Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered a 20-percent reduction of four-star officers — the military’s senior ranks — continuing the wide swath of job reductions and firings that have marked his three months at the helm of the Pentagon.
In a memo on Monday, Mr. Hegseth also ordered a 10 percent reduction of overall general-level officers in the military, and a 20 percent cut of four-star positions in the National Guard.
“Through these measures, we will uphold our position as the most lethal fighting force in the world, achieving peace through strength and ensuring greater efficiency, innovation and preparedness for achieving any challenge that lies ahead,” he said.
Mr. Hegseth has already fired a raft of military leaders, many of them people of color and women. He fired the Black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr.; the first woman to command the Navy, Admiral Lisa Franchetti; and the U.S. military’s representative to the NATO military committee, Vice Admiral Shoshana Chatfield.
Mr. Hegseth is fighting calls for his own firing after disclosing on Signal, a commercial chat app, the flight sequencing for U.S. strikes against Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen.
He has made targeting what he has called a “woke” agenda at the Pentagon one of the signatures of his tenure. Last week he boasted on social media that he had “proudly” canceled a program encouraging more women to take roles in national security.
In his memo on Monday laying out the cuts, Mr. Hegseth, a former Fox News weekend anchor, said that “the Department of Defense is committed to ensuring the lethality of U.S. Military Forces to deter threats and, when necessary, achieve a decisive victory.”
He added: “A critical step in this process is removing redundant force structure to optimize and streamline leadership by reducing excess general and flag officer positions.”
There are about 800 general-level officers in the military. At the most senior, four-star level, there are 44.
It was unclear how Mr. Hegseth planned to cut the positions. Because general officers serve at the pleasure of the president, they can sometimes be easier to fire than lower-ranked service members.
