their actions. The purpose of the United States Military Academy is to provide such leaders of character.
That is definitely antifa.
Kegseth should look into having that removed and a picture of Dear Leader put in its place.
That spirit is precisely what the summoning of generals and admirals to be hectored by Trump and Hegseth, was intended to undermine. I doubt whether senior miltary officers like to be humiliated in this way (or if they do, it’s a purely leisure-time actiuvity!), so I do wonder whether there were any subsequent and surreptitious contacts among those summoned, concerning the circumstances under which to refuse illegal orders, or even act to protect the Constitution – and indeed themselves – against the regime.
I wonder when this was composed. It sounds like a response to the “Nuremberg defence” – “I was only following orders”.
Clause 3 of article 6 is just a general admonition to uphold the constitution, nothing specific about military leaders.
@ ^
@1. Hemidactylus : Shhh.. Don’t give him any ideas..
In addition to the manifest amateurishness of a country whose government periodically has petulant ‘shutdowns’ as a form of political theatre, Hegseth’s speech to his generals should have the military brass in every near-peer nation both laughing their asses off and relieved. Seeing the failing United States loudly and publicly declare that they’re giving up on the idea of an effective modern military is a genuine relief.
By all means: fire every soldier who won’t tolerate ‘hazing (torture)’ or ‘brutal PT’. I’m sure the people who maintain the electronics in the radar units, the people who drive the trucks, and the people piloting the drones will all be easy to replace with the kind of buff, clean-shaven, white twinks that Hegseth dreams of. After all, the only thing that matters in a modern army is having a well-shaven chiseled jaw and bulging muscles, right? The army only needs Jocks to succeed, and allowing any Nerds in is just weak and soy.
Watching that speech would be like watching in 1930 an American
SecDef(oops, forgot the gender-affirming pronoun change) SecWAR announce that the US would be henceforth prioritizing horsemanship as the essential skill for every soldier, and that the US Army would be discharging any soldiers unable to competently sit a horse.I actually did predict an American descent into fascism and functionally an end to your democracy by 2030, way back in 2016 – I have a standing bet with some friends that I expect to sadly win. I just didn’t expect the fascists to be so fucking DUMB. But I should have, at least according to the history content I’ve consumed in the last couple years, the reputation of Fascists for effectiveness has been much overblown. Hitler was as much of an incompetent messy fool as Trump, though not nearly as demented – at least before the steady diet of drugs. How do people this bad at what they do manage to do so much damage?
What took so you so long? It was obvious enough during Obama’s first term that the other side would welcome fascism as soon as they got back into power which, of course, was inevitable even if Trump didn’t win in 2016.
@Walter –
I wasn’t paying nearly as much attention to American politics pre-trump, when the worldwide media wasn’t shoving it so hard down the throats of every other nation.
Our allegiance transcends petty nationalism, patriotism, etc. We have a specific written set of Omniascendent Principles. We do not pledge allegiance to any piece of cloth. We take no oaths to a fantasy deity. We work toward peaceful, honest words and acts that support a decent standard of living for the entire populace.
@1 Hemidactylus mentioned kegseth
I reply: that’s a great nickname for him. We think he should be elected to the ‘chicken-hawk hall-of-fame’.
Shirer’s Rise and Fall ot the Third Reich says that Hitler required all officiers, and may be all soldiers, to swear an oath of loyalty to Hitler personally, not to the German nation, or to the German people. Telling.
By transforming the military into a white, all-male, misogynistic, muscle-bound Trump worshipping brotherhood, he will severely weaken America’s Military capabilities (see snarkhunter at #6). A military of exclusion and narrowness weakens their overall effectiveness. Diversity produces far more success than homogeneity.
Trying to compensate for these deficiencies by relying on civilians, while funneling money to the military-industrial complex, will not be adequate remedies. While civilian support is valuable, it cannot fully replace the capabilities and strategic advantages that a diverse military provides.
@stuffin, 12
Precisely. The US military has spent most of the last half of the 20th century making itself less flexible, less resilient and less adaptable. This fits with the MIC goal of extracting as much money as possible from the public purse.
Look at the Iraq war, for example. Even things that should have been core military functions – like guarding and running logistics convoys in a hostile zone – became outsourced to private companies that hired ex-soldiers at inflated rates while taking a fat rake off of the price.
If the US ever gets involved in a real shooting war, instead of the kind of colonial regime change and pacification it has specialized in (poorly) over the last few decades, that delicate system of contractors and PMC operators is going to become seriously unwieldy. Being beholden to suppliers who are all trying to copy the John Deere model of subscription-based equipment is also not going to work well outside of peacetime.
If you can’t do an emergency field repair of the power-train for your mobile missile launcher without the signoff of two different engineers from two different Defense Contractors before the vehicle’s onboard computers will accept the new parts, you’re going to have a hard time dealing with battle damage. That’s a business model that works well for companies in our current capitalist system, but it’s fragile and prone to disruption.
But Kegsbreath doesn’t know or care about any of this. Like the rest of MAGA, he understands the military entirely though the lens of popular fiction media and maybe video games. War is all about chiseled hunks grimacing and wielding big scary weapons. Who cares how the ammo gets there, or where the drinking water comes from, we’ve got a game of CTF to win and those guys are the terrorists…..
@ 13 snarkhunter – If the US ever gets involved in a real shooting war
My concern! A war with a major power like China or Russia, possibly N. Korea or Iran, would expose America’s military preparedness. A shootout with China (Taiwan) should be our biggest worry. Conflicts with any of them would reveal the true state of America’s military preparedness. One hope, Trump is a coward, He bombed uninhabited mountains in Iran, attacked defenseless drug boats from Venezuela and now his sites are set on American cities (they have no military).
Doubt he would help Taiwan or Europe. His reluctance to back America’s allies are well known, unless he can get a Nobel Peace Prize or make a billion dollars from it, he wouldn’t be interested. This idiotic and foolish trend of pretense and showmanship to please Trump’s ego is making America look weak and foolish.
stuffin, just recently:
“Should our enemies choose, foolishly, to challenge us, they will be crushed by the violence, precision, and ferocity of the War Department. In other words, to our enemies, F-A-F-O.”
&
“From 1789 until 1947, our nation won some of its greatest military victories under the direction of a Secretary of War operating within a Department of War. We’re bringing that name back because we don’t apologize for strength. We don’t tiptoe around enemies. We win.”
See, one thing with which Trump can’t cope is a loss of “face”.
Hard to be the strongman when you cringe from a fight.
—
“This idiotic and foolish trend of pretense and showmanship to please Trump’s ego is making America look weak and foolish.”
Yeah, but it’s neither. It is a powerhouse of industry and technology, particularly the military kind.
It may turn dystopic, but it shan’t be weak.
It’s really tough to imagine the order/oath to support and defend the Constitution — especially in light of Amendments I, IV, V, VI, VIII, XIII, XIV, XV, and XIX — as demanding anything of military officers inconsistent with being social justice warriors. Which might explain yesterday’s meeting all… too… well… especially if you know much about the history of the “Civil Affairs Officer” (Hegseth’s last active-duty assignment).