Sec Def gen austin lloyd
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see wounded knee medals
Austin Orders Review of Wounded Knee Medals
July 24, 2024 | By Joseph Clark, DOD News |
Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III has directed the Defense Department to review the Medals of Honor awarded to approximately 20 soldiers for their actions during the December 1890 engagement at Wounded Knee Creek, South Dakota, to ensure no awardees were recognized for conduct inconsistent with the nation's highest military honor.
DOD's Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness will convene a special review panel to conduct an individualized assessment based on standards in effect during that period.
The scope of the panel's review is limited to examining each Medal of Honor awardee' s individual actions during the engagement at Wounded Knee Creek. However, "The [special review panel] may consider the context of the overall engagement as appropriate, including as necessary to understand each [Wounded Knee Creek Medal of Honor] recipient's individual actions," Austin wrote in a memorandum directing the review, which was released today.
Austin signed the memorandum last week following department consultation with the White House and Department of the Interior.
"It's never too late to do what's right," a senior defense official said in an interview this week. "And that's what is intended by the review that the secretary directed, which is to ensure that we go back and review each of these medals in a rigorous and individualized manner to understand the actions of the individual in the context of the overall engagement."
The official noted that the review is warranted based on a range of factors, including a congressional recommendation to review the awards included in the fiscal year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act.
The panel will provide Austin with a recommendation to either retain or rescind each Medal of Honor awarded for actions related to the Wounded Knee engagement, which resulted in the death and injury of approximately 350 to 375 Native American men, women and children, according to a 1990 Senate resolution.
That resolution, which marked the 100th anniversary of Wounded Knee, referred to the engagement as a massacre and expressed "deep regret on behalf of the United States to the descendants of the victims and survivors and their respective tribal communities."
The panel will include at least five experts, including two from the Department of the Interior. It will provide a written report of findings and recommendations by mid-October. Austin will then provide his recommendations to the president.
The secretary of the Army will provide historical records for the review no later than July 26. The Army will include everything associated with the award recommendations for each soldier, the personnel file for each awardee, copies of any Army reports into the actions at Wounded Knee Creek and any other known historical documents salient to the engagement.
The secretary of the Army will provide support to the panel throughout the review, including document retrieval and answering requests for information about the events at Wounded Knee Creek.
Defense officials noted that the department regularly reviews awards for upgrades. The Executive Branch has also conducted reviews to determine whether previous awards should be rescinded, including one in 1916 that led to 911 Medals of Honor being revoked.
The officials noted that the standards for awarding the Medal of Honor have evolved over time, and the review would be held in accordance with the standards in place at the time, as well as the context surrounding the actions at Wounded Knee.
The panel will also consider other relevant laws and regulations, such as those relating to fundamental protections for noncombatants.
"This is not a retrospective review," one official said. "We're applying the standards at the time. And that's critical because we want to make sure that as these are reviewed and as a recommendation is made to the secretary and then to the president that we have applied the standards appropriately, while ensuring that we look at the context."
External stakeholders interested in submitting historical documents for consideration by the panel have until September 15th to submit. All submissions should be sent via e-mail to: osd.pentagon.ousd-p-r.mbx.wounded-knee-moh-review@mail.mil.
WOUNDED-KNEE-MOH-REVIEW-SD-MEMO-SIGNED list
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calvary-soldiers-who-massacred-hundreds-at-wounded-knee-get-to-keep-their-medals-of-honor
by levi Rickert September 26, 2025
Department of War Pete Hegseth used social media on Thursday night to announce that U.S. 7th Cavalry soldiers who massacred hundreds of innocent Lakota during the 1890 Wounded Knee Massacre will retain their Medals of Honor. The Medal of Honor, which is the highest award of valor presented to military service members, was given to 20 soldiers.
These medals were given despite the fact that the incident involved the killing of at least 250–300 Lakota people, the majority of whom were women, children, and elders.
“Under my direction, we’re making it clear, without hesitation, that the soldiers who fought in the Battle of Wounded Knee in 1890 will keep their medals, and we’re making it clear that they deserve those medals,” Hegseth said in a video posted on the social platform X.
In July 2024, then-Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin had established a five-member panel to reassess the commendations awarded to troops for their actions at Wounded Knee.
