Pete Hegseth Cuts Security for General Trump Hates
Gen. Mark Milley may also be demoted pending an inspector general review, according to a Fox News report.
Mark Wilson/Getty Images
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is stripping retired Gen. Mark Milley of his personal security detail and his security clearance, even as the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff faces death threats, Fox News reported Tuesday.
As part of the latest instance of the Trump administration’s retaliation against the man the president once suggested should be executed for treason, Hegseth will also consider removing a star from the general. According to Fox, Hegseth is directing the Pentagon’s acting inspector general—who replaced the IG Trump fired on Friday—to look into whether Milley “undermine[d] the chain of command” while he served in the White House.
Milley, according to the 2021 book Peril by reporters Bob Woodward and Robert Costa, twice contacted his Chinese counterpart after the Jan. 6 insurrection—when he believed Trump was in “serious mental decline”—to say the U.S. military would not be striking China.
After that revelation, Pentagon officials told Fox News that Milley “did not try to insert himself in the chain of command regarding the launch of nuclear weapons, but he made sure everyone knew what their roles were and what they weren’t.”
Still, the acting IG will consider whether a loss in rank is appropriate.
Additionally, Fox reported, the second of two portraits of Milley that had been hanging in the Pentagon will be coming down. The first only made it a few hours into Trump’s second term.
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Following the U.S. drone strike that killed Iranian military chief Qasem Soleimani in early January 2020, Milley and others involved in the decision—including then-National Security Adviser John Bolton—were assigned personal security details given Iran’s threat of retaliation.
Trump removed Bolton’s Secret Service protection and revoked his security clearance last week.
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