Tag Archives: Mark Esper

ABC News reports: Pentagon officials working on Defense Secretary Mark Esper’s cost-cutting review of the department have proposed slashing military health care by $2.2 billion, a reduction that some defense officials say could effectively gut the Pentagon’s health care system during a nationwide pandemic. The proposed cut to the military health system over the next five years is part of …

Politico reports: A new mandatory Pentagon training course aimed at preventing leaks refers to protesters and journalists as “adversaries” in a fictional scenario designed to teach Defense Department personnel how to better protect sensitive information. The new course was recently launched as part of Defense Secretary Mark Esper’s effort to improve “operational security,” or OPSEC, and clamp down on leaks. …

The Associated Press reports: After weeks of wrangling, the Pentagon on Friday will ban displays of the Confederate flag on military installations, in a carefully worded policy that doesn’t mention the word ban or that specific flag. The policy, laid out in a memo obtained by The Associated Press, was described by officials as a creative way to bar the …

Via press release from the Pentagon: Secretary Esper has approved a Department of the Interior request for DOD support to the 2020 Salute to America. DOD will provide aerial, musical and ceremonial support to this year’s celebration in Washington, D.C. This year’s support will also include a flyover of the Mount Rushmore National Memorial, as well an aerial salute to …

Somebody really wants to keep his job: In an abrupt reversal, Defense Secretary Mark Esper on Wednesday overturned an earlier Pentagon decision to send a couple hundred active-duty soldiers home from the Washington, D.C., region, amid growing tensions with the White House over the military response to the protests. Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy told The Associated Press that the reversal …

CNN reports: Secretary of Defense Mark Esper said Wednesday that he does not support using active duty troops to quell the large-scale protests across the United States triggered by the death of George Floyd and those forces should only be used in a law enforcement role as a last resort, directly contradicting President Donald Trump. “The option to use active …

The military site Task & Purpose reports: The Defense Department should prepare to operate in a “globally-persistent” novel coronavirus (COVID-19) environment without an effective vaccine until “at least the summer of 2021,” according to a draft Pentagon memo obtained by Task & Purpose. “We have a long path ahead, with the real possibility of a resurgence of COVID-19,” reads the …

The Military Times reports: The Defense Department has set a goal to be testing 60,000 service members a day for coronavirus by June, but they won’t get there all at once. The plan is to start testing the most at-risk and most essential troops first, then work their way toward the rest of the force as testing capacity increases. Of …

The Hill reports: Defense Secretary Mark Esper said he is open to reinstating the Navy captain who was removed from his post last week shortly after asking for help with a coronavirus outbreak aboard his ship. “We’ve taken nothing off the table,” Esper said on CBS News Friday morning. “My inclination is always to support the chain of command, and …

CNN reports: Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly resigned on Tuesday, a day after leaked audio revealed he called the ousted commander of the USS Theodore Roosevelt “stupid” in an address to the ship’s crew, according to a US official and a former senior military official. The Navy and Department of Defense did not respond to a request for comment. Undersecretary …

The Daily Beast reports: Defense Secretary Mark Esper directed Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly to apologize for his remarks about Capt. Brett Crozier, hours after the military official had publicly doubled down and said they were “from the heart.” The defense secretary’s order prompted Modly’s apology about his speech to the crew of the nuclear aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt …

ABC News reports: The Pentagon will soon announce a new policy requiring face masks for military personnel, Defense Secretary Mark Esper said Sunday on ABC This Week. “We will have a directive coming up on that today,” Secretary of Defense Mark Esper told ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos. “Now we’re going to move towards face covering.” Over 1,200 service …

The Associated Press reports: Lawmakers from both parties told Pentagon leaders on Wednesday that the Defense Department is undermining its own efforts to get military money by diverting billions of dollars for the construction of President Donald Trump’s U.S.-Mexico border wall The chairman of the House Armed Services Committee and the committee’s top Republican warned Defense Secretary Mark Esper that …

NBC News reports: Sen. Lindsey Graham and a bipartisan group of lawmakers, uniting against a Trump administration idea to withdraw U.S. troops from part of Africa, pushed back during a fiery exchange with Defense Secretary Mark Esper here over the weekend, according to four people present at or familiar with the meeting. At one point, Graham warned Esper that there …

Stars & Stripes reports: Defense Secretary Mark Esper on Thursday defended the Pentagon’s effort to strip Stars and Stripes of all of its federal funding as part of its fiscal year 2021 budget request, telling reporters in Brussels that the independent news organization is not a priority. “So, we trimmed the support for Stars and Stripes because we need to …

CBS News reports: Secretary of Defense Mark Esper said he “didn’t see” specific evidence that top Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani was planning attacks on four U.S. embassies, but said he believed such attack would have occurred. “The president didn’t cite a specific piece of evidence. What he said was he believed,” Esper said Sunday on “Face the Nation.” “I …

CNN reports: “We are not looking to start a war with Iran, but we are prepared to finish one,” Defense Secretary Mark Esper told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour Tuesday.  He also insisted the US had evidence to justify the attack that killed Iranian General Qasem Soleimani in Iraq last week. “I can assure you it’s more than razor thin, it’s persuasive. …

Politico reports: Eric Chewning, chief of staff to Defense Secretary Mark Esper, is stepping down at the end of the month, the latest in a series of high-profile civilians to leave the Pentagon. He’ll be replaced by Jen Stewart, the top Republican staffer on the House Armed Services Committee and a former top adviser to the chairman of the Joint …

Agence France-Press reports: The Pentagon warned Thursday that the Iran-backed Kataeb Hezbollah group that stormed the US embassy in Baghdad would would carry out more attacks on US facilities – and would regret it. “The provocative behavior has been out there for months… So do I think they may do something? Yes. And they will likely regret it,” Esper told …

The Associated Press reports: Defense Secretary Mark Esper said Monday that President Donald Trump gave him a direct order to allow a Navy SEAL accused of war crimes to retire without losing his SEAL status. Esper told reporters at the Pentagon that Trump’s verbal order was the reason Esper announced Sunday that Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher would be allowed …