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- [00:00]
Expedia Voice
Packages by Expedia. You were made to be rechargeable. We were made to package flights, hotels and hammocks for less. Expedia Made to travel. Trip planner by Expedia. You were made to have strong opinions about sand. We were made to help you and your friends find a place on the beach with a pool and a marina and a waterfall and a soaking tube. Expedia Made to travel.
- [00:43]
Tim Miller
Hello, and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Delighted to welcome back retired lieutenant general. He's a former commanding general of the U.S. army of Europe. It's Mark Hertling. How you doing, sir?
- [00:54]
Mark Hertling
Hey, good, Tim. How are you?
- [00:56]
Tim Miller
I'm doing well. Appreciate you coming on today. Kind of on short notice. I gotta tell you, I was pretty shook by President Trump's speech yesterday at Fort Bragg. Obviously there have been actual policies that I've found more appalling since he's been in, but just as a scene, it might have been the most dispiriting scene, I think for me since the inauguration. He's speaking in front of a bunch of soldiers commemorating the 250th anniversary. I try not to do clips of him for people because everybody needs a break. They can watch him on the news if they want, but I'm more interested in the reaction than in Trump's words. So if you don't mind, I've got a little highlight, low light reel, if you will, from the speech I want to play and get your reaction to the fake news.
- [01:40]
Donald Trump
Ladies and gentlemen, look at them. Look at them all. What I have to put up with. Fake news. What I have to put up with. You think this crowd would have showed up for Biden? I don't think so. I don't think so. I don't think so. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm wrong. In Los Angeles, the Governor of California, the mayor of Los Angeles, they're incompetent.
- [02:13]
Tim Miller
Yeah. So active duty military, they're booing the fake news. Former Commander in Chief Gavin Newsom. What did you make of that?
- [02:20]
Mark Hertling
You said you were shook by it. I was, too. I was also embarrassed. But I'll lead in by saying, you know, the military, especially the army, draws from all elements of the population. So it is not a surprise that there are some soldiers who support different parties. A lot of soldiers, maybe in this audience appeared to have supported Trump. The backstory, though, that I'm receiving from some folks in the military, and I'm not sure any of this is true, but there was a Couple of chain of command. I don't want to say orders, but they were, hey, if you. If you support this guy and you want to, you know, stand behind him, you can do that. Just make sure that you look good, that you're in shape, you've got your beret on, and don't embarrass, you know, yourself. And if you're not a supporter, then you don't even have to go to the speech. So this was not something that was ordered to the entire either 18th Airborne Corps or 82nd Airborne Division. But you can understand that a lot of people jumped at the chance because a lot of young soldiers are enamored by their president, no matter what party they're in. But what really stunned me, I think this is what stunned you was the reaction to some of the things that were actually contrary to our Constitution. You know, insulting the press, insulting other politicians. It became a political speech. It became a rally speech. It was a rally speech. It didn't become one. It probably started off as a rally. And there's a significant number of rules and regulations and policies that tell soldiers, when you're wearing the uniform, you must remain apolitical. You can't support another party in either an election or a campaign or in current political issues. So these were a bunch of young soldiers. And I scanned the audience when I was watching it, and it seemed like a bunch of very young soldiers without probably a whole lot of leadership, either sergeants or officers in the crowd with them. And they got caught up in the rally environment and almost kind of a mob like reaction. So, yeah, it was very disappointing. And what I'll tell you, Tim, is I sure would hope there's a bunch of commanders and senior leaders right now telling their soldiers about the policies, reminding them again what they should and should not do at political rallies in terms of supporting candidates, but especially candidates that seem to run contrary to some of the things that our Constitution requires.
- [05:00]
Tim Miller
Yeah, I mean, look, I've been. I've been 20 before and got caught up in a mob like environment jeering at people that maybe I look back on and shouldn't have done. Right. So I. I understand that. Even still, you know, it's in the military, everybody's in uniform, and like you said, hopefully there are some commanders or military leadership that maybe would provide some feedback afterwards. But is that happening? Like, is there evidence of that happening? I know Tom Nichols is in the Atlantic this morning, you know, saying folks should speak as far as military leadership is concerned. Maybe that's too much to wish for. I don't know. What do you think in the conversations you have with ex military and all that? What do you think the conversations are like?
