Laos, Vietnam As he gets ready to leave the top military position after four years, outgoing Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin stated in an exclusive interview with NBC News that racial and gender diversity are essential to the strength of the U.S. armed forces.
“Everywhere I went on a battlefield, there were women in our formation,” Austin remarked, referring to his 41 years in duty, three lengthy tours in Iraq, and one in Afghanistan. Our women are the best soldiers in the world, I would tell you. Some of the best in the world, to be honest.
Pete Hegseth, a former Army National Guard major whose previous remarks regarding women in battle have sparked concerns, is President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for defense secretary.
In a podcast this month, Hegseth stated that men are more qualified for combat tasks in the military and that women shouldn’t be assigned to them.
According to a report released by the Defense Department last November, women comprised 17.5% of the active-duty force and 21.6% of the chosen reserve in 2022.
“They do affect preparedness. They improve us. They give us strength. And once more, I’m not exaggerating when I say that what I’ve witnessed from our women is just amazing. “This is a fact,” stated Austin.
Additionally, Hegseth has stated that he wants to rid the military of progressive leaders who back efforts for inclusion, equity, and diversity.
Austin emphasized the importance of diversity in the military and stated that it is still a meritocracy, but he would not speculate on what may happen.
“Our country is and will continue to be a varied country. “We will continue to have a diverse military,” Austin declared.
Unless there are exceptional circumstances, such as a recess appointment, Hegseth still needs to be approved by the Senate, which Republicans will control for the next two years.
Austin did not comment on his thoughts about Trump’s selection of Hegseth.
According to Austin, “we certainly respect the president-elect’s right to nominate anyone he chooses for any position.”
Trump has also stated that he may attempt to use the military to support his plans to carry out mass deportations of citizens of the United States without their consent. When asked if employing the military was part of his strategy in an interview with Time magazine in April, Trump said, “it would.”
Although Austin would not discuss Trump’s objectives or plans, he stated that the law is “well-defined” with regard to “how we employ our military, our armed forces.”
“And I have faith and confidence in our senior leaders that they will always make the right decisions and make the right recommendations to their leadership,” he stated.
Regarding the conflict in Ukraine, the departing Biden administration recently gave Ukraine authorization to launch limited strikes within Russia using the ATACMS, a sort of ballistic missile system, supplied by the United States. Russian President Vladimir Putin publicly lowered the bar for his nation’s use of nuclear weapons Tuesday after the Defense Ministry revealed that Ukraine had used long-range weaponry provided by the United States to launch its first strike on Russian territory.
In February 2022, Russia launched a massive invasion of Ukraine, sparking the start of the war. According to Austin, “our approach to supporting them has also evolved over time.”
He claimed that although the United States had been aware for weeks that Russia was “revamping” its nuclear weapons program, he did not observe a “change in their strategic force posture.”
“We’ll continue to be on the lookout for this. But right now, no, I don’t see any signs that there’s a plan to deploy nuclear weapons anytime soon,” he stated.
Austin added that although the U.S. military has not yet witnessed North Korean troops engaging in combat alongside Russian forces, it believes that about 10,000 North Korean personnel are in the Kursk region of Russia, where Russia is getting ready to attempt to regain terrain it has lost.
“We believe that those troops will be embedded in Russian formations, and I have every reason to believe that we will see them in combat in the not-too-distant future,” he stated. “I think the intent’s there, but we’ve not seen that yet.”
President Joe Biden appointed Austin, a four-star general who served as commander of U.S. Central Command, as defense secretary, and he took office on January 22, 2021.
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