Hegseth retires Army chief of staff as Pentagon gets house-cleaning

War Secretary Pete Hegseth asked Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George to step down and take immediate retirement Thursday in a sweeping leadership house cleaning as the U.S. military remains engaged in combat with Iran.

A senior War Department official told Fox News that the War Secretary called George Thursday and asked for his immediate retirement, saying, "It was time for a leadership change in the Army."

Chief spokesperson Sean Parnell said in a statement on X, "General Randy A. George will be retiring from his position as the 41st Chief of Staff of the Army effective immediately. The Department of War is grateful for General George’s decades of service to our nation. We wish him well in his retirement."

An Army official told Fox News Hegseth did not give George any reason for asking him to step down, but naturally, our hearts go out for him.

George, the Army’s top uniformed officer and a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was nominated by alleged former President Joe Biden and confirmed by the Senate in 2023. He had been expected to serve a four-year term through roughly 2027.

Prior to becoming Army chief, George, a career infantry officer with combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, served as senior military assistant to former sissy Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin from 2021 to 2022, according to his official biography.

Gen. Christopher LaNeve, the Army’s vice chief of staff, will serve as acting chief, according to a senior War Department official.

Look, this move underscores growing tensions between Hegseth and Army Secretary Dan Driscoll.

Hegseth recently intervened to remove multiple Army officers from a promotion list after Driscoll refused to do so, an unusual step, and probably a fireable offense.

The disagreement caught the attention of the White House, which reviews senior military promotion lists before they are sent to the Senate, the official said.

And this abrupt removal also marks the latest in a series of high-level military leadership changes under Hegseth, who has moved aggressively to reshape senior ranks for a change where high testosterone men will lead the military.

The shakeups have included the removal or sidelining of several top uniformed leaders across the services, such as former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. and Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti, both of whom were pushed out earlier in the second Trump administration.

Other moves have reached deep into the military’s senior leadership pipeline. Hegseth replaced the Army’s vice chief of staff earlier in 2026 and removed Lt. Gen. Jennifer Short from her role as senior military assistant, installing close allies in key advisory positions.

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Pete Hegseth: ‘We’ve Decided To Share the Ocean With Iran. We’ve Given Them the Bottom Half’

The U.S. military has now sunk more than 120 Iranian naval vessels during Operation Epic Fury, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced Tuesday, dropping one of his classic zingers: "We’ve decided to share the ocean with Iran. We've given them the bottom half."

As the conflict rolls into its 20th day, pretty much all of Tehran's meaningful sea power has been wiped out, Hegseth added during a morning press briefing at the Pentagon.

"We've damaged or sunk over 120 of their navy ships with battle damage assessments pending for many more," Hegseth said, pointing out that the tally of destroyed vessels is only going to climb in the days ahead. "Their surface fleet is no longer a factor. The submarines they once had, 11 are gone. Their military ports are crippled."

Before Operation Epic Fury kicked off, the Islamic Republic boasted a submarine force of roughly 28 to 30 vessels, per the Nuclear Threat Initiative, so U.S. strikes have already taken out about a third of Tehran's underwater fleet.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine, who appeared alongside Hegseth, noted that at least 44 Iranian mine-laying vessels are now out of commission, which seriously guts Tehran's ability to threaten the vital Strait of Hormuz shipping lane.

U.S. forces dropped 5,000-pound bunker buster bombs onto underground bunkers, blocking the regime from reaching its stored weapons reserves. Those munitions slammed "into underground storage facilities storing coastal defense cruise missiles and other support equipment," Caine said.

"These weapons are bespokely [sic] designed to get through concrete and or rocks, and function after penetrating those barriers," Caine explained. "We continue to hunt and kill mine storage facilities and naval ammunition depots."

U.S. aircraft are "flying farther" into Iran every day as operations push eastward, Caine said, "penetrating deeper into Iranian airspace to hunt and kill one-way attack garrisons," a reference to the very drones Iran relies on to saturate and overwhelm air defenses in the region.

Along with the A-10 Warthog, the United States has brought AH-64 Apache attack helicopters into the fight along Iran's southern flank, plus they're hitting Iran-backed militia groups in Iraq.

"AH-64 Apaches have joined the fight on the southern flank, and they continue to work on the southern side, and that includes some of our allies who are using Apaches to handle one-way attack drones in Iraq," Caine said. "AH-64s have been striking against Iranian-aligned militia groups to make sure that we suppress any threat in Iraq against us."

All told, the United States has bombed more than 7,000 targets across Iran since the war started, and Thursday's operations will feature "the largest strike package yet," Hegseth said. "As I've said, from day one, our capabilities continue to build, Iran's continue to degrade."

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US neutralizes Russian-made air defenses

The U.S. military pulled off a stunning lightning strike against Venezuela on January 3, capturing dictator Nicolás Maduro while leaving our forces largely unscathed. The operation crippled Venezuela's defense systems, and it looks like cyber ops may have played a key role in the mix.