- [05:38]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, I think there's going to be a reaction by the military today. And I always look at it from what would I do if, you know, when I do military analysis for different people, I try and look at the enemy's point of view, the friendly point of view, and what I would do as a commander if I had been still in command of either U.S. army Europe 1st Armored Division, a brigade or a squadron, or even a company with 100 people in it. If I had seen that, I think the very first thing I would do at morning PT formation is go in and talk to the soldiers that I was leading and say, hey, this isn't what we are. This is not who we are proposing to be. This is not the culture of the military. The press, you know, we work with the press. Even though sometimes we don't like them and they get under our cross, sometimes we work with them because by the way, the military, the army specifically and the press are the two institutions that are named by name in the Constitution of the United States. So those are two things. You don't counter and you don't cheer for one political party or person over another when people make fun of other people. I mean, one of our army values is respect. We should have respect for all people. And so when you're jeering the press or you're jeering Governor new scum, as Mr. Trump called them, or anything else, that's just not appropriate in the military culture. And I think soldiers have to be reminded of that.
- [07:14]
Tim Miller
I do think this will be interesting to see how that shakes out. I hope that's happening. Obviously the worries are, you know, at some level the scene was like, what word did you use? Embarrassing. And you know, it felt like not particularly American. And so that is what gives you kind of a natural negative physical reaction to it. But you know, the, the worry obviously is the kind of worst case scenario elements of all this, that folks in the military just start to get used to this and, and what we're about to get into LA next, but like across a series of different, you know, in a series of different ways, you know, they start to undermine what the kind of traditional, you know, role had been and you start to see the military doing more partisan stuff on behalf of an increasingly emboldened wannabe autocrat. I mean, like, that's the thing that I think worried me watching that is like, man, I see a lot of people that I think would go along with a lot of stuff right now that isn't great.
- [08:11]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, I think we see the, the president openly trying to create chaos in different institutions and especially the institutions that held during his first administration. The legal system, the rule of law, the courts, the military. Those are the ones I think present the biggest potential for a crisis. And I see last night truly as kind of that opening of a door to a potential crisis, especially given the other things that are going on. The context of last night at Fort Bragg was really pretty interesting. Talking about the parade this weekend, what's going on in Los Angeles, what's potentially going on in other places, the reduction of arms to Ukraine, the announcement made by Secretary Hegseth. Those are the things all coming together that really show sort of an upheaval of not only our policies, but also our foreign policy.
- [09:12]
Tim Miller
I want to get into all those things. One more thing from the speech and the words of Rick Sanchez from Rick and Morty, your booze mean nothing because I've seen what makes you cheer. It wasn't just what they booed that was concerning. There was some cheers following the announcement that we're going to rename some of these military installations after, you know, or go back to the Confederate names. I just want to play that clip really quick.
- [09:33]
Donald Trump
I think it took them a little by surprise. But for a little breaking news, we are also going to be restoring the names to Fort Pickett, Fort Hood, Fort Gordon, Fort Rucker, Fort Polk, Fort A.P. hill, and Fort Robert E. Lee.
- [09:58]
Mark Hertling
It's interesting because every one of those that he named were a Confederate general. The posts were named after the. The Department of Defense. Secretary Hegseth is trying to get around that by saying, well, it's not the real Lee that we're naming it after. We're not really naming it after Robert E. Lee. We're naming it after Fitz Lee, who I think was actually a relative of Robert E. Lee who died in another war and received an award.
- [10:22]
Tim Miller
Yeah, a lot of the relatives, Robert E. Lee, who fought for the Union, by the way, There is. I was seeing some stuff of some chatter on social media about how. Well, how can you blame Robert E. Lee? We got to go back to him. He was defending his family and it's like, no, actually that's not true. People should listen to the behind the bathrooms about Robert E. Lee. It's a really excellent podcast. And his family was split actually, so that's not quite right. So he did. So there are some Lee's that were on the Union side we could name things after for sure.
- [10:46]
Mark Hertling
You know, the other post, A.P. hill, Bragg, I mean, these were generals that did not cover themselves with glory. And in fact, they were some of the most incompetent Confederate generals. Not only did they, you know, act as a traitor to the country by disavowing their oath, but they also were not all that good on the battlefield, but they happened to be good in the eyes of their citizens enough to posture them as the namesakes of some of these posts.
- [11:12]
Tim Miller
You have a theory for why that might be?
- [11:15]
Mark Hertling
No, I have no theory whatsoever.
- [11:17]
Tim Miller
Okay, I've got one. Racism. They like the Confederacy. It's Confederacy nostalgia. I'm very upset about the Mexican flag. Right. Because at these protests is the claim because you gotta represent America. But at the same time, we want to take the people that were traders to America and put their names back on our military installations.
- [11:37]
Mark Hertling
Well, if you don't like the Mexican flag, you probably like the Confederate flag even more. But, yeah, it's nonsensical. It's just appealing to emotion. It's the proverbial red meat, and I hate to use that phrase. It seems to override any logic or pragmatism that when you look at the evidence, you say, oh, okay, that's why these posts shouldn't be named that way. Or that's why the Marines shouldn't deploy. Or that's why. Yeah, I mean, you could go down the entire list. If you actually analyze it and apply facts and rationale, you get a whole different solution. But it doesn't seem to be. That's in the equation. It's all about emotions and opinions and rabidness, I guess.
