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Business Standard
14-05-2025
- Business
- Business Standard
US warns of missile threats that Donald Trump's Golden Dome may face
The DIA released a chart as a prelude to a White House announcement regarding threats to the US that the Golden Dome missile defense umbrella, a priority of President Donald Trump, would counter Bloomberg China may within a decade possess scores of orbiting missiles with nuclear payloads capable of reaching the US with much shorter flight times than traditional intercontinental ballistic missiles, the Defense Intelligence Agency said Tuesday. The agency released a chart as a prelude to a White House announcement regarding threats to the US that the Golden Dome missile defense umbrella, a priority of President Donald Trump, would counter. The chart depicted potential advancements in increased traditional intercontinental ballistic missile capabilities among adversaries, including China, Iran and Russia. China, according to the chart, could field as many as 700 nuclear-tipped ICBMs by 2035 up from 400 today; Iran 60, up from none today. Russia's inventory could grow to 400 from 350 now. More significantly, the chart showed the potential growth in China and less in Russia of orbiting, nuclear-armed space-based missiles in a 'Fractional Orbital Bombardment System,' or FOBS. The weapon enters 'a low-altitude orbit before reentering to strike its target, with much shorter flight times if flying the same direction as traditional ICBMs, or can travel over the South Pole to avoid early warning systems and missile defenses,' the agency said. 'It releases its payload before completing a full orbit.' DIA projected China could possess 60 of these weapons by 2035 from none today, and Russia 12 from zero today. The disclosure in 2021 that China executed a FOBS test flight set off alarms within the US military. 'What we saw was a very significant event of a test of a weapon system. And it is very concerning,' Mark Milley, then the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in an October 2021 interview on Bloomberg Television. 'I don't know if it's quite a Sputnik moment, but I think it's very close to that. It has all of our attention.' Separately, the DIA chart forecast that China might field by 2035 as many as 4,000 'Hypersonic Glide Vehicles,' up from 600 today. The vehicles are launched by ballistic missiles and glide for at least half of their flight to targets. They can be armed with a nuclear warhead, but China may already 'have deployed a conventional' weapon 'with sufficient range to strike Alaska,' according to the chart. As of now, the Defense Department and White House have offered few specifics regarding the Golden Dome's architecture, timelines and cost. 'No one has really defined what the Golden Dome is,' Representative Ken Calvert, chairman of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, said in an interview last week. 'Is it defending the entire Lower 48 and Alaska? What are we doing and how are we doing it? I've heard from every consultant in town that's trying to get in the middle of this thing.' The US may have to spend as much as $542 billion over 20 years to develop and launch the least proven and likely most contentious segment of the system — the network of space-based interceptors, the Congressional Budget Office said last week. That network could cost $161 billion even at the low end, the office said in an assessment prepared for a subcommittee of the Senate Armed Services Committee. The price tag will depend on launch costs and the number of weapons put into orbit, it said. Trump's plan harkens back to former President Ronald Reagan's unfulfilled quest for a space-based missile defense system that was widely known as 'Star Wars.'
Fox News
14-03-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
Pentagon calls Mark Milley 'corpulent' as it kicks off review of physical fitness and grooming standards
Pentagon press secretary John Ullyot lobbed a shot at the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Mark Milley, as he explained Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth's new review of physical fitness and grooming standards. "Unfortunately, the U.S. military's high standards on body composition and other metrics eroded in recent years, particularly during the tenure of former Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley, who set a bad example from the top through his own personal corpulence. Secretary Hegseth is committed to restoring high standards, and this review is the first step in doing so," Ullyot said in a statement to Fox News Digital. The Pentagon revoked Milley's security detail and clearance in late January. The review comes after the secretary has voiced concerns that fitness standards have eroded, and questioned whether mismatched standards for men and women are affecting readiness. The memo specifically calls out protocols for beards. It directs the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness to look at "existing standards set by the Military Departments pertaining to physical fitness, body composition, and grooming, which includes but is not limited to beards." The memo directs the review to examine how standards have changed since 2015. "Our troops will be fit – not fat. Our troops will look sharp – not sloppy. We seek only quality – not quotas," Hegseth wrote in a post on X late on Wednesday. "That will be part of one of the first things we do at the Pentagon – is reviewing that in a gender-neutral way – the standards ensuring readiness and meritocracy is front and center," Hegseth promised in January. In December 2015, the military opened up all combat roles to women. In a podcast interview shortly before he was tapped as secretary, Hegseth said the U.S. "should not have women in combat roles." But during his confirmation hearing, he clarified that in ground combat roles, women should have to meet the same standards as men. "Whether it is a man or woman, they have to meet the same high standards," he said. "In any place where those things have been eroded, or courses or criteria have been changed to meet quotas . . . that's the kind of review I'm talking about. Not whether women should have access to ground combat." The review could possibly lead to changes to the Army Combat Fitness Test, which is currently scored under age- and gender-specific requirements. That became the Army's standard fitness test in 2023, after decades of a physical fitness test that imposed the same standards on men and women. The current test requires men ages 17-21 to run two miles in 22 minutes, and women of the same age to do it in 23 minutes and 22 seconds. The service branches began making accommodations for recruits who don't meet physical fitness standards in recent years as a way to address the recruiting crisis. The Army and Navy offered pre-boot camp training for those who did not meet physical fitness or testing scores. But those recruits had to meet the same standards in order to graduate from training courses and serve. "When I was in the Army, we kicked out good soldiers for having naked women tattooed on their arms, and today we are relaxing the standards on shaving, dreadlocks, man buns, and straight-up obesity," Hegseth wrote in his book 'The War on Warriors.' "Piece by piece, the standards had to go ... because of equity," he added. The service branches have begun allowing troops to sport different hairstyles, in large part due to female service members who argued that the constant tight, low bun was leading to hair loss. In recent years, the Army has begun allowing cornrows and twists after female service members argued that the hairstyles were cheaper and easier to maintain.
Yahoo
14-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Punishing Military Officers for Political Reasons Endangers Our Troops and Threatens National Security
The opinions expressed in this op-ed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of If you would like to submit your own commentary, please send your article to opinions@ for consideration. Recent actions taken against the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley are more than punitive measures taken against a single officer. The retribution moves dangerously close to threatening the apolitical foundation of the military who serve our nation and protect us as citizens. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's decision last month to initiate an investigation into Gen. Milley, revoke his security detail, suspend his security clearance, remove his portrait from the Pentagon, and potentially reduce his retirement rank is unprecedented and a threat to American civil-military relations. We are former service secretaries, retired generals and admirals, and senior defense officials who know Gen. Milley's 43-year record of distinguished service, the rigorous meritocratic systems that vetted and elevated him, and the critical importance of preserving the military's apolitical integrity. Punitive actions against Gen. Milley diminish the core principles that keep our military strong, unified, and feared by our enemies. The Milley decision was not an isolated incident. Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Linda Fagan's recent firing was unconvincingly justified with a list of inaccurate accusations. Even more concerning are reports of a draft executive order that would have a panel of retired generals and admirals review and potentially recommend the removal of serving generals and admirals based on their perceived commitment to the ideals of the current administration. Intentionally or not, these actions run the risk of sending a message to all uniformed leaders as well as rank-and-file military service members that this administration will not tolerate differences of opinion. They undermine 236 years of tradition since the signing of the Constitution that have served this country well. This is a dangerous message to send to those we count on to protect our country. It not only undermines morale and cohesion within the ranks but also threatens the American people's trust in the armed forces -- and ultimately endangers our men and women in uniform. Strong and healthy civil-military relations are vital to both a properly functioning democracy and our military's readiness to defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. We realize that this might seem like an arcane principle to most Americans but, from our experience in both Republican and Democratic administrations, it is of vital importance and not something that we should take for granted. Since the founding of the republic and formation of our Constitution, the United States has adhered to a principle of civilian control of the military. The president and his appointed civilian leaders make the choices and decisions necessary for our nation's security. Each administration will have its priorities for defense strategy and policy, but civilian leaders' decisions will be ill-informed if senior military leaders don't tell them the hard truths and implications of their policies and strategies because of the threat of retaliation. The U.S. military's strength depends on its ability to remain above the fray of politics. Our military leaders swear an oath to the Constitution, not a particular person. Actions like those being suggested today will create the perception in the military that disagreeing with political leaders is hazardous to one's career. Our national security depends on mutual trust and respect between civilian and military leaders based on open dialogue and candid communications. Disagreement by our military leaders can't be seen as an act of disloyalty. We will all be less safe as a result.
New York Times
11-02-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
America Is Full of People Trump Doesn't Like
In its early days, the second Trump administration is delivering a clear message: The United States is full of the wrong kind of people. Federal civil servants, for example, have been deemed the wrong kind of people. Their political and ideological allegiances are questionable, their ideas destructive and their low-productivity jobs not worth their salaries. Too many are lawbreakers or just 'evil.' Whether they toil at U.S.A.I.D. or the Treasury, the C.I.A. or the F.D.A., in Washington or throughout the country, they should look upon that fork in the road and opt to resign. In some cases, they should be purged. Children born in the United States to undocumented parents — or to parents who are here legally but only temporarily, such as people on work or student visas — are also the wrong people. They are not true Americans and should not be granted the 'gift' of citizenship. Refugees and asylum seekers are the wrong kind of people and should be prevented from entering the country. Transgender Americans lack the 'humility and selflessness' needed in the U.S. armed forces, according to a Trump executive order, and can no longer serve. Former officials such as Mark Milley, who served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the first Trump administration, are disloyal and undeserving of government protection or even of a Pentagon portrait. And anyone fitting a 'diversity' category of any kind is automatically suspect, a convenient scapegoat whenever something — wildfires, plane crashes — goes wrong. It's a familiar political impulse, with antecedents that predate President Trump's terms in office. During the 2008 presidential campaign, Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee, mused about the virtues of 'real America' — those patriotic small towns that make up the 'pro-America areas of this great nation.' (She later offered one of those I'm-sorry-if-it-came-out-wrong apologies.) But now we've gone from praising real America to parsing real Americans. And the audit is being conducted by a vengeful and decidedly unapologetic executive. If, according to the Trump administration, so many people in the United States are the wrong kind of people, who makes up the right kind? Who belongs here — in our military, our government, our territory? The administration invokes meritocracy as one way to answer those questions. As Trump put it in an executive order on his second day in office, 'individual merit, aptitude, hard work and determination' should be the overriding factors when hiring workers, not just in government but throughout 'key sectors of American society.' This directive might be more persuasive if Trump had followed it when selecting key members of his administration. Did Matt Gaetz, Trump's first pick to serve as attorney general, possess the individual merit needed to lead the Justice Department? Does Tulsi Gabbard have the aptitude required to become director of national intelligence, or Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to oversee the Department of Health and Human Services? Is Pete Hegseth the hardest-working option to run the Defense Department? The answer is evident. Their merit is not found in professional experience or outstanding qualifications, but in their fealty to the president. (When new appointees are hailed as disrupters, remember that in the Trump era 'disruptive' is a euphemism for 'obedient.') The racial imperative behind determining the right and wrong people — recall, for example, Trump's disdain for outsiders who supposedly poison the national bloodstream — fuses with arguments over merit. Darren Beattie, a former Trump speechwriter who has been named acting under secretary of public diplomacy at the State Department, wrote late last year that 'competent white men must be in charge if you want things to work.' It would be one thing simply to roll back the excesses of D.E.I. programs throughout the federal government, but this worldview takes that process to its illogical extreme: If the quest for a diverse work force is prohibited, its opposite must be the best, the only, work force possible. During his campaign for the U.S. Senate in 2021, JD Vance told a conservative podcast host that, should Trump regain the presidency, he needed to 'fire every single midlevel bureaucrat' and proceed to 'replace them with our people.' Vance's use of 'our people' has always stuck in my mind, mainly because I wonder who the future vice president had in his mind. Who counts as 'our people' to this administration? Which marker of belonging makes someone theirs? Trump has often referred to people in the first-person possessive. At times, he alludes to a category of people, as in 'my judges' or 'my generals,' but he has also claimed title to specific individuals, as in 'my two Steves' (referring to Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller) and, in the case of one unfortunate former House speaker, 'my Kevin.' Trump has also longed to see 'my people' sit up at attention for him the way North Koreans do for Kim Jong-un. With this last line, with 'my people,' Trump may have been referring to his aides and underlings, or perhaps to his party, or maybe to the MAGA movement, or to voters, or even Americans overall. That ambiguity captures the risks and the power inherent in a notion like 'we the people.' When it does not include everyone, when it is malleable and shifting, you never know who counts, for how long, and who makes the calculation. Does Trump determine who is the right kind of person for America today? Does the Office of Management and Budget pick? Does Elon Musk decide who is part of the future and who gets tossed into the wood chipper? Belonging has long been elusive in America, a 'we' contested by wealth, race, sex and ancestry. In his second Inaugural Address, Trump warned that 'our government confronts a crisis of trust,' but he also declared that, with his election victory, 'national unity is now returning to America.' One could dismiss this vision of renewed civic harmony as an obligatory line, or just more Trumpian self-regard rather than a faithful reflection of reality. But that misses the administration's underlying project. National unity is indeed returning — if, that is, your conception of the nation is limited to those on your side, if only some of the people are really 'the people.' This president prefers to lead a nation in which belonging is constantly up for grabs, in which certain people are the wrong kind and others are the right kind, in which some are real Americans and others will never be. The result is not just a crisis of trust in our government, but in each other.