The Biden administration stated that the panel would evaluate each medal recipient’s service and records individually to ensure that “no soldier was recognized for conduct that did not merit recognition under the standards applicable at the time.”
Hegseth did not release the findings of the panel during Thursday’s social media announcement.
“We are not surprised, but disheartened that Secretary Hegseth has decided to follow former Defense Secretary Austin’s footsteps and follow recommendations by what I believe to be a panel that was established to ensure a specific outcome,” O.J. Semans, Sr. (Rosebud Sioux), co-founder and co-executive director of Four Directions, Inc., told Native News Online on Thursday evening.
The violence began when the U.S. Cavalry attempted to confiscate weapons from those taken into custody; a shot was fired, prompting troops to open fire and kill at least 250 Lakota men, women, and children. Around 25 U.S. soldiers also died, likely as a result of friendly fire.
For several years, Native organizations have urged Congress to pass the Remove the Stain Act that would rescind the Medal of Honor to those awarded for their violent deeds at Wounded Knee.
In May 20205,*Remove the Stain Act of 2025* was reintroducedby Senators Elizabeth Warren (D–MA) and Jeff Merkley (D–OR), along with Representative Jill Tokuda (D–HI),
"We cannot be a country that celebrates and rewards horrifying acts of violence against Native people," Sen. Warren said when the legislation was reintroduced. "Congress must recognize how shameful this massacre was and take an important step toward justice for the Lakota people."
“We must acknowledge our history and take concrete steps to right historic wrongs from America’s darkest chapters,” said Sen. Merkley. "Moving forward together as a nation demands we remember, reflect on, and work to rectify the abhorrent massacre of hundreds of innocent Lakota men, women, and children at Wounded Knee. This horrific injustice is not deserving of our nation’s highest award for military valor, and our long-overdue bill helps finally set the record straight by revoking these medals.”
Semans still hopes Congress will pass the legislation.
“We will continue to work with Congress to ensure Americans know the truth,” Semans said.
Earlier in the year, Hegseth also directed the restoration and refurbishment of a Confederate memorial at Arlington National Cemetery that had previously been removed.
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// bs?
GREG GUTFELD (HOST): Tyler, I think, last night Trump called for Austin to be fired immediately. What do you think Trump would say if one of his cabinet members suddenly went missing for four days.
TYLER FISCHER (GUEST): Well, frankly I wouldn't hire somebody so incompetent. It wouldn't happen. It wouldn't happen. But this guy was, we call it a diversity hire, right? He was a diversity hire. He was the mentally retarded hire, right?
Sure, you can't say that, you can't say that. Yes, you can. You can say it. You can say it. But, no, Biden doesn't even know that he's gone missing. No, he doesn't know he's gone missing.
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4/22 edit bd
I don’t follow what every Democrat says. No one can. There’s no way for me to know whether the tenor and tone of their collective rhetoric changed last week. But it felt like it got stronger, sharper and angrier.
Consider Brian Schatz.
The Hawaii Senator took to the Senate floor to scorch his colleague Josh Hawley of Missouri, who’s been holding up appointments to the Department of Defense that are necessary to America’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Before he signs off, he said, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin must resign for his “failures” in Afghanistan.
Schatz said that’s rich coming from a guy who raised his fist in solidarity with the J6 insurrectionists and who voted to acquit the former president for the high crime of extorting Ukraine’s president.
“This comes from a guy who before the Russian invasion suggested that maybe it would be wise for [Volodymyr] Zelenskyy to make a few concessions about Ukraine and their willingness to join NATO.”
He added:
“They withheld lethal aid until, unless Zelenskyy released false smears against Joe Biden's son. Then [Hawley] voted to exonerate President Trump for this. So spare me the new solidarity with the Ukrainians and with the free world, because this man's record is exactly the opposite.”
His tirade amazed those of us longing for the Democrats to take a strong stand against the Republican Party’s lies and bad faith. Perhaps we’ll see more now that Greg Sargent put a brighter light on it.
The Post columnist interviewed Brian Schatz on Friday. “Democrats need to make more noise,” the Senator conceded. “We have to scream from the rooftops because this is a battle for the free world now.”
Let’s not forget what Schatz said, however.
He said Hawley is “doing a very specific thing.”
“He is damaging the Department of Defense.”
So far, Schatz is the only Democrat seeing what needs seeing.
Though he says he’s outraged by the US pullout from Afghanistan, Josh Hawley is also attacking, directly, the military leadership itself. (He won’t move on appointments until the secretary of defense resigns.)
Demanding Austin’s resignation is not a “reasonable request,” Schatz said. It can’t be. The point is sabotaging civilian control of the military.
You read that right.
The point is cleaving the ranks. The point is to create conditions in which military personnel feel inspired to take action that’s favorable to the Republicans’ (perhaps the former president’s) return to power.
They are picking up where the J6 insurrection left off. But next time, it won’t be a mob of schlubs. It will be an army of highly-trained insurgents bent on restoring whiteness to the center of the republic.
At gunpoint.
Everyone should see what Schatz sees.
So I interviewed Fred Wellman, founder of Beer Hall Projectand a 20-year Army veteran who served when Secretary Austin was General Austin. I called Fred after US Rep. Matt Gaetz failed to humiliate the secretary in testimony before the House Arms Services Committee.
Fred said: “A standing army can’t be a tool of a political party. Under the Trump years, it became more partisan. Now Matt Gaetz and his peers in the Republican Party are directly undermining the apolitical and nonpolitical nature of the military by dividing troops from leaders.”
Matt Gaetz and US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. Thoughts?
My main frustration has always been with the “performance wing” of the Republican Party. They don’t want to govern. They want to act.
In this case, Matt Gaetz tried convincing people that “wokeism,” or trying to get a more diverse American military force, is hurting our ability to fight wars. It shows how monumentally stupid he is.
He's dragging culture wars into national defense. That he does so while sitting on the House Armed Service Committee is outrageous.
It’s a committee responsible for oversight of the men and women in uniform, but it’s oversight partially provided by someone as monumentally asinine as Matt Gaetz – that’s just disgusting to me.
Good point. When a country sends people overseas, the presumption should be that leaders will take that responsibility deadly seriously. Deadly serious responsibility is the opposite of Matt Gaetz.
I'm a 20-year Army veteran. I rose through the ranks to be a lieutenant colonel. I retired after Desert Storm and three Iraq tours. I’m the son of a World War II Marine veteran. My son is an Army veteran. My son-in-law continues to serve in the National Guard.
But not everybody can serve.
Less than 7 percent of our nation is veterans. Less than 1 percent serve at all. Less than one-third of the eligible population is capable of serving. I'm talking about fitness, criminal record, mental health, etc. This is the reality of maintaining and growing an all-volunteer force.
That's the point of trying to increase the diversity of the officer corps. That's the point of trying to increase the diversity of the pilot corps. That's the point of welcoming all races and creeds. As Secretary Austin said, anybody who's eligible, who has the capability to serve, should be welcomed even if they're non-binary, gay, straight, whatever.
If they're capable of serving, of meeting the physical and mental requirements we need in our military, we've got to open our arms.
There are just not enough white dudes left.
When you have someone like the Florida congressman directly attacking that, that turns away possible recruits. Gaetz is literally undermining those who serve and who may serve in the future.
Sounds like you’re angry?
I amangry.
The Matt Gaetzs and Marsha Blackburns of the world are openly undermining good order and military discipline with a culture war for political effect. A representative sitting on the Armed Services Committee should understand the challenges of an all-volunteer force.
Civilian oversight of the military matters even though those civilians may never have served, may not have been qualified to serve. People like me, people like Secretary Austin – we understand that. Someone who rose to the rank of four-star understands he’s going to answer to some 25-year-old kid on the Armed Services Committee.
That's the nature of it.
But what frustrates me is the lack of respect for the office and a lack of respect for the military as an apolitical and non-political entity.
One of the biggest fears of our founding fathers was a standing army. They didn't want one and that undermined efforts early on in the republic because of rebellions. We had no army to address them.
Even Washington was like, man, we need an army.
A standing army can’t be a tool of a political party. Under the Trump years, it became more partisan. Now Matt Gaetz and his peers in the Republican Party are directly undermining the apolitical and nonpolitical nature of the military by dividing troops from leaders.
The troops love Trump, they believe, but the troops are being failed by “woke” leaders. Where the fuck do you think the leaders are? You don't just magically make a general. Secretary Austin started as a fucking second lieutenant. He rose through the ranks. This is dangerous.
I do not say this lightly.
This is incredibly dangerous.
They attack the military leadership as“woke”because they're trying to cause a break in the ranks. They're literally undermining good order and military discipline deliberately to break the chain of command.
I've never seen that in my lifetime.
You’re describing national security risk. Is that overstating it?
No, I don't think so.
The very nature of our republic relies on an apolitical military every American knows serves them, no matter their race, creed, religion, color, region, political party, whatever. Our republic depends on everyone knowing a standing army is not a threat to the country.
Many in the Republican Party are super-fans of Putin, let's be honest.They're having CPAC in Hungary, for God's sake, a country led by a rightwing dictator, a Putin fan. Imagine a scenario in which they’re in power and we can't fight because they’ve undermined the military.
It's terrifying to think where this could go.
I've seen reports of white nationalism gaining traction in the ranks of the military. There's an effort from above to deal with that.
I learned in military science 101 at West Point that an all-volunteer force is a direct reflection of our society. You raised your children for 18 years before they get into the military. I give them 12 weeks of basic training. That won’t overcome 18 years of raising them as racists.
All I can do is ensure they don't act on those beliefs and undermine good order and military discipline. If they do behave inappropriately, we use the separate military system to discipline them appropriately and remove them from the military as they're no longer a threat.
But we do know white nationalist and patriot front-type groups have been actively sending “their troops,” if you will, into the military for military training. Right-wing nationalist groups are infiltrating the ranks and recruiting veterans after they get out of the military.
At one point,10 percent of Jan6 cases were United States military and veterans. One of them is an active-duty Marine Corps major!
How horrifying that is.
Talk about the fundamental tension between universal values, like honor, and individual interest, like investment in whiteness.
Some really extreme right-wing politicians say universal values are an attack on conservative thought. It's not against conservative thought.
Conservative thought should mean taxes and “pulling up my bootstraps and raising myself up by going into the military” – that's fine.
Saying Black people are inferior soldiers, assaulting the ranks, inciting homophobia and transphobia and attacking fellow service members – That’s not conservative. That’s extremism, white nationalism.
That needs to be stomped out.
There have been several surveys of service members saying the biggest threat they face isn’t Muslim terrorists. It’s extremism in the ranks....
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Pentagon Revolving Door Database - POGO.orghttps://www.pogo.org › database › pentagon-revolving-...
The Pentagon Revolving Door Database exposes the depth of the reciprocal relationship between senior Pentagon officials and defense contractors.
Brass Parachutes: The Problem of the Pentagon Revolving Doorhttps://www.pogo.org › report › 2018/11 › brass-parac...
Nov 5, 2018 — At least 380 high-ranking Department of Defense officials and military officers shifted into the private sector to become lobbyists, board ...
New watchdog report decries 'revolving door' between the ...https://www.defensenews.com › industry › 2018/11/06
Nov 6, 2018 — The Project On Government Oversight is concerned that former officials who join defense contractors will use their influence to win ...
Missing: logistic ?| Must include: logistic
The Industry Agenda: Military-Industrial Complex - Revolving ...https://therevolvingdoorproject.org › the-industry-agen...
Mar 17, 2021 — The defense industry is seeking to influence executive branch ... flow through the Defense Department, the National Security Council is ...
Latest Count of 'Revolving Door' Defense Contractors Names ...https://www.govexec.com › management › 2018/11 › l...
Nov 14, 2018 — As many as 380 high-ranking Defense Department officials and officers over the past decade left government to become lobbyists, ...
Biden Is Filling Top Pentagon Spots With Defense Contractorshttps://theintercept.com › 2021/05/28 › biden-pentagon...
May 28, 2021 — Whatever differences he has from Trump, a rejection of the revolving door between industry and the Pentagon is not one of them.
https://theintercept.com/2021/05/28/biden-pentagon-defense-contractors/
no lnx
jOE BIDEN IS FILLING TOP PENTAGON POSITIONS WITH DEFENSE CONTRACTORS
Some of the top Defense Department officials — including Defense Secretary nominee Lloyd Austin — have deep ties to the private sector.
Sara SirotaLee FangSara Sirota, Lee Fang
May 28 2021,
THE PROSPECT OF another retired general becoming secretary of defense before finishing the mandatory seven-year, post-service waiting period wasn’t the only problem looming over President Joe Biden’s nomination of Lloyd Austin for the Cabinet position. The former four-star head of U.S. Central Command also sat on the board of Raytheon, a multibillion-dollar defense contractor that would be vying for the Pentagon’s most lucrative deals, raising questions about the military’s impartiality when issuing awards.
Austin’s nomination arrived on the heels of a corporate-ridden Defense Department under the Trump administration. Before Austin, another person with ties to Raytheon, the contractor’s chief lobbyist Mark Esper, held the reins of the Pentagon.Esper’s predecessors, Patrick Shanahan and James Mattis, had respectively been a senior vice president at Boeing and a board member of General Dynamics. Ellen Lord, the former president and CEO of Textron Systems, oversaw the Pentagon’s weapon acquisitions.
After the abundant conflicts of interest in Trump’s White House, some in Biden’s party pushed for someone without industry ties to lead the Defense Department.
“Despite President Trump’s boast that he would ‘drain the swamp’ and hire only ‘the best people,’ he has continuously failed to do so,” Reps. Mark Pocan, D-Wis., and Barbara Lee, D-Calif., wrote in a November 2020 letter to Biden. “We strongly encourage you to reject the mistaken nominations of the Trump era; and, again, commit to appointing Secretaries of Defense with no previous ties to defense contractors.”
Biden ignored their call. Whatever differences he has from Trump, a rejection of the revolving door between industry and the Pentagon is not one of them. In addition to Austin, the new White House has nominated or appointed a slew of corporate executives to serve at the upper echelons of a federal department whose enormous budget funnels billions of dollars to private companies every year.
Related
Biden Defense Secretary Nominee Lloyd Austin Comes Under Fire for Industry Connections]
Jack Poulson, executive director of the accountability nonprofit Tech Inquiry, which tracks tech and defense contractor influence in government, noted that there seemed to be a bipartisan consensus on the cozy relationship between the private and public sectors.
The pattern of Biden appointments of high-level Pentagon officials straight from consulting firms and corporations seeking influence with the government, said Poulson, risks “something close to pay-to-play in the tech national security arena.”
Ronald Moultrie, Biden’s pick to serve as Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security, comes from at least a dozen consulting firms and contractors, which he joined after holding positions in the National Security Agency, Central Intelligence Agency, and Navy.
He notably was a board member of Altamira Technologies, a defense contractor that recently won an award worth up to $950 million to support the Air Force’sAdvanced Battle Management System program that’s creating a high-speed network for military personnel to share information as they’re taking potentially lethal action.
For what differences Biden has from Trump, a rejection of the revolving door between industry and the Pentagon is not one of them.
Moultrie has a background that involves overt influence peddling, including work as a paid adviser to Resolute Public Affairs, a lobbying shop that touts its ability to intervene on behalf of clients on sensitive matters such as controls of foreign investments. Moultrie reported earning $350,000 since 2020 from the firm on his disclosure forms.
Moultrie also sat on the board of Pallas Advisors, a “strategic advisory firm specializing in navigating complex national and international security dynamics” founded by Sally Donnelly, a senior adviser to Mattis during his tenure as defense secretary. Donnelly, a former Amazon consultant, notoriously facilitated a private dinner between Mattis and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos while the Pentagon was developing a solicitation for a $10 billion Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure cloud services contract. That contract is now entangled in a lawsuit Amazon filed after Microsoft won the award.
Silicon Valley-based corporations like Amazon have had growing influence inside the Department of Defense as the military embraces big data. The Pentagon has launched outreach initiatives like the flagship Defense Innovation Unit, whose managing director, Michael Brown, is now Biden’s choice to serve as Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment, the position Lord previously held.
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Brown leads the Pentagon’s primary outreach to California’s technology giants — and was himself formerly CEO of Symantec Corporation and Quantum Corporation, multibillion-dollar companies in the cybersecurity and computer storage industries.
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In a recent “virtual fireside chat” with Eric Schmidt, the former Google CEO who previously served as the founding chair of the Department of Defense’s Innovation Board, Brown expounded on the success of DIU for facilitating military partnerships with Silicon Valley. He emphasized that there was much more to be done.
“We need more cross-pollination, so there needs to be more folks from the tech world who get into government and going back out,” said Brown.
Frank Kendall III talks before the start of his confirmation hearing to be secretary of the Air Force before the Senate Armed Services Committee in Washington on May 25, 2021. Frank Kendall talks before the start of his confirmation hearing to serve as secretary of the Air Force before the Senate Armed Services Committee in Washington, D.C., on May 25, 2021. Photo: Caroline Brehman/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images
THIS WEEK, the Senate Armed Services Committee reviewed the nomination of Frank Kendall, chosen by Biden to lead the Air Force. Kendall, a former vice president at Raytheon who served as Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics for President Barack Obama, has spent the last few years as an adviser and consultant to defense contractors. Kendall’s disclosures show that the bulk of his income has come from advisingNorthrop Grumman, followed by income from Renaissance Strategic Advisors, an investment firm that arranges mergers and acquisitions in the defense sector.
Shawn Skelly, nominated as the assistant secretary of defense for readiness, comes to the Pentagon from CACI International, the sprawling contractor that serves military bases around the world.
The Biden administration is embracing corporate executives at a time when the Defense Department is acknowledging the disastrous effects of the neoliberal outlook that has dominated the corporate world since the 1980s.
“Together, a U.S. business climate that has favored short-term shareholder earnings (versus long-term capital investment), deindustrialization, and an abstract, radical vision of ‘free trade,’ without fair trade enforcement, have severely damaged America’s ability to arms itself today and in the future,” a January report from the Pentagon’s industrial policy office states.
“The recent wave of industry appointments certainly raises concern.”
Biden’s appointee to oversee this office, Jesse Salazar, comes from none other than management consulting giant McKinsey, responsible for facilitating mergers, acquisitions and offshoring that have consolidated industries and supply chains and moved manufacturing overseas.
While not working inside the Pentagon, Pete Buttigieg’s leadership of the Transportation Department is likely to bring another McKinsey alum in close proximity to the Defense Department, as the two set eyes on emerging aerospace technology. Buttigieg’s predecessor Elaine Chao, for example, participated in an industry event hosted by the Air Force last year to engage makers of electric vertical take-off and landing vehicles, or flying cars.
Heidi Shyu, nominated to be the Under Secretary for Defense Research, runs an aerospace and defense consulting firm, through which she advises a range of contractors as a consultant and a board member to several companies. Shyu advises traditional defense giants, such as Boeing, General Electric, Raytheon, and Northrop Grumman, according to her recently filed ethics disclosure.
Shyu, a former Pentagon official in the Obama administration, also serves on the board of several drone-focused ventures, including Auterion Government Solutions, a start-up that provides artificial intelligence software for drones to the Pentagon, and Levitate Capital, which invests in autonomous aerial vehicles.
The Office of the Secretary of Defense, notably, will be staffed by many officials with close ties to contractors. Elizabeth George, the deputy general counsel for the Pentagon, is a former outside Google attorney through the firm Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. Ahmad Khan, a special assistant to the secretary, comes from Govini, a start-up that won a $400 million contract in 2019 to help the Pentagon analyze data. Ely Ratner, also appointed as an adviser to the secretary, previously consulted for the defense IT firm SAIC and for WestExec Advisors, a firm founded by former Obama administration officials to help Silicon Valley firms win contracts with the government.
“Much of Biden’s policy circles are already strongly vying for increases to the Pentagon budget under a ‘great-power competition’ framing, especially with respect to integrating AI into U.S. battle networks,” said Poulson, the executive director of Tech Inquiry. “The recent wave of industry appointments certainly raises concern.”
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Reduce Corporate Influence at the Pentagon | Elizabeth Warrenhttps://elizabethwarren.com › plans › corporate-influen...
Let's shut the revolving door between giant contractors and the Pentagon and crack ... Coziness between defense lobbyists, Congress, and the Pentagon tilts ...
Missing: logistic ?| Must include: logistic
The Chief Management Officer of the Department of Defensehttps://dbb.defense.gov › Documents › ReportsPDF
Jun 1, 2020 — Commission on the National Defense Strategy for the United States posited ... regularly rotating through what is called a “revolving door” ...
392 pages
The Revolving Door and the Entrenchment of the Permanent ...https://www.degruyter.com › doi › peps-2015-0001 › html
by TK Duncan · 2015 · Cited by 16 — Every time the Congress authorizes a military appropriation, ... To date, the US defense sector's revolving door has not been analyzed in ...
Frank Kendall flies out of revolving door and into Air Force ...https://responsiblestatecraft.org › Air Force
May 24, 2021 — Biden's pick for secretary worked in Pentagon acquisitions before his most recent gigs consulting for top defense contractors.
Related searches
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hedges 1220
The list of new administration officials includes retired General Lloyd J. Austin III who is being nominated to be secretary of defense. Austin is on the board of Raytheon Technologies and a partner at Pine Island Capital, a firm that invests in defense industries and also includes Antony Blinken, Biden's nominee to be secretary of state. Blinken, who was deputy national security adviser and deputy secretary of state, is a strong supporter of the apartheid state of Israel. He was one of the architects of the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq and a proponent of the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, resulting in yet another failed state in the Middle East.
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https://theintercept.com/2020/12/08/biden-defense-secretary-lloyd-austin-raytheon/
last MONTH, two progressive members of Congress sent President-elect Joe Biden a letter requesting that he commit to nominating a secretary of defense with no previous ties to weapons manufacturers. The letter, from Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wisc., and Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., cited President Donald Trump’s Defense Secretary Mark Esper — a former lobbyist for Raytheon, one the country’s largest defense contractors — and called on Biden to adopt a different standard and find a nominee with “no prior employment history with a defense contractor.”
But on Tuesday, Biden announced that he will nominate retired four-star Gen. Lloyd Austin III, once the top commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East and now a member of the board of directors at Raytheon. The company has been in the spotlight during the Trump administration in part because it supplies air-to-ground munitions for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen, and Austin’s role with Raytheon could be central to his confirmation fight.
austin oversaw U.S. operations in the Middle East until March 2016, a year after the Saudi-led intervention began. He retired from the military the next month and later joined the board of United Technologies, a defense contractor that merged with Raytheon earlier this year. In 2019, Raytheon proceeded with an $8 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which included air-to-ground munitions. After congressional Democrats blocked the sale on human rights grounds, the Trump administration helped force the sale through by declaring a state of emergency.
“Raytheon manufactures the bomb components that are used in Yemen. He bears a direct responsibility,” Phyllis Bennis, who directs the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy Studies, told The Intercept. “He was making money as a board member of this company that is directly responsible for the death and destruction there.”
William Hartung, the director of the Arms and Security Project at the Center for International Policy, told The Intercept that picking Austin was “tantamount to making the position of secretary of defense the ‘secretary of defense contractors.’”
“The potential for conflicts is huge,” Hartung said. “Raytheon is deeply involved in controversial programs from unworkable missile defense projects to nuclear weapons — the new nuclear-armed cruise missile — to precision-guided bombs that have killed untold numbers of civilians in Saudi Arabia’s brutal war in Yemen. If General Austin were to recuse himself from decisions on programs and policies involving Raytheon, he could not carry out large parts of his job as defense secretary.”
Austin was reportedly selected from a pool of other leading contenders with ties to top weapons companies: Michèle Flournoy, the former undersecretary of defense for policy, joined the board of Booz Allen Hamilton in 2018, and Jeh Johnson, the former secretary of Homeland Security under President Barack Obama, sits on the board of Lockheed Martin.
One of only a few African Americans to ever become a four-star general in the Army, Austin was the first African American in charge of a regional combatant command, overseeing U.S. forces in the Middle East. And if confirmed, he will be the first Black secretary of defense. The Congressional Black Caucus leaned heavily on Biden to select either him or Johnson, who is also Black.