- [12:21]
Tim Miller
And it's all about sticking your finger in the eye of the other guys. Right? I mean, Tegseth does this. You know, we're not going to be woke. We're not going to be politically correct. And it's about that, right? It's like, we know this will make our political enemies unhappy. You know, that it will be a troll on them to rename this, these, you know, whatever. Rename a fort after some loser trader general. And that's. That's why they're doing it. Y' all looking for some normcore summer basics that feel good and last look good. I'd recommend going back to Quint's just like I've been. Quints is all the things you actually want to wear this summer. Organic cotton silk polos, European linen beach shorts, and comfortable pants that work for everything from backyard hangs to nice dinners. The best part, everything With Quince is half the cost of similar brands. By working directly with top artisans and cutting out the middleman, Quince gives you luxury pieces without the markups. I've been very pleased with the Quince orders we've been getting. I got some new shorts, needed some short shorts. It's tough out there, I gotta tell you. For us short, short wearers, the short shorts are out. We were shopping in Nashville and I was complaining to the person at the hipster store that all the shorts were long. And he was like, yeah, the guys just nobody buys short shorts anymore. Back in the day, the gays bought short shorts and there's a little kind of a southern frat bro short short energy as well. But these days, no, the youngs, the hipsters, straights, everybody wants long shorts. So you know, that's tough. But quince had some 5 inch inseamers, so I got that, got my little army green jacket. I've been wearing a lot of Quint's gear I like. You should check it out as well. Stick to the staples. At last. With elevated essentials from quince, go to quince.com the bulwark for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's Q U-I-N-C-E.com the bulwark to get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com thebullwork okay, I wanna talk about Los Angeles. So some stuff has happened since yesterday. We do now have hundred of marines. They're hitting the streets of LA today. We learned a little bit more about what the National Guard troops were doing. Maybe you can explain this. Adam Kinzinger texted me and said that's not, they are National Guard troops, but technically they're kind of federal troops because of the nature of how they've been brought into service, so to speak, here in Los Angeles. But anyway, we saw the type of production they're providing and it doesn't seem like we have reporting that they're providing like perimeter protection for ICE raids. So it's not, not even anti rio, it, it's not even like they were involved in any of the pushback on the number of rioters, but they were, they were providing protection for ICE agents during raids, some of these National Guards troops. So anyway, what do you make of what we know so far about what the use of military in Southern California?
- [15:14]
Mark Hertling
Well, I'll talk about the control of them first. I mean any state's National Guard belongs to the governor of that state and he or she can Use the Guard in ways that, that contribute to law and order or security within the state or for humanitarian crisis. That's something called Title 32. And when the president says, hey, I need the National Guard for something else, like, I mean, all during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, multiple National Guard units were mobilized under Title 10 and reinforced the active duty military. But that's with the coordination and the collaboration of the government of the state, particularly the governor. So the President would go to the governor and say, hey, look, I need the division out of California to reinforce one of the active divisions in Iraq. Can you mobilize them under Title 10? And we can federalize them and have them go just like active troops. And they do that. And they're great. I mean, they are terrific. They normally do logistics functions, but there are some combat arms forces. Okay, so when you disregard the role of the governor in controlling his National Guard, then that's a major party file. You should always be coordinating with the Guard for their state's militia, if you will. So that's the first thing that stuck in the craw of Governor Newsom that he was not asked if these could be federalized. It just came as an order from the Department of Defense. So very little coordination. And what you have to consider is these Guard soldiers are not sitting around in a barrack somewhere or in the motor pool of some tank park. They're working jobs as real estate agents and dental assistants and anything you can name, and they are pulled away from those jobs. So it's a huge disruption, not just for the individual soldier who has to then report to his unit for deployment, but it's a disruption of the workplace that they have to leave. Add to that the fact that the California Guard specifically does some wonderful things, not only in firefighting and, you know, wildfires and all the things that they do, but they're also part of something called a state partnership program, which no one really knows about. So every single state has a partnership with some other country. Coincidentally, over the last 10 years, California's National Guard has had a partnership with Ukraine. So they have been inside of Ukraine multiple times with small forces training the Ukrainian army prior to the war breaking out. I used to work with the California Guard. They're a great, when I was in US Army Europe, they're a great organization. They've got some great leaders, and the Ukrainians stand by them 100%. So you can see just by that description the churn you're going to get of disrupting normal missions and taking people away from their jobs. And how employers feel about this. You know, if you've got a person working for you who's a guardsman, and every couple of weeks they're saying, hey, I just got notified, I got to go somewhere. Well, if you're an employer, you're going to lose that person for a month or two months. And in this case, from what I understand, the deployment order is two months long, 60 days, even though they haven't been really given a mission other than support for civilian authorities. And that's a very amorphous kind of mission set where you're asked to do anything you can. So that's the background.
