Veterans and former military leaders have criticised US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth’s address to hundreds of generals and admirals at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia, describing it as ‘insulting’, ‘egotistical’ and ‘dangerous’. The closed-door meeting, which involved around 800 senior officers, was called amid a looming government shutdown and drew sharp reactions from those who served.
Naveed Shah, a veteran and policy director for the advocacy group Common Defense, said he struggled to find words for the speech. ‘The people in that room who have served for 20, 30-plus years in uniform do not need Pete Hegseth to tell them about warrior ethos,’ he stated. Retired Army General Dana Pittard, who commanded in Iraq, called the address ‘insulting’ and rejected Hegseth’s claims that senior officers of colour had benefited from a quota system for promotions.
Pittard also criticised the timing and cost of the meeting, calling it a waste of resources. ‘A bad cold could have threatened our entire chain of command,’ Shah added, noting the risk of illness among so many senior leaders gathered just before a potential shutdown. Pittard described the event as ‘egotistical’ and warned that Donald Trump’s subsequent speech, which mentioned the ‘enemy within’, created a ‘dangerous, slippery slope’ towards partisanship in the military.
Hegseth’s remarks on physical fitness standards for women in combat roles drew mixed responses. Sally Roberts, an Afghanistan veteran and world medalist in wrestling, saw a potential for fairness, saying it could ‘level the playing field’ for high-performing women. However, retired Marine pilot Amy McGrath countered that there has never been a separate male and female standard, stating, ‘You can either do the job or you can’t. Period.’ Tamara Stevens, a former navy cryptologic technician, expressed alarm over Hegseth’s emphasis on ‘lethality’, particularly given Trump’s comments about using military deployments domestically.