Austin was formerly the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, where he oversaw major troop withdrawals under Obama, before becoming the top U.S. commander in the Middle East. In the U.S. campaign against the Islamic State, he reportedly pushed for more restrictive rules of engagement in an effort to reduce civilian casualties, but
from congressional Republicans who wanted the military to intervene in Syria.
“I’ve never met the man, but people who have worked with him say it will be easy for the White House with him in charge,” said Bennis. “That is, he’s unlikely to challenge his commander-in-chief. When you’re talking about orders that might violate international law or lead to the death of civilians, you want somebody who is willing to push back. That doesn’t sound like him.”
In contrast with other military leaders during the Obama administration, like Gens. David Petraeus or Stanley McChrystal, who maintained high profiles and sometimes clashed with the White House, Austin is known as a quieter presence. He earned the trust of many in Obama’s inner circle, including Biden.
In an op-ed in The Atlantic on Tuesday, Biden said that Austin “played a crucial role in bringing 150,000 American troops home from the [Iraqi] theater of war.”
“Pulling that off took more than just the skill and strategy of a seasoned soldier. It required Austin to practice diplomacy, building relationships with our Iraqi counterparts and with our partners in the region. He served as a statesman, representing our country with honor and dignity and always, above all, looking out for his people,” Biden wrote.
“I am certain that General Austin will find other ways to serve his country in retirement,” Obama said as the general exited the government in 2016. But since he left the military more than four years ago, Austin has formed extensive private-sector ties that could surface during his confirmation hearing. In addition to Raytheon, he joined the board of directors of the steel production company Nucor Corporation, Tenet Healthcare Corporation, and Guest Services Inc., a hospitality management company.
And both Austin and Antony Blinken — Biden’s nominee for secretary of state — have ties to Pine Island Capital Partners, a large investment firm that has raised hundreds of millions of dollars for acquisitions in defense companies this year,according to the New York Times.
Led by John Thain, the chief executive of Merrill Lynch at the time of its collapse in 2008, Pine Island boasts of an “experienced investment team with a group of deeply-connected and accomplished former senior government and military officials,” according to its website. In documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the firm notes that its team not only has “extensive connections to industry leaders,” but “unusual access to information.” Just last month, Pine Island raised $218 million to finance investments in “businesses in the defense, government service and aerospace industries.”
Austin joins an increasing number of generals and top military officials who exit to the private sector, holding lucrative positions at top companies. One 2018 study by the Project on Government Oversight tracked 380 cases of former military officers and Department of Defense officials who, in the previous years, became board members, executives, lobbyists, or consultants with defense companies.
Private-sector work was the subject of intense scrutiny during the confirmation hearing of Esper,Trump’s last defense secretary. Prior to joining the Trump administration in 2017 as army secretary, Esper worked as a senior lobbyist for Raytheon. He faced sharp questioning from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., over whether he would fully recuse himself from matters involving Raytheon as defense secretary.
When Esper did not commit to fully recusing himself from any decision involving Raytheon, Warren said that it “smacks of corruption, plain and simple.” It is unclear whether Senate Democrats will hold Austin to the similar standard, but his role with Raytheon could create ethics complications.
Austin is slated to face a rocky confirmation process, not only due to his business ties, but also because his nomination already was criticized as a violation of civil-military relations. By law, the secretary of defense position is a civilian position and not supposed to be held by recently retired officers. The rule is meant to emphasize civilian control over the military, and Austin has not yet undergone a legally required seven-year “cooling off” period. Austin’s confirmation will require Congress to waive that requirement — just as they did with Trump’s first defense secretary, retired Gen. James Mattis.
That puts Senate Democrats is a difficult position. Seventeen voted against granting Mattis the waiver, and the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., said at the time that he was unlikely to support a similar waiver in the future. In a statement on Tuesday, Reed said that he would review the nomination carefully. “One cannot separate the waiver from the individual who has been nominated,” the statement said.
Warren told CNN on Tuesday that she would oppose Austin’s nomination on the grounds that Congress shouldn’t grant waivers to recently retired generals.
“The principle of civilian control of the military is important. It’s not a guarantee that a civilian will be any more conscious of the consequences of war, but the prohibition should not be waived lightly,” said Bennis.
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