Pete Hegseth's Losing Battle Trump's secretary of defense has embraced a great idea--but he seems to be the worst person

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Pete Hegseth’s Losing Battle
Trump’s secretary of defense has embraced a great idea—but he seems to be the worst person to implement it.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2025/11/trump-pete-hegseth-weapons-military-pentagon.html?via=rss


By Fred Kaplan Nov 08, 20255:45 AM


A battle is brewing between Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and big contractors in the military-industrial complex over how the nation buys weapons systems. Some of Hegseth’s notions, which have been circulating in reform circles for a decade, are laudable. But his style of running the Pentagon—including the way he’s put forth his new policy—gravely dims his chances for success.

His policy—laid out in a six-page memo, which he presented to top corporate executives at a meeting on Friday—is meant to cut through the sclerotic bureaucracies, in the Pentagon and at defense contractors, which have slowed the development of weapons programs, boosted their cost, and neglected the needs of the servicemen and -women who would actually use the weapons in training and combat.

Whether his new policy would actually solve these problems—whether it could create the structures and incentives to override bureaucratic and corporate interests—is another matter..............