If you destroy the integrity of the professional military corps through destructive and despotