# It's Hegseth we need to get **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Tags:** trump\ **Created:** [April 30, 2025, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-hegseth-we-need-to-get/1017720 "2025-04-30T18:29:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2025, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-hegseth-we-need-to-get/1017720/21 "2025-05-06T02:49:36Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > > “We won World War II with seven four-star generals. Today we have 44,” Hegseth said at a [town hall](https://www.dvidshub.net/video/951876/defense-secretary-pete-hegseth-hosts-town-hall-meeting-pentagon-feb-7-2025) at the Pentagon in February. “Do all of those directly contribute to warfighting success? Maybe they do — I don’t know — but it’s worth reviewing to make sure they do.” > > “I admit I don’t actually know what any of those generals are doing, but I’ll make an arbitrary decision to cut 20% of them anyways, before doing any kind of review.” In WWII we only had a fledgling (Army) Air Force; no ‘Nuclear Navy’, STRATCOM, SOCOM, or satellites and space launch capability; didn’t have to worry about cyberwarfare; minimal cryptographic capability, and so many other capabilities and technologies that didn’t even exist circa 1945. While I’m sympathetic to general desire to streamline the often complex managerial bureaucracy of the Department of Defense, arbitrarily shaving off percentages or evaluating the DoD specifically on “contribut[ing] to warfighting success” when the military actually has a much broader role in national security beyond just lobbing bombs and engaging in broadsides is, charitably speaking, obtuse. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![PhillyGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ed655f/32.png) [@PhillyGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PhillyGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2025, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-hegseth-we-need-to-get/1017720/22 "2025-05-06T02:51:38Z")
> [@PastTense](#): > > . . . this will provide an opportunity to get rid of many of those generals who don’t support Trump. Government purges are this year’s agenda, in and out of the military. Next year, they will decide they needed those positions after all and fill them with lackeys. I can’t recall historical examples but have read this is from the normal dictator playbook. P.S. I don’t exactly know what a playbook is, but the professional pundits use the word a lot. So why not I? ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2025, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-hegseth-we-need-to-get/1017720/23 "2025-05-06T02:52:13Z")
Yeah, I was wondering about a break down of how many types of commands just didn’t exist back then. We have jobs now that WWII era generals just couldn’t imagine. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2025, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-hegseth-we-need-to-get/1017720/24 "2025-05-06T02:56:10Z")
> [@PhillyGuy](#): > > P.S. I don’t exactly know what a playbook is It’s literally a book in which you write down all your plays. Probably the most common in American Football, which uses set-piece plays all the time. > **[Football Playbooks & Schemes | USA Football](https://usafootball.com/coaches-organizations/football-playbooks-schemes)** > > USA Football provides playbooks to certified coaches, members and enrolled organizations to help coaches compete! ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2025, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-hegseth-we-need-to-get/1017720/25 "2025-05-06T03:06:06Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > Yeah, I was wondering about a break down of how many types of commands just didn’t exist back then. We have jobs now that WWII era generals just couldn’t imagine. The entire structure of the military and even its essential mission today is very different from the US Army and Navy of WWII, or even as of the Vietnam War. Just making that kind of comparison shows that Hegseth doesn’t really understand anything about the military…but then, he’s probably mostly resentful that he got sidelined in his job for being a vocal racist with Christian Nationalist tattoos. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2025, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-hegseth-we-need-to-get/1017720/26 "2025-05-07T05:35:57Z")
> [@](#): > > “We won World War II with seven four-star generals. Today we have 44,” Hegseth said at a [town hall](https://www.dvidshub.net/video/951876/defense-secretary-pete-hegseth-hosts-town-hall-meeting-pentagon-feb-7-2025) at the Pentagon in February. “Do all of those directly contribute to warfighting success? Maybe they do — I don’t know — but it’s worth reviewing to make sure they do.” You know what would be really nice? If Hegseth had any idea what he was talking about or could get basic facts straight. Because that’s flat-out bullshit and factually wrong. > **[The Army Now Has the Most 4-Star Generals on Duty Since World War II](https://www.military.com/daily-news/2020/08/28/army-now-has-most-4-star-generals-duty-world-war-ii.html)** > > One reason for the Army's current dominance in the joint world is that the most recent conflicts had a heavy Army presence. > “Last time we had that rank density was April 1945, when we had four five-stars and 13 four-stars,” Coglianese said, adding pointing out that at that time the Air Force was known as the U.S. Army Air Force. Add to that those Naval officers of equivalent rank there were seven officers of five-star rank and 24 officers of four-star rank in the US military in World War II. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-hegseth-we-need-to-get/1017720.md?page=1)