Hegseth Announces Elon Musk and Newt Gingrich Will Help Lead Military

[u/T_Shurt]

https://newrepublic.com/post/216045/pete-hegseth-elon-musk-newt-gingrich-help-lead-military

[u/gmrussell]

Pete’s unqualified for his position, but at least he was actually in the military. Musk is a foreign-born citizen with no military experience and Gingrich doesn’t have any, either. None of the three are qualified to be involved in high-level planning, especially with mapping the trajectory of wars, domains, and technologies. 

A skeptic might see this and think “well, Elon has a top secret clearance—so he must be familiar with military technology, right?” To that, I’d answer that clearances involve both the requisite clearance and the need to know. Elon might be aware of certain technology that relates to Space X, but he has no business knowing anything about many of the systems we use stateside or deployed. He’d have no experience with any of that, or even knowledge of it. So, any of that experience shouldn’t in any meaningful way qualify him for this role. Moreover, it means almost certainly giving a foreign-born drug addict access to even more military secrets (this isn’t a dig at foreign-born people or drug addicts in general—just Musk).

Hegseth introduced the autonomous warfare command, a unit focused on robotic, artificial intelligence and drone warfare

Oh perfect. That’s just what we need. Let’s give AI access to our drones and whatever other systems they decide to make autonomous. Surely it won’t ever hallucinate and strike an American citizen in America, or maybe destroy another school filled with children. 

[u/elite0x33 → u/gmrussell]

His military career is more of a detriment to his position as SECEF. He was a company grade officer that never held command because senior leaders determined he was an insider threat. He then promoted to MAJ while on inactive reserve (IRR) and has essentially zero field grade officer experience.

He hasn't proven them wrong.

[u/Unlucky_Topic7963 → u/elite0x33]

Oh he definitely was on a g-series avoid list.

[u/cytherian → u/elite0x33]

That's 100% correct. Hegseth is the first SecDef to serve with really no relevant experience for the role. He's so inept and that was clearly confirmed with this pathetic war he started at Trump's behest (who was pressured by Netanyahu to commence).

[u/Zombie_John_Strachan → u/elite0x33]

How do you get promoted on inactive reserve? I've never heard of that happening up here in Canada. Once you are on the Supplementary Reserve you stay at your rank.

[u/gmrussell → u/Zombie_John_Strachan]

It happens here in the states. I haven’t ever heard of it happening for my branch but I have a marine friend who was promoted during IRR

[u/impulsivepatience → u/elite0x33]

Ooo0oh I've never heard the inside threat bit before! Interesting