Yahoo
08-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
'You're fired': The people Trump has sacked since taking office
President Donald Trump took over the White House less than a month ago, and in keeping with his reality television show catchphrase from The Apprentice - "You're Fired" - he has already removed more than 200 employees. Some amount of turnover is typical for a new administration, but Trump has made massive changes during his first weeks in office. He offered buyouts to millions of government workers and put a stop to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programmes. On Friday, Trump fired the nation's top record keeper, US Archivist Colleen Shogan. Later that night, he pledged to fire board of trustees members for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts - and to name himself as chairman. Here's a look at some of the major dismissals during Trump's first few weeks in office. Trump's new Republican administration began with a splash when the White House began offering nearly all of the more than 2 million federal employees offers to resign, part of Trump's efforts to slash the size of the federal government. A US judge temporarily paused the plan, which had offered federal workers eight months of pay to quit by 6 February. The White House says more than 40,000 employees already accepted the offer. Trump has also targeted specific government officials, firing Democratic Federal Elections Committee (FEC) chair Ellen Weintraub, according to a letter she shared online. Weintraub alleges her firing was not legal. The FEC enforces campaign finance laws and oversees federal elections. The president also dismissed Gwynne Wilcox, the first black woman to serve on the National Labor Relations Board, who is now suing the administration. Trump's former appointees have been dismissed too. "Jose Andres from the President's Council on Sports, Fitness and Nutrition, Mark Milley from the National Infrastructure Advisory Council, Brian Hook from the Wilson Center for Scholars, and Keisha Lance Bottoms from the Presidents Export Council — YOU'RE FIRED!" Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social. Brian Hook, a top envoy to Iran during Trump's first term, was fired. General Mark Milley, whom Trump named as Joint Chiefs of Staff during his first administration, was also told he is no longer needed. The Pentagon revoked the security detail and clearance for Gen Milley, who has been critical of Trump in the past. In the hours after Trump's second inauguration, Trump's officials also removed a portrait of Gen Milley from the Pentagon. During Trump's time on the campaign trail, he pledged to terminate DEI programmes. DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) programmes aim to promote participation in workplaces by people from a range of backgrounds. Their backers say they address historical or ongoing discrimination and underrepresentation of certain groups, including racial minorities, but critics argue such programmes can themselves be discriminatory. Trump aimed to fulfill his election promise against DEI on his second day in office, telling federal agencies to terminate all staff working on those projects. The Trump administration emailed thousands of federal employees, ordering them to report any efforts to "disguise" diversity initiatives in their agencies or face "adverse consequences". The Justice Department said last month that it had fired several career prosecutors who were involved in criminal investigations into the president. Trump was charged in two federal cases, which were later dismissed when he won the presidential election. The Justice Department told US media that the move to fire the prosecutors was "consistent with the mission of ending the weaponization of government", another one of Trump's campaign pledges. The Trump administration also fired eight senior FBI officials involved in investigating the 6 January Capitol riots, according to a memo written by Emil Bove, a former defense lawyer for Trump who now works for the Justice Department. The administration has asked the FBI to compile a list of all the agents involved in those 6 January probes, a list a US judge has ordered Trump's team to keep confidential. Trump has also fired at least a dozen inspectors general across several federal agencies, including the departments of defence, energy and state. The role of inspector general was created to provide a check on governmental abuses of power. Trump says he is revoking Biden's security clearance Judge blocks Trump plan to put thousands of USAID staff on leave Musk to rehire Doge aide who resigned over racist posts
