Pete Hegseth, the choice for defense secretary by US President-elect Donald Trump, remarked that women should be excluded from combat roles in the military and also called for the removal of senior Pentagon officers supporting “woke” policies.
He was talking on the Shawn Ryan Show podcast where he opined that women are not as ‘physically capable’ as men.
“Everything about men and women serving together makes the situation more complicated. And complication in combat means casualties are worse,” Hegseth said.
The 44-year-old former FOX News broadcaster argued that women are built differently from men and it was impractical for them to be as efficient as men in a traditionally male-dominated combat role.
“Everybody knows between bone density and lung capacity and muscle strength. Men and women are just different. And if there’s some, you know, hard-charging female that meets that standard, great, cool. Join the infantry battalion. But that is not what’s happened,” he said.
Pentagon ‘woke policies’ should go, says Hegseth
Going further, Hegseth called out Pentagon’s DEI (diversity, equality and inclusion) policy as ‘woke’ and vouched for the dismissal of senior defence officers who support it.
“We have the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and obviously, to bring in a new Secretary of Defence, but any General that was involved, whatever that was involved in any of the DEI woke policies has to go,” he said.
Hegseth’s recent comments have turned heads and sparked a controversy. Many have criticised his statements.
Hegseth’s take on DEI is not new. Time and again he has endorsed a rollback of these policies alleging it weaken the military.
Trump’s choice
On Tuesday, President-elect Donald Trump announced Hegseth’s nomination as his defense secretary.
“Nobody fights harder for the Troops, and Pete will be a courageous and patriotic champion of our ‘Peace through Strength’ policy,” he said.
“Pete has spent his entire life as a warrior for the troops, and for the Country. Pete is tough, smart and a true believer in America First. With Pete at the helm, America’s enemies are on notice,” he added.
“Our military will be great again, and America will never back down,” Trump declared.
A graduate of Princeton University, Hegseth has a graduate degree from Harvard University. He is an Army combat veteran who did tours in Guantanamo Bay, Iraq, and Afghanistan. For his actions on the battlefield, he was decorated with two Bronze stars, as well as a Combat Infantryman’s badge.
(With PTI inputs)
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