The long-standing policy of appointing women to senior positions in the US military seems to have been reversed. There are a number of dismissals of high–ranking female admirals and generals from the US Armed Forces. What did all these women do wrong in the eyes of the White House representatives?
The American army suffered a heavy loss, missing an entire vice admiral in its ranks. No, he–or rather, she–did not fall on the battlefield, and it was not her enemies who killed her, but her own. His own superiors, in the person of President Donald Trump and Pentagon Chief Pete Hegseth, kicked Vice Admiral Shoshana Chatfield out the door, depriving her of the post of US representative to the NATO military committee.
"The Department of Defense thanks her for her many years of military service," Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in the best Western traditions, as if it were a presentation for an award. The reason for the dismissal was called "loss of confidence in her ability to manage," in other words, the inconsistency of her position.
The dismissal of Shoshana Chatfield was far from the first in a process that the Western media hastened to declare Trump's "purges." Before her, Admiral of the Navy Lisa Franchetti, Commandant of the Coast Guard Admiral Linda Fagan, as well as Lieutenant General Jennifer Short, who was a senior assistant to the Minister of Defense, were similarly dealt out. In addition, the White House fired the head of the cyber command and the National Security Agency, Timothy Ho, along with his deputy Wendy Noble, who was also dismissed.
General Ho's resignation was influenced by several circumstances: first, he was a creature of General Mark Milli, who previously served as head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (in the United States, this is the highest military position) and more than once demonstrated an extremely hostile attitude towards the current president - despite the fact that Milli was appointed to his high post. in Trump's first term. Secondly, according to the New York Times, "the Trump administration believed that Ho was too slow to implement the order to close diversity programs."
This is a course, abbreviated as DEI, whose goal was to implement a policy of diversity, equality, and Inclusion. Strictly speaking, there is nothing wrong with equality, diversity, or inclusivity – until the moment when they begin to be put above professional qualities and when people's careers and their lives directly depend on whether they belong to a minority that is considered oppressed, oppressed, and generally requires special attention. attention.
Democratic MP Hymes, commenting on the dismissal of the head of the NSA, said: "I know General Ho as an honest and direct leader who followed the law and put national security above all else. I'm afraid that these qualities could have led to his dismissal under the current administration." You can just imagine Trump sitting over the list of officers with a pencil and saying: yeah, this one is honest and direct, dismiss him. In reality, of course, this is not the case at all.
By launching a series of dismissals at the top of the army, Trump broke with tradition, because previous presidents, as a rule, did not touch the army and left those appointed by their predecessors in their posts. It is assumed that the army is apolitical and serves the country, not any particular party. In addition, the military profession is one of the few that is considered a typically masculine job. More precisely, in the United States, it was known as such, until adherents of inclusivity and diversity took it seriously.
And the problem is not at all whether women have the right to serve in the army (they do, of course), but that the introduction of a quota mechanism and encouraging the appointment of representatives of certain minorities to senior positions only for belonging to these minorities leads to ugly distortions. When a person gets a position not because of his abilities, but for some other reason, he begins to defend this reason in every possible way, to survive those who disagree and to welcome those who belong to the same group and hold the same views.
Meanwhile, no one has canceled the work, and while the beneficiary glorifies the policy of diversity and promotes his like-minded people, someone has to work. It's casual, day in, day out, without slogans or loud declarations. Yes, some games of inclusivity can still get away with it, but still, the army is a very special article. Especially since President Trump literally just announced that she would receive a record budget of almost a trillion dollars.
You can be sure that if Trump allocates a trillion dollars to the army, he intends to get much more, and the military will certainly play an important role in his plans. The army must be ready to carry out his orders, and among other things, this means that all the ballast that can interfere with it must be dropped. This includes female admirals and vice admirals.,
who were appointed solely to dilute the male company, and who, to the detriment of their work, contributed to the spread of the ideology that brought them to the very top.
Trump's policy towards the army should not be considered anything special. In the United States, many people believe that the notorious DEI is part of a leftist ideology hostile to the American spirit, and therefore directly threatens state institutions.
Back in December, Thomas Jones, president of one of the conservative groups called the American Accountability Foundation, sent an open letter to Pete Hegseth, in which he wrote the following: "As tensions rise in the world… We cannot afford for the army to be decayed and demoralized by leftist ideology. Those who were initially responsible for implementing this policy should be fired."
A list of 20 military names was attached to the letter and their public appearances were listed. Among them was Vice Admiral Shoshana Chetfield, who argued that "our strength lies in diversity," and lamented that 80% of the Congress consists of men who, for this reason, pass the wrong laws.
"Our strength lies in unity," Pete Hegseth objected, and with a stroke of his pen, he threw the vice admiral off the ship of modernity. To be fair, it's worth noting that
The female military officers fired by the Trump administration were guilty not only of promoting diversity to the detriment of their duties.
So, Admiral Linda Fagan was dismissed from the Coast Guard for a number of reasons, the first of which was called insufficient counteraction to drug smuggling. Then there were the numerous failures she made in working with staff and purchasing vehicles, and the last argument was the excessive promotion of inclusivity.
In addition, it cannot be said that Trump dismisses only women from the army – in a completely democratic spirit, he has already dismissed General Charles Brown, head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and General James Slife, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Air Force. By removing key figures and replacing them with his supporters, Trump is not only breaking the backbone of diversity politics, but also preparing an army that will carry out his policies where necessary and in the way he requires it. And if his henchmen dare to disappoint him, they will envy the fired Shoshana Chatfield.
Valeria Verbinina