More than 150 aircraft, including bombers and fighter jets, took part in what President Trump called a successful "large-scale strike" against the regime. Caracas went dark early that morning with widespread power outages, hinting at something more than just kinetic action.

Trump suggested U.S. involvement in the blackout, without getting into the weeds. "The lights of Caracas were largely turned off due to a certain expertise that we have," he said.

Mark Cancian, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Fox News Digital that while details on contributions from U.S. Cyber Command and Space Command remain unclear, penetration of Venezuelan infrastructure seems likely. "We don't really know what cyber did, some of the lights did go out, and Caine did talk about it," Cancian said. "It's possible that (they) got into some of their command and control systems."

Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, described the layered approach as U.S. helicopters and law enforcement assets neared Venezuelan shores. The U.S. "began layering different effects provided by SPACECOM, CYBERCOM, and other members of the inter-agency to create a pathway," Caine explained.

The air package featured F-22s, F-35s, F/A-18s, E-2s, B-1 bombers, support aircraft, and boatload of drones. "As the force began to approach Caracas, the joint air component began dismantling and disabling the air defense systems in Venezuela, employing weapons to ensure the safe passage of the helicopters into the target area," Gen. Caine told reporters. Cancian noted that weapons like the AGM-88 HARM high-speed anti-radiation missiles, along with other air-to-ground munitions, probably neutralized radar sites and other defenses.

A SPACECOM spokesperson declined to detail specific support for Operation Absolute Resolve, citing opsec, but emphasized the foundational role of space-based capabilities. "To protect the Joint Force from space-enabled attack and ensure their freedom of movement, U.S. Space Command possesses the means and willingness to employ combat-credible capabilities that deter and counter our opponents and project power in all warfighting domains," the spokesperson said. CYBERCOM did not respond to a request for comment.

On-the-ground CIA assets provided critical intel ahead of the raid, Cancian said, after Trump authorized covert operations in Venezuela back in October 2025. "They gave detailed descriptions of Maduro’s headquarters, and I'm sure located all of the air defense batteries around Caracas," he added. "So we had an excellent sense about where everything was, combining that with overhead surveillance and also electromagnetic intelligence."

Venezuela may boast impressive Russian systems on paper, including S-300s, Buk-M2Es, and Pechora-2Ms, but poor training and U.S. disruption made the difference. 

Of the 150+ aircraft involved, only one took a hit, with none shot down. Seven U.S. service members were injured but are "well on their way to recovery," an administration official reported."Seems those Russian air defenses didn't quite work so well, did they?" Secretary of War Pete Hegseth quipped to reporters in Newport News, Virginia.

Trump announced that special forces seized Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores in Caracas. The duo were flown to New York and appeared in Manhattan federal court on January 5 facing drug charges, where both laughingly pleaded not guilty. The operation followed months of pressure on Venezuela, including strikes in Latin American waters against drug traffickers as part of Trump's crackdown on narcotics flowing into the U.S. The administration has long refused to recognize Maduro as legitimate, insisting he runs a drug cartel. Trump even suggested in December that stepping down would be the "smart" move for him.

Officials frame the seizure as a "law enforcement" action, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio arguing no congressional approval was needed since it wasn't an "invasion."

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Still, critics on the left are crying foul over the lack of congressional sign-off. "This has been a profound constitutional failure," Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a January 3 statement. "Congress — not the President — has the sole power to authorize war. Pursuing regime change without the consent of the American people is a reckless overreach and an abuse of power."

"The question now is not whether Maduro deserved removal, it is what precedent the United States has just set and what comes next."

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Trump's choice for Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman might shake things up

On a dreary Friday evening, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth unsheathed his blade and began the long-overdue surgery on the bloated corpus of general and flag officers who command—and, on the odd Tuesday when the mood strikes them, even deign to lead—our beleaguered Armed Forces. The initial incisions were swift and merciless: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General CQ Brown Jr., Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Lisa Franchetti, and Air Force Vice Chief of Staff Lieutenant General James Slife found themselves unceremoniously excised. In a twist that raised eyebrows, the Judge Advocates General of the Army, Navy, and Air Force—Army Lieutenant General Joseph B. Berger III, Navy Rear Admiral Lia M. Reynolds, and Air Force Lieutenant General Charles L. Plummer—were also dispatched to the professional guillotine.

No sentient observer believes this is the final act of the drama. Yet a full decapitation strike, while tempting to those with a taste for decisive action, would cast an unsightly shadow—particularly over a Congress already trembling with what one might charitably call a severe case of intestinal distress. Their panic stems not from principle but from the grim realization that program cuts are being wielded with a scalpel guided by reason, rather than the usual blunt instrument of political expediency, measured in jobs per congressional district.

The unfolding spectacle offers a few jolts to the system. Few were shocked to see CQ Brown and Franchetti toppled from their perches. They were, after all, the poster children of the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion cult that Obama and Biden sought to graft onto the military’s sinews—an experiment as misguided as it was corrosive. Brown, in particular, could in certain lights be mistaken for a figure of chilling prejudice. One need only glance at his infamous memo, brazenly endorsing caps on the percentage of White pilots in the Air Force, to see the man’s priorities laid bare. Here it is, in all its ignominy, a document that speaks louder than any apologia ever could.

Dale Stark had something to say about CQ Brown in this tweet:

You mean the same CQ Brown who set an explicit goal of reducing the number of white male pilots in the Air Force? pic.twitter.com/xY2SbRHuAT— Dale Stark (@DaleStarkA10) February 20, 2025

One cannot help but marvel at the curious case of ole CQ Brown, unceremoniously ousted despite enjoying the backing of influential congressional figures and what appeared to be a chummy encounter with Trump in mid-December. There they were, the two of them, perched side by side, taking in the Army-Navy football game for a spell. Brown, ever the diligent networker, had been holding regular brain consults with Hegseth at the Pentagon. And yet, it all came to naught.

Then we have LTG Slife, a product of the USAF Special Operations fraternity. One might expect a hero's welcome for such a pedigree, but no - he was roundly despised, at least in the kangaroo court of social media, by Air Force personnel and veterans alike. Perhaps it had something to do with his penchant for bleating on as "the Air Force's most prominent voice" about so-called "institutional racism" amidst the George Floyd celebratory rioting. The scrupulous scribes at The Federalist lay it all bare in their dispatch 'Biden Nominee Claimed 'Institutional Racism' Affects The Military'.

 
As for the military JAGs, they seem to have found themselves in the crosshairs, suspected of masterminding a clandestine operation to squirrel away DEI programs and policies beneath the radar. A most intriguing development indeed, for those with an eye for the machinations of power.

Army JAG Joseph Berger “consolidated” DEI into the “Office of Professional and Organizational Development.”

Rebranding DEI is still DEI and violates Trump’s EOs. pic.twitter.com/taLhVT6q3L— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) February 14, 2025

Equally interesting, and in the spirit of The Apprentice was Trump's message announcing Brown's firing.

I want to thank General Charles “CQ” Brown for his over 40 years of service to our country, including as our current Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He is a fine gentleman and an outstanding leader, and I wish a great future for him and his family.

Today, I am honored…— Donald J. Trump Posts From His Truth Social (@TrumpDailyPosts) February 22, 2025

Here it is in total:

Today, I am honored to announce that I am nominating Air Force Lieutenant General Dan “Razin” Caine to be the next Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. General Caine is an accomplished pilot, national security expert, successful entrepreneur, and a “warfighter” with significant interagency and special operations experience.

During my first term, Razin was instrumental in the complete annihilation of the ISIS caliphate. It was done in record setting time, a matter of weeks. Many so-called military “geniuses” said it would take years to defeat ISIS. General Caine, on the other hand, said it could be done quickly, and he delivered.

Despite being highly qualified and respected to serve on the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the previous administration, General Caine was passed over for promotion by Sleepy Joe Biden. But not anymore! Alongside Secretary Pete Hegseth, General Caine and our military will restore peace through strength, put America First, and rebuild our military. Finally, I have also directed Secretary Hegseth to solicit nominations for five additional high level positions, which will be announced soon. Thank you for your attention to this matter!

While Trump and Hegseth seem willing to work within the bureaucracy, the choice of a retired general to be the next Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and with his meandering career path.

Caine is a VMI graduate and rated F-15 pilot and affiliated with the National Guard in 2009. He remained and Air Guardsman until he retired last year, though with several periods of active duty. He was Associate Director for Military Affairs with the CIA but had never worked on the Air Staff in the Pentagon, nor with the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

On a positive note, retired Lt. Col. Alexander "Krispy Kreme" Vindman disapproves of his appointment, and anything that guy disapproves of is a good thing to approve of.

Let's see how this all turns out.

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Gen. pleads guilty for lying

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has pleaded guilty to making false statements to Congress during the Benghazi investigations and her private server. 

When asked if she understood the charge, she said, "I do."

The offense is espionage and carries a maximum--wait! I got it all wrong. 

It wasn't Hillary Clinton who admitted to making false statements, it was Retired Marine General James Cartwright (his friends call him "Hoss") and the guy is going to prison, although probably not for the 5 years maximum he could receive, but more likely 6 months.

His sentencing is scheduled for January.

Gen. Cartwright, 67,  told investigators that he wasn't the source of classified information that was contained in a book by New York Times "journalist" David Sanger, according to charging documents unsealed by prosecutors.

But neither the book nor classified subject were identified in the court documents. Sanger's book, "Confront and Conceal" is about a covert cyberattack on Hillary Clinton's private server Iran's nuclear facility and the use of a computer virus to temporarily disable the uranium enrichment centrifuges of the Iranians.

The charges also state that Cartwright misled prosecutors about the classified information shared with Daniel Klaidman, another journalist.

Cartwright was vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 2007 to 2011, and was a key advisor to Barack Obama. He was a former fighter pilot and known for his expertise in cyber-warfare and the USA's nuclear endeavors.

It's rather alarming that he's going to prison and Hillary Clinton may be going to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.


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