When Pete Hegseth was first nominated as Trump’s Secretary of Defense, he vowed to have a major culture change over what was taking place during the Biden administration.
This started with cutting excess spending, as well as reducing and transforming our military.
That would now also include bringing back “shark attack” training, which is getting mixed reviews.
If there is one area of our government that is a breeding area for waste and fraud, it is the military.
Honestly, military fraud dates back to when I was in diapers, as I honestly cannot remember a time when reports were not being reported about military waste.
Hegseth, on this subject, stated, "Ever since I've taken this position, the only thing I've cared about is doing right by our service members — soldiers, sailors, Marines, airmen and guardians. In short, we want the biggest, most badass military on the planet."
He later added, "[DOGE is] here, and they're going to be incorporated into what we're doing at DOD to find fraud, waste and abuse in the largest discretionary budget in the federal government.”
Hegseth was also about trimming leadership back to WWII-era levels, believing we now have an excess of general and flag officers, while needing better recruiting to bring in a higher quality of soldier to the ranks.
He stated, “More generals and admirals does not equal more success. This is not a slash and burn exercise meant to punish high-ranking officers. Nothing could be further from the truth. This has been a deliberative process.”
He also stated that there would be big changes in the ranks to make our military more lethal.
Army Secretary Daniel P. Driscoll explained, "President Trump and Secretary Hegseth have empowered the Army to make the hard decisions and hard changes to reallocate our dollars to best position our soldiers to be the most lethal they can be. These are hard decisions. These are legacy systems that have been around a long time."
For many soldiers, the shark attack was their formal introduction to military life, which many old timers would say is a necessary wake-up call that their old life was gone and things were changing.
If you are not familiar with the term, it is when several drill sergeants swarm to a recruit, all screaming at him (or her) at the top of their lungs, giving orders, insults, and just about anything else you can imagine.
The shark attack was replaced with “The First 100 Yards,” which was touted as a way to improve teamwork as well as introduce mental and physical challenges. DoD Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson explained, "The secretary is very excited to be making basic training great. Again, I can confirm that he's going to be looking at basic training and making sure that the standards are where they should be. We want our warfighters to be strong, and that starts in basic training, and we want to make sure we really, again, go back to basics. And shark attacks are going to be something that he is looking at reinstating."
My contacts in the military and those who have retired were mildly mixed on this, but the majority of them welcome this training method coming back in. The one thing they all agreed on was that you could tell who had the right attitude and those who would likely wilt under pressure, and that is what it is all about. You never know how you will react until you get punched in the mouth, so why not get it out of the way on the very first day?
