Trump FIRES Top Military Brass in Friday Night PURGE

Summary

Bulwark Takes: Detailed Summary of "Trump FIRES Top Military Brass in Friday Night PURGE"

Release Date: February 22, 2025

Hosts: Sam Stein and Bill Kristol

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1. Introduction

In this episode of Bulwark Takes, Sam Stein, the managing editor at The Bulwark, is joined by political commentator Bill Kristol to dissect a significant development within the Trump administration. The discussion centers around President Trump's unexpected dismissal of seven high-ranking military officials in what has been termed a "mass purge" on a Friday night.

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2. Overview of the Friday Night Purge

Sam Stein opens the conversation by highlighting the unprecedented nature of the event:

"We had a mass, I guess we could call it mass purge of top military brass, seven in all, fired by President Trump on Friday night."
— Sam Stein [00:00]

This purge includes the termination of notable figures such as General Charles Brown, Lisa Franchetti (the first woman to lead the Navy), the Vice Chief of the Air Force, and the top lawyers for the Army, Navy, and Air Force.

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3. Focus on General Charles Brown

a. Legacy and Contributions

Bill Kristol provides an in-depth analysis of General Charles Brown's career and contributions:

"CQ Brown had served the country very well. [...He was] very much involved in updating the military's understanding of technology, had been in command of air assets in the Pacific, so very much involved in the pivot to the Indo-Pacific and to taking on China."
— Bill Kristol [01:56]

Brown is portrayed as a reformer and an innovator within the military, instrumental in modernizing the Air Force and shaping U.S. military strategy in the Indo-Pacific region.

b. Reasons for Firing

The discussion delves into the reasons behind Brown's termination, with Kristol questioning the suddenness and lack of apparent cause:

"What's the urgency in replacing him? The CQ grant wasn't going to disobey Trump's orders to try to downsize the civilians at the Defense Department."
— Sam Stein [01:56]

Kristol emphasizes that Brown was a dutiful officer executing Trump's directives, particularly regarding increased military resources for border security, making his dismissal appear unwarranted and abrupt.

c. Analysis of Motivations

Kristol further critiques the administration's rationale, suggesting underlying motives such as racism and a desire to undermine diversity initiatives:

"The explanation for that is racism. Hegseth knows nothing."
— Bill Kristol [03:30]

He defends Brown against slanders related to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs, highlighting Brown's reputation as an open-minded leader committed to meritocratic principles within the military.

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4. Introduction of General Dan Kaine

a. Background of General Kaine

Sam Stein shifts focus to General Dan Kaine, the individual appointed to replace Brown. Kristol provides insights into Kaine's background:

"He left the Air Force to go into the Air Force Guard for a few years and got involved in some Silicon Valley stuff. And those actually was involved in a firm run by I think, Jared Kushner's brother."
— Bill Kristol [05:38]

Kaine's connections to Silicon Valley and ties to influential figures within Trump’s circle are noted, raising questions about his qualifications compared to his predecessors.

b. Qualifications and Appointment

Kristol scrutinizes the legality and appropriateness of Kaine's appointment, given that he lacks the typical qualifications expected for such a high-ranking position:

"The president can have a [waiver]. But which again brings home how extraordinary this is."
— Bill Kristol [06:33]

He points out that Kaine had to obtain a waiver to bypass standard requirements, highlighting the administration's willingness to override established norms.

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5. Loyalty and Institutional Norms

a. Breaking with Tradition

The conversation highlights a broader trend of the Trump administration undermining institutional norms and prioritizing personal loyalty over expertise:

"What this is truly about, I'll just make two quick points, is breaking all institutional resistance to Trump. [...] he wants the power agencies to be utterly responsive to him, loyal to him."
— Bill Kristol [11:09]

Kristol compares this purge to historical instances but underscores its unprecedented nature in targeting military leadership without clear, justified reasons.

b. Comparison to Historical Precedents

While acknowledging responses from Trump supporters citing past instances like Truman dismissing MacArthur or Obama removing McChrystal, Kristol argues these situations were contextually different:

"Those actually had, you know, pretext to the reasons. [...] They have no relation to what we're talking about here."
— Bill Kristol [11:09]

He emphasizes that the current purge lacks the justifiable reasons that characterized previous high-profile military dismissals.

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6. Implications for Military and National Security

a. Impact on Military Morale and Structure

The firing of top military officials is seen as a destabilizing move that could have long-term repercussions on military morale and the effectiveness of the armed forces.

b. Legal and Ethical Concerns

Kristol raises concerns about the removal of the top lawyers (JAGs) for each service branch, questioning the legality and ethical implications of reducing checks and balances within the military hierarchy:

"These are the top lawyers who opine on whether orders enforce, obviously, the laws help, you know, supervise the enforcement of laws within the military, including against the war criminals."
— Bill Kristol [12:23]

c. Threat to Civil-Military Relations

The episode posits that such actions undermine the traditional civil-military relationship, placing personal loyalty above institutional integrity and adherence to the rule of law.

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7. Responses and Reactions

a. Support from Political Figures

Sam Stein notes that political figures like Roger Wicker, head of the Armed Services Committee, have publicly supported the purge without objection:

"Roger Wicker, who is head of the Armed Services Committee, put out a statement last night and no objection whatsoever to it."
— Sam Stein [14:07]

b. Online Backlash and Justifications

In response to criticisms, Trump supporters argue that such purges are standard practice, citing historical examples. However, Kristol counters these claims by differentiating the current situation from past precedents.

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8. Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Bill Kristol and Sam Stein wrap up the discussion by emphasizing the ominous nature of the purge and its alignment with Trump's strategy to consolidate power by replacing independent and experienced military leaders with loyalists. They express concern over the long-term implications for the military's autonomy and the broader national security apparatus.

"It's ominous. But to be honest, it's all ominous. [...] Do you feel like this guy is going to be loyal to you, and if he stops being loyal to you, kick him to the curb?"
— Sam Stein [13:30]

Kristol adds:

"A good question."
— Bill Kristol [14:35]

The episode concludes with an appreciation for the listeners and a reminder to subscribe to The Bulwark's feed for future updates.

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Key Takeaways

• Unprecedented Military Purge: President Trump's firing of seven top military officials marks an extraordinary move that breaks longstanding institutional norms.

• Focus on Loyalty Over Expertise: The administration appears to prioritize personal loyalty and alignment with Trump's agenda over the professional qualifications and experience of military leaders.

• Potential Legal and Ethical Issues: The dismissal of top JAGs raises concerns about the erosion of legal oversight within the military, potentially undermining the rule of law.

• Long-term Implications: Such actions may have detrimental effects on military morale, effectiveness, and the delicate balance of civil-military relations essential for national security.

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For a comprehensive analysis and ongoing coverage of this developing story, subscribe to Bulwark Takes through your preferred podcast platform.

Transcript

[Sam Stein]

Hey, guys. Me. Sam Stein, managing editor at the Bulwark, back on a Saturday morning, joined by Bill Kristol. As always, thank you for tuning in. Please subscribe to the feed. We're gonna get right into it because as is usual with the Trump administration, a lot of news happens on Friday night and this Friday was no different. We had a mass, I guess we could call it mass purge of top military brass, seven in all, fired by President Trump on Friday night. The biggest name, of course, was General Charles Brown. He's the Joint Chiefs of Chairman, Four star fighter pilot known as cq. He was not the only one. We also saw the sacking of Lisa Franchetti. She was the first woman to lead the Navy. The vice chief of the Air Force was also sacked. And then the top lawyers for Army, Navy and Air Force also sacked. We're going to get into the context in a little bit, but I know you want to say something about CQ Brown first, Bill, so why don't you talk a little bit about this and the role that he played and sort of the legacy that he now leaves.

[Bill Kristol]

Well, just on the broad context for one second, we're used to people coming in and sacking the leaders of. Not sacking, they just resigned the leaders of the civilian agencies. And you know, no question that Austin wasn't going to stay as secretary of defense when Trump took over and he put Hegseth in and Hegseth got confirmed by the Senate. This is very unusual to do this with the military. I mean, now, over time, do you move in officers you think might be better suited to the jobs? Do you think you correct mistakes the preceding administration made? Absolutely. Occasionally you make it a more abrupt change in the middle of the war. That happened a bit during the Iraq war, for example. But this is quite extraordinary. And in fact, Trump said in his statement that these were all defied people. CQ Brown had done a, served the country very well. So what was the urgency in replacing him? The CQ grant wasn't going to disobey Trump's orders to try to downsize the civilians at the Defense Department.

[Sam Stein]

You know, in fact, it's quite the opposite. He found his, he found out he had been terminated when he was down in the border because he was executing on Trump's desired mission to put more military resources towards border security. So he had been dutiful soldier when he was sacked. Right.

[Bill Kristol]

Don't reappoint him for a second to your term. There were millions. Anyway, the abruptness of it, the, the, the willingness to just ignore norms not laws, but norms about how military, how and when one replaces military leaders, not again the civilian people there or elsewhere, even in the Justice Department and so forth, is pretty extraordinary. Just on CQ Brown for a second, I'm, this is now I'm reporting what people I trust have told me, people I trust who served in the Reagan administration and other Republican administrations and aren't big fans of DEI programs in general. That, that is one of the real slanders against, against General Brown. Extremely impressive man, apparently very open minded, a reformer within the military who was making the Air Force. Trump made him, incidentally, chief of staff of the Air Force in the first Trump term. He then becomes chairman of the Joint Chiefs. Very much involved in updating the military's understanding of technology, had been in command of air assets in the Pacific. So very much involved in the pivot to the Indo Pacific and to taking on China. So from any kind of rational point of view, he's a guy you would want there for this moment in foreign policy and national security policy. And even according to Trump's own and Musk's I guess, own desire to make it more high tech and more adaptable and all that, that's what Brown was partly about, about innovation and so forth. And again, move him out after six months, sure. But this kind of firing of him, really bad and a terrible precedent, but also just totally unfair. I mean, Hegseth attacked him as a DEI appointee. There's, you know what the explanation for that is? Racism. Hegseth knows nothing. There's not. And I looked at the book for a second and you've looked at that book more and more than I have. I think for your sins, there's zero explanation. There's not like, oh, this guy was obviously bumped up over other people, which is total nonsense. He had served a long time. He had been promoted. He had been promoted, you know, in accord with normal promotion things. And Trump made him chairman of the Air Force.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah. And so the context here is. So when Trump did appoint him term of the Air Force head of the Air Force, he did actually go out of his way to note the historic nature of the appointment. He said this first black person who's held this title, this was the first Trump administration hexif in his book and on subsequent podcasts called for his removal. He said he has to be fired. His explanation was not so much that Brown was black, although that was obviously, you know, part of it. It was that Brown had focused too much of his stewardship as the Joint Chiefs at the Joint Chiefs on DEI initiatives, on getting more recruitment from minority communities. And that was where Hegseth came down. It is notable that in the brief time since he has been confirmed that they have been getting along or working together. And this was kind of, I mean, it was anticipated, but it was also sort of very much abrupt and out of the blue to a degree. Like I said, Brown was in some hotel in Texas when he got the call, according to reports.

[Bill Kristol]

And just one last thing on the kind of details, I think the bigger picture is more important. But the person who's being promoted, I don't know much about him and certainly not going to opine without a guy named Dan Cain, Dan Cain, nickname that.

[Sam Stein]

Trump seems to love.

[Bill Kristol]

Because he praised Trump.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, exactly. He likes the radio.

[Bill Kristol]

I mean, Trump tells stories about him, which may or may not be true, incidentally, about things he said to Trump and the one or two times they met, apparently in 2018, 19, he seems to, he's been involved. He left the Air Force to go into the Air Force Guard for a few years and got involved in some Silicon Valley stuff. And those actually was involved in a firm run by I think, Jared Kushner's brother. Right. Josh Kushner and stuff. So there's some relation. He may know some of the sort of Silicon Valley people who are influential with Trump, which is fine. I mean, maybe or maybe not. We don't know. So I'm not going to opine on Kaine except to say that to take someone who's been retired and bump him up at a three star and has never been in charge of either one of the services as Brown, let's say, was chief of the Air Force or in charge of a region as a combatant commander is the law says you should have one of those two qualifications to be trained at the Joint Chiefs. Now you can override that. The president can have a.

[Sam Stein]

And you could get a waiver.

[Bill Kristol]

Could get a waiver. But which again brings home how extraordinary this is. He has to go out and get a waiver for the person he's bringing in to over to jump over an awful lot of active duty four stars, including the currently serving chief about whom there were no complaints, so to speak. So again, he's going out of his way to pick General Kane.

[Sam Stein]

So let's talk about that. I mean, so the question obviously is why? Why do it? Right. Like, and we can, let's guess. I mean, we're, we're guessing right. But I think we have reasonable context and history to inform our guesses here.

[Bill Kristol]

So I think people are focused a lot on the individuals. And I guess my broader point would be General Kaine owes everything to Donald Trump. Right. He's not a guy who already was there when Trump took over. So he may be a perfectly decent and fine public servant and want to do the right thing, but still his attitude is going to be more that, I'm going to put it this way, of Marco Rubio or Michael Walsh, both of whom were not regarded as particularly Trumpy when they were in the Senate and the House, respectively. But as Secretary of State, look at what Rubio's doing, and it's because he's totally dependent on and owes everything to Trump. So I think Trump wants people who owe everything to him in there. He wants loyalists. And I do think it's. So it's the. It's the overall message.

[Sam Stein]

Well, talk a bit, Bill, Talk a bit about how the Mark Milley history probably informs Trump's view of this.

[Bill Kristol]

Well, it's interesting, yeah, because. So he picked Milley. And wasn't it right after the Army Navy game? I have some vague memory of that.

[Sam Stein]

I'll have to look that up.

[Bill Kristol]

Remember that at Thanksgiving 2018, and, you know, he went to the gate, Maybe Milley went with him. I can't remember. I mean, at the time, the people I knew who sort of followed this stuff closely, Milley wasn't the consensus choice to be chairman. I think people thought the Air Force Chief of staff, Goldfein, I think his name was, was more impressive, but whatever. And Milley was chair and certainly was Army Chief of Staff. He was qualified. I think Trump thought he was appointing a loyalist. And it turned out Milley stood up to Trump famously, obviously made a mistake at Lafayette Square, but then stood up to him after November 3rd and privately before November 3rd, as worked with Pompeo and with Esper to stop some really bad things from happening. And I think the lesson Trump learned from that is Milley looked like at the time in 2018, some of my friends thought, Millie's kind of sucking off to Trump a little bit. I mean, he sort of wants, you know, he wants Trump to pick him. Understandable. I suppose Trump liked the way he looked. The lesson Trump learned is you really need someone who has no independent standing. I think that's the key point. You need someone who doesn't have his own network. CQ Brown knew a lot of people, and he'd been around for, you know, a long time. He'd been at senior levels. He knew the defense community, the national security community. He wasn't going to simply assume that if Trump said X, there were no other points of view worth at least entertaining or recommending to Trump as the adviser to Trump and so forth. Kaine hasn't been in that situation. He served in the Biden administration, amusingly enough, as the top military guy over at the CIA. There's a position at the CIA, quite senior, where you're the kind of liaison, in effect, with the military. And he worked closely with Bill Burns, Biden CIA director. So it's not as if he's a raging MAGA person, presumably, but he doesn't have the kind of independent standing that even Milley had, let alone CQ Brown. And I think that's key in Trump's mind.

[Sam Stein]

Right. And how I view it is that Trump really got angry with Milley for speaking out. And also the Lafayette Square incident where Milley was very upset about the use of National Guard to go and basically suppress protesters, of course, obviously speaking out about what happened on January 6th. And for Trump, ultimately, it just comes down to loyalty, right? It's like, do you feel like this guy is going to be loyal to you, and if he stops being loyal to you, kick him to the curb? And so Trump 2.0 is sort of built around this idea that we are going to just start fresh and bring in all the loyalists so that we can at least start by trusting him. And that is certainly looks to be the case in this situation. Now, just before we go, the response, the retort from the Trump people online to any criticism of this is that this is totally kosher. I think no one's arguing that it's illegal or anything. You can do this. It's just not within the norms. But also, they're like, well, Truman sacked MacArthur, Obama sacked McChrystal. Like, this happens all the time. In fact, those are two very unique situations that have no relation to what we're talking about here, because those actually had, you know, pretext to the reasons. Yeah, exactly. So talk a little about that. I mean, do you see any historical parallel or.

[Bill Kristol]

No, pretty hard to find one. I mean, I think what this is truly about, I'll just make two quick points, is breaking all institutional resistance to Trump. I mean, if you put it together, what happened to the Justice Department and the FBI and National Intelligence, he wants the power agencies to be utterly responsive to him, loyal to him, beyond loyal, you know, to have fealty to him. And that's part of this. Now, that's not to say that Kaine might not surprise him, but that's he's doing his best to move in that direction. And then final point, they're taking no chances.

[Sam Stein]

Don't take chances.

[Bill Kristol]

Right. Firing the Jags, that I believe is totally unprecedented. These are the top lawyers, obviously, in each of the services. They each have their own. What are the rationales they're using. And the media, I'd say, has bought this a little too much, in my opinion, from skimming the news this morning that, well, he wants people who are in sync with the America first agenda. Well, the Jags aren't in sync with the. He doesn't know whether the Jags are in sync with America first agenda or the Bush agenda or the Biden agenda. They're Jags. Right. They're lawyers who opine on whether, among other things, whether orders enforce, obviously, the laws help, you know, supervise the enforcement of laws within the military, including against the war criminals.

[Sam Stein]

I mean, Hecliff has been fairly upfront about that, too. He wants to get rid of people who he thinks unnecessarily constrained military force. I think he sort of apologists for some of the worst features that the military can. Can pursue. And so that is a way to get rid of those roadblocks.

[Bill Kristol]

Totally. So part of it is these people, you know, presided over a system that found some of the people that Trump pardoned, you know, to be war criminals.

[Sam Stein]

Who Hegseth was friends with. Yeah.

[Bill Kristol]

But also, even more broadly, these are the people who would have to say if an order came down that was questionable, using troops at the US Insurrection act, all the obvious things that the stuff that Milley was balking at and working very hard to prevent. These are the people who would say this is a lawful order or no. I have real questions about this. And at least I'm going to go to the Secretary of Defense and say that in my opinion, members of the Air Force or the army or the Navy should not. Should at least have questions about obeying this order, or we need to bring it back up to the president and say it's not. He does not want, they don't want. For me, that's very ominous because again, there's not even a pretense that the Jags have a point of view about, you know, about. I don't know whether we should do more with China or whether we should sell out Ukraine. It's not about that.

[Sam Stein]

Just interpretation of the law.

[Bill Kristol]

I don't want any obstacles. It's more like the Justice Department, if you want, you know, or like that is. I don't want any obstacles to personal loyalty to me in any of these top positions.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, well, it's ominous. But to be honest, it's all ominous. And so it kind of fits into the general vibe. And so I'm not like, you know, not totally thrown off by this. I'm stewing in it.

[Bill Kristol]

Maybe it's a bit of a wake up call of how ominous things are. I do think there's been a little bit of that going on. You've reported on this a lot in the last few days in terms of what Musk has been up to. A little bit of a wake up about that. Maybe now the military, you know, there are a lot of people.

[Sam Stein]

Well, I would say so. But then you had Roger Wicker, who is head of the Armed Services Committee, put out a statement last night and no objection whatsoever to it. Right. I mean, he's just like, okay, cool. And so you get to the place where we've been continuously, you and I, where it's like, well, what's the point of these people? Why did you run for office? Like, at what point do you actually want to, you know, exert some independence or take your job seriously? And we're not quite there yet. So.

[Bill Kristol]

A good question.

[Sam Stein]

All right, Bill, thanks so much for waking up and doing this. Appreciate it. And thank you guys for tuning in, watching us again. Do subscribe to the feed. We really appreciate it and we'll be in touch. Bye.