Trump’s Pentagon Purge Threatens U.S. Security
Congress needs to speak up to prevent further mischief.
What’s behind the lame-duck shakeup?
Photographer: Daniel Slim/AFP/Getty Images
President Donald Trump’s wholesale removal of the top civilian leadership of the Defense Department almost certainly isn’t the coup-in-the-making that some of his critics have alleged. Even so, the purge threatens to inflict lasting damage on America’s national security — unless Congress is prepared to rein the president in.
Trump’s post-election firing of Defense Secretary Mark Esper was not wholly unexpected. Esper had objected publicly to the president’s suggestion that active-duty troops be deployed to quell domestic unrest over the summer, and expressed support for renaming military bases that honor Confederate generals, an idea that the boss opposes. The White House also dismissed Esper’s former chief of staff and the undersecretaries overseeing policy and intelligence, while installing hardline Trump loyalists in their place.