- [18:42]
Tim Miller
Well, I think that's an interesting context in particular for the other element of what I brought up. Right. That we're learning yesterday. It's like you're disrupting the lives of these guardsmen. You're disrupting the businesses they work at. You're disrupting, you know, you're doing all that to what end?
- [18:56]
Mark Hertling
Basically you're taking them away from their.
- [18:57]
Tim Miller
Family as well to be the muscle for a deportation force. And that's really what this is like. It'd be one thing, you know, to say, okay, these riots are out of control and we need more manpower. Now obviously you would want to coordinate with the governor on that. And this has happened, happened many times throughout history where the governor and president have coordinated on such a thing. But that's not what this. And that's what they kind of said it was. But what it turns out it actually is, is that they're taking these guys to go to raid, you know, businesses where they're unarmed immigrants. You know, there are videos yesterday of ICE agents, you know, kind of detaining unarmed immigrants with these guardsmen kind of standing around with their weapons just, just, you know, whatever, protecting the space. That feels to me to be insane.
- [19:41]
Mark Hertling
With no coordination beforehand for things like lodging and food and hey, that's up to the Guard, or in this case, once it transfers from the guard to the federal authority, then they fall under an entirely different command structure. So every National Guard has the adjutant general, which is a two star general. And as soon as they're mobilized, that two star general is no longer the authority. They are put under the control of U.S. northern Commander, a federal active component organization. So there's that, you know, whole kabuki dance. The one other thing I'll say about the guardsmen, though, I didn't mention Tim, and it's important. A lot of soldiers, a lot of guardsmen are single parents. So when they're deployed for 30 days or 60 days at a time. Where do their kids go? When you're a Guardsman, you have to have a family support plan where you say, if I am deployed, if I am activated for service, here's where my child is going to go. It's either going to go with a grandparent or your ex wife or whatever. So even that creates a whole bunch of churn within the personal aspects of the Guard. And then especially when they're mobilized by the feds to work against their fellow citizens, you've got the face off of guardsmen who may or may not believe in what's going on, facing off against civilians who are in most cases peacefully protesting. So there's more dynamics to this than I think most Americans understand.
- [21:12]
Tim Miller
Like, listening to you explain all that. Like, my reaction is like, it really raises the bar for doing this. Right? Like, this is not a thing to do willy nilly because you want a Fox News segment. Right. Like, there's a lot of considerations at play. There's a lot of personal considerations, there's safety considerations. Right. And there's no evidence at this point that this was necessary for anything other than kind of escalating the public feud between Trump and Newsom and blue states and immigrants. Right. I mean, do you, like, is there any rationale for doing it the way they've done it?
- [21:49]
Mark Hertling
What you just described is sort of how I see it. But you and I are not on the ground in California, so we're taking the word of Newsom versus Trump, Bass versus Trump. But I tend to believe the person on the ground who's seeing what's happening, especially a person that has a very large police force at their disposal. You know, it was interesting. I heard somebody say the other day that there are, with the 2,000 plus, 2,000 plus 700 marines, there are more National Guard and Marines on the ground in California than we had at the very end of the stages in Afghanistan. So, you know, it's kind of an interesting comparison. But to your point, it really gets to how do civilian leaders make decisions on using the military? It better be a considered, analyzed, pragmatic way. And the ones who finally pull that trigger of saying, let's launch this force really have to understand the implications of launching this force. To your point of, it shouldn't just be something to put on Fox News because there's perceived craziness.
- [23:00]
Tim Miller
I think that's right. And look, you're right, we're not on the ground in L. A and there certainly are like some sophisticated rioters and like I was watching some of the news last night and like some of these guys are obviously have thought through the troublemaking that they're trying to do. I guess just say that. So it's not as if, I mean, there also are a bunch of peaceful, like all this stuff is happening simultaneously, right? So it's not as if there is no public safety threat. But, but I just think to what you're getting at, like the thing that worries me and I think the thing that worries a lot of people is just like, okay, well, like the Trump administration isn't even really making the case that they needed to do this to support the public safety element of this only. Right. And that like they were going to do what was needed to work with, you know, any, anybody in California that needs them, the LAPD or whatever. Like, that's not the case that they're making. Like their case is that LA is out of control and that they need to go in there and they need to be part of the mass deportation efforts. That's just a very different animal.
- [23:59]
Mark Hertling
And again, I'm going to go back to the mission set because this is important too. When the Guard is deployed, when active duty soldiers or Marines are deployed, unless the Insurrection act has been called, there's a limit on what they can do. There's a mission set called Support for Civil Authorities. So what the Guard does in those kind of missions is they take on the administrative functions, the logistical functions of supporting the frontline people who are doing the acts. So as Mike Barnacle said yesterday, our shared friend, he said the one thing that the Guard or the Marines can't do is say you're under arrest. They're not authorized to do that. They can't touch people unless they're threatened. So when you're talking about what the Guard can do, they can put up barricades, they can put up fences, they can stand around buildings to protect them. And in fact, the new mission set that you're talking about is standing around or forming a cordon around ice. They can actually do that too. But it puts them in a position that they could be attacked by these protesters and then they have to use force to extricate themselves, but they can't arrest the people that are using force or that are protesting.
- [25:18]
Tim Miller
I think there was a letter DHS was trying to ask Higgs says for permission to let them do that or whatever. Which again takes you to a very concerning place.
- [25:26]
Mark Hertling
Well, that's where the whole posse comatitis, which few people understand comes into play.
- [25:31]
Tim Miller
Why don't you explain it for folks?
- [25:33]
Mark Hertling
Well, it's a Latin term saying for the, for the county. It basically says that military forces, unless it's an emergency or an insurrection, do not have the power to police, to do the acts of police people. And there's a very good reason for that. There's many good reasons for it. The one is you're approaching fellow citizens and arresting them when you're supposed to be defending them as the military. The second thing is most of these guardsmen on the street have not been trained in police action. Unless you've got a military police battalion out on the street, they're not going to know how to handcuff people, they're not going to know how to treat people, they're not going to know how to read rights or any of those other kind of things that policemen do. They're infantry guys or in some cases cooks and bottle washers. You know, that's the scary part of it.
- [26:22]
Expedia Voice
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- [26:39]
Tim Miller
One more thing is on the, on this, on the folks on the ground there in LA because there is some, some dialogue about this going on. I saw a video of, she was dressed like an active duty troop, I guess I didn't check. She was in fatigues. Talking about how her fellow soldiers should not obey unconstitutional orders and that, you know, do any sort of the things that you're talking about, things that violate Posse Comitatus, things that violate the constitutional rights of Americans, you know, comes to these immigration raids, they should not be a part of. Michael Wood, who we've had on here a few times, who's a veteran and who ran for Congress, posted Marine soldiers, sailors, airmen, you're not some sort of Republican Guard. Your loyalties to the Constitution above all else. But on the other hand, I noticed you posted a guy named Joseph Collins saying that he's concerned about the well meaning people telling these corporals and privates not to obey an unlawful order. It's, it's more complex than it seems. So why don't you kind of just talk about that choice that I don't, I don't think we're kind of, I don't know if we've crossed the Rubicon to that yet, but man, we're a lot closer than we've been in a while.
- [27:43]
Mark Hertling
We are close and I Saw that. That clip, too, or that tweet or whatever it was. And it was a very good point, because there's an expression in the military called a barracks lawyer. That's someone that lives in the barracks and makes decisions on what's right and wrong and what's legal and not. And normally, most soldiers don't have law degrees, so they can't really tell. But within units, there are lawyers that advise commanders that say, here's what's legal and here's what's not. Okay, here's the order I just got. What do you think? Well, that's an illegal order. You should protest it with your superior individual soldiers should not do that because they really don't know what is a legal or illegal order is. But if they have questions about it, they should ask their commander and their chain of command, and even that gets a little tenuous as well.
- [28:31]
Tim Miller
What is, like, the chatter for you among fellow retireds, like, how worried is everybody about this? What is the state of alarm about kind of the use of military domestically at this point?
- [28:44]
Mark Hertling
Well, the chatter among the proverbial generals and admirals is it's a continuous debate on civil military relations. What do we do? What do we have the authority to do other than what we're doing right now talking about the facts associated with the issue? What we can't say is, we need to go arrest Trump. That's ridiculous. I mean, that is.
- [29:05]
Tim Miller
I can do that.
- [29:06]
Mark Hertling
You can do that. As a guy who represents the defense of America, I can't. What I can point out are things that are happening within our republic that says, these don't seem to fit into our Constitution. And, boy, you should remember that the next time you vote. But as long as you voted, the American public have given this guy the plurality of the vote. The military is beholden to obey his legal orders, number one. But then there's beyond the military debate going on, Tim. And this is the interesting thing. I can't tell you the number of texts or tweets or blue skies that I get on a daily basis saying, why aren't you guys doing something about this? And the question is, what exactly do you want us to do? You're the one that elected them. I'm sorry. And I think somebody said this after the last election. The generals aren't going to save you. That's not what we do. We defend the country. So if you want a different leader, it's up to you to determine how to get that leader. And usually it's associated with voting.
- [30:04]
Tim Miller
And, yeah, Some of that is just the gasp of frustration of people like where who is going to be out there? And I get that. And part of it is, you know, I don't know. Again, we're closer to this than we've been. I don't know. I certainly may back to the civil rights era, maybe more, you know, where like these questions become real. Like, what is my duty, right? Is my duty to just follow orders blindly? Is my duty to the Constitution? If I'm going to be ordered to do something that is illegal or that targets my fellow citizens, how do I process that? I don't know. If somebody called you and was just like, what advice do you have for me on this? I'm in a pickle. What is the answer right now? It seems tough.
- [30:46]
Mark Hertling
What I would tell you is I'm in that same kind of squishy ground because I was thinking about the other day during my 38 year military career I worked under, I think it was either five or four Democratic presidents and six Republican presidents. And I never had these kind of thoughts before. That's the problem. And even in Tom Nichols column you mentioned the other day, he said Randy George, the chief of staff of the army should go in and whisper in the president's ear and say you got to quit using troops as your political props. That's easier written in the Atlantic than it is done by the chief of the army, especially with this president. That's the hard part. How do you get this guy to back off and how do you get Hegseth to back off from the kinds of things that they're doing? And I don't know the answer to that.
- [31:36]
Tim Miller
I think the last thing you all, we kind of talked about the military parade which is coming up this weekend. So I don't know how much more you have to say about that. One thing that happened yesterday was Trump said that anybody who protests the military parade, quote, hate our country and will be met with very heavy force. And that's alarming as well. I don't know. It could just be Trump bluster. But again, this is the type of thing that's like, we are really on a precipice here. And so I don't know, I'm wondering if you've kind of updated your thoughts on what we're going to see Saturday since we last spoke.
- [32:09]
Mark Hertling
I said to some folks yesterday that I'm all for celebrating the soldiers who have served in the army or are currently serving in the army for 250 years. It's a great milestone. The army was founded, was created, and its birthday is a year older than our country. So that's a pretty big deal. You know, other than required parades, like for changes of command or Memorial Day parades, where you go down the street, you honor different people. I've never been, truthfully, a big parade guy. Even at West Point, I tried to avoid as many parades as I could as a athlete. But if you do have a parade, it should be honoring the soldiers that served on their birthday or that are currently serving. Part of the parade is doing that. But what we're seeing is it's turning into somewhat of a vanity play for one individual. And they're making no bones about that. That's the sad thing about it. And when I say they, it's primarily the people in the White House and the Defense Department. So I think what was initially planned as a celebration of soldiers and the anniversary of the army has turned into something else. And with the remarks from yesterday about very big actions against protesters, I mean, that's part of the Constitution, too. That's part of the First Amendment right, the right to protest and to speak freely. So there's a contrary action being associated with a celebration. If somebody wants to get out and stand along the side of the road that they're marching down and say, we protest with signs, I'm okay with that. The same thing as the president said last night in front of the troops that they cheered about people kneeling at football games when the Star Spangled Banners played. I'm okay with that too, to be honest with you. I don't like it, but I'm okay with it. Because that's what we protect. We protect freedom of speech and expression. So there's that conversation that I think is being overwhelmed by some of the bluster, and that's what concerns me sort of finer point.
- [34:19]
Tim Miller
It really is kind of wrapping in the American flag. A lot of really anti American sentiments, you know, a lot of quasi authoritarian sentiments. When it comes to breaking down protesters, very partisan speeches in front of the military, going out. Right. Anti immigrant. Like all this stuff is this kind of jingoism without the underlying elements of what makes America special. And that. That is. I don't know, that's something that really, you know, I. I find dangerous.
- [34:51]
Mark Hertling
I think we've talked about this once before, but it gets back to American values. And you have a lot of people say they are, you know, that I'm all for American values. Okay. Really? What are those values? What are they? Well, it's. It's freedom of expression, freedom of Speech, respect for other individuals, liberty, life. And, you know, you go down of all the pluralism. Yeah. You go down the speeches of people like King and Kennedy and Roosevelt, and you see what American values are. And there's oftentimes we're running contrary to what those American values are, especially respect for one another and freedom of speech and freedom of religion, freedom from want. Those are the kind of things that have been outlined for us as part of our history, and yet they're being ignored by just the simple statement of why I'm all for American values. Okay, well, what are they? And are you really living by them? So there's a little bit of hypocrisy there.
- [35:50]
Tim Miller
I had some friends sending you videos from Ukraine over the last few days. Like, there have been massive aerial attacks from Russia on Kharkiv, on Kiev. It's a little bit out of the news because of all the other stuff that is happening. But that offensive coming off of this period of Trump talking to Putin for an hour and a half and saying that these are just two guys fighting on the playground. You got to let them fight it out. I mean, it seems like to me, again, as an outsider, that we're in an escalating period from Russia in response to the President's cowering. But I don't know what you make of what you're seeing out of Ukraine and what you're hearing from folks.
- [36:32]
Mark Hertling
It's interesting. I think the Russians continue to do what they've been doing for three years, but at a much greater rate. They launched over 450 missiles and drones over the last couple of nights, each night against civilian targets, specifically civilian targets. So they're hitting infrastructure, apartment buildings, hospitals, schools, churches. And this is in direct reaction to Ukraine's action and the spider web operation that specifically targeted military aircraft and military facilities. So you've got one side going after the military and the other side continuing to try and affect the will of the Ukrainian people by killing people, by killing civilians, contrary to the law, international law, and the law of land warfare. And it is Putin, I think, trying to gain an advantage of imparting his will against the people more massively than he has over the last couple of years. And it's because we are ignoring it. I think that's one of the reasons why Putin invaded in the first place, because he saw a divided America and a divided NATO. Well, NATO has come together. America sort of came together for a while, and now it's separating apart. So he's using that obfuscation as a way to continue with his desires to occupy part or all of Ukraine, which is troubling.
- [37:58]
Tim Miller
Kyiv Pride is this weekend, so I request that folks stay safe in that. That feels like, I guess, a lot of dangerous targets these days. If you're in Ukraine, do you have any. I think I asked you this last time, but, you know, three months, Things are changing so quickly. We've seen what happened with the offensive from Ukraine. Do you sense that without America, this is a doable fight for Ukraine with Europeans behind them? How do you assess their capabilities without.
- [38:28]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, I do. In fact, I was in Sweden two weeks ago talking to their defense university. And my take is there's an uptick on what the Europeans are trying to do to compensate for the loss of at least some of American support. But at the same time, I also see Ukraine masterfully building drone factories and ammunition factories and trying to keep up. But the biggest problem is they don't have the air defense capability that they need. And there's only a few people, us included, that can provide some of that. And that's what Secretary Hegseth evidently eliminated as of today.
- [39:06]
Tim Miller
Eliminated the air defense help?
- [39:08]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, the contributions of weapons systems to Ukraine. Not sure. That may be just, you know, Internet rumor, but allegedly that's what he said he was going to do, and he said it in the speech last night at Fort Bragg.
- [39:19]
Tim Miller
Yeah. Speaking of Internet rumor, I also have on decent authority that this is not going to be surprising that they're going to revoke. I don't have the official name in front of me, but whatever the version of TPS was for Ukraine, Temporary Protected status for Ukrainians who came to America, it isn't tbs. It was a different program. A lot of discussion in immigration circles that they're planning on revoking that.
- [39:43]
Mark Hertling
That goes in line with the revoking of the Afghan special visa holders as well.
- [39:48]
Tim Miller
Is there outrage about that in your circles, the Afghan special visa revocation?
- [39:53]
Mark Hertling
There is, because I think a lot of the military folks who served in Afghanistan understand it. What it's going to do. It's going to send people back to Afghanistan who were contributing to our fight as interpreters or assisters in units. So, yeah, there's outrage in the military community, but it's underneath the wave tops of all the other crap that's going on.
- [40:16]
Tim Miller
Okay. Last thing, I just. I couldn't not ask you about Tulsi, our Director of National Intelligence, while I had you. Two news items in the last 48 hours. Apparently she fed the JFK files into an AI to see what she thought should be declassified. She said that in a speech at some corporate function. She also put out this creepy video about how we're the closest we've ever been to nuclear annihilation, which to me read is either, you know, kind of some sort of Russian propaganda type message that like, hey, we should back out of Ukraine, we don't want to escalate towards nuclear war. Or maybe kind of a golden dome type. I was trying to understand what was behind this, like very weird video. Me and Sam Stein did a big breakdown of it where she was warning that we're close to nuclear annihilation. Open ended on what you've seen from our Director of National Intelligence.
- [41:10]
Mark Hertling
The latter one on the nuclear weapons is that that seems to be a messaging of a Russian talking point, multiple talking points that they've made about using nuclear weapons. And it continues to be a debate within the Russian government. The first one about the AI. I heard that this morning. And it's just mind boggling to me that unless it's a secure AI capability, she's given up secrets. I mean, I can, you know, insert things in chat GPT and say, consolidate all my writings into this thing and give me a summary of all this, which is if what she did was on an open source AI platform, she's just provided it to the entire world.
- [41:51]
Tim Miller
So the Director of National Intelligence also that job, she's so upfront, it should be a secret, it should be a behind the scenes job, right? I mean, talk to me about that a little bit. You're in the military. Do you want the Director of National Intelligence out there doing all this stuff?
- [42:10]
Mark Hertling
And I was in the Pentagon as the J7 when the, when the DNI was first created under Rumsfeld. And it's interesting because that was supposed.
- [42:17]
Tim Miller
To be the Negroponte was the first dni, is that right?
- [42:20]
Mark Hertling
No, I think it was, wasn't it, Cambone? I'm not sure, I don't remember. But the thing was created and it was supposed to be the coordinator of all the intelligence agencies. Well, you would think that person would be in a trench somewhere and no one would ever know. The very fact that we don't even know who it was. And I don't even know who the last couple of ones were tells you that they're never seen. But I'm seeing Gabbard all over the news recently, you know, with performative politics and what she thinks should be happening. And it's not collaboration of intelligence, it's just her own personal beliefs.
- [42:51]
Tim Miller
All right. Anything. I didn't ask you for any wisdom you want to leave us with. It was a pretty. It was a pretty bleak podcast today. Generals. You got any?
- [42:58]
Mark Hertling
You know, the one thing that. That I've kind of been hot on that, that I don't think has garnered attention because it's so buried, and that's the deletion of cisa, the cyber network folks that are doing a great job in keeping us safe. I think that it's not a military operation, but it certainly is connected to the military. And I think we've said that cyber warfare is a potential national threat for the last 20 years, and now we've completely disbanded the agency that's is supposed to be protecting us. So that I think that's troublesome and should garner more attention.
- [43:34]
Tim Miller
I'm glad you mentioned that. And I think that, again, it's hard to do. You're doing Kremlin Ology now with the administration sometimes, but it could be just directly related to the 2020 stuff. Chris Krebs was the person that was the point man on that, that spoke, you know, that they were protecting our elections from cyber attacks. They do other protection of us from cyber attacks, but that was one thing they were doing that he was the point person on. And Trump got obviously mad at him for telling the truth about the election and is targeting him. And who in the hell knows with Trump? It might just be that now that word says that he doesn't like anymore because they were the people that were saying the election was not stolen in 2020.
- [44:17]
Mark Hertling
Right. The cleanest election we've ever had. So let's disband the people that helped make it that way. Yeah, so that's one area, but there. Tim, there's so many others. We could go on and on, but it's kind of an interesting national security environment, isn't it?
- [44:31]
Tim Miller
Not an uplifting close, but okay. That's okay. You know, that's just the world we're in. Mark Hertling, please come back. We obviously have a lot of developments, unfortunately, domestically and abroad, related to the military. And so we appreciate your expertise and wisdom on all this.
- [44:46]
Mark Hertling
Okay. Hey, thanks, Tim. Appreciate it.
- [44:48]
Tim Miller
All right, everybody else, we'll be back here tomorrow with another edition of the Bull Work Podcast. See you all then. Peace.
- [44:53]
Unknown Artist
April 26, 1992. There was a riot on streets. Tell me, where were you? You were sitting home watching your TV while I was parked. It's a manarchy. First spot we hit it was my liquor store. I finally got all that alcohol. I can't afford with red lights flashing. Time to retire. And then we turned that liquor store into a structure fire. Next stop we hid in was the music shop. It only took one rip to make that window drop. Finally we got our own pa. Where do you think I got this guitar that you're hearing today? Call fire at Del Mar Station out Cincinnati.
- [45:34]
Tim Miller
It's flaming up good.
- [45:47]
Unknown Artist
When we return to the pat to unload everything, it dawned on me that I need new home furnishings. So once again we built the van until it was full. Since that day, my living wasn't much more comfortable Cuz everybody in the hood has added up to here. Here it's getting hotter and hotter and harder each and every year. Some kids went in a store with their mother I saw when she came out she was getting some peppers. They said it was for the black man. They said it was for the Mexican and not for the white man. But if you look at the street, it wasn't about Rodney King got this up situation and these fucked up police. It's about coming up and staying on top and screaming 1187 on a motherfucking cop. It's not in a paper, it's on the wall. National Guard smoke from all around.
- [46:39]
Mark Hertling
Units be advised as an attempt 211 to arrest now at 9:38 temple.
- [46:43]
Tim Miller
938 temple 30 subjects with bands trying.
- [46:46]
Mark Hertling
To get inside the CP now.
- [46:50]
Tim Miller
The Borg podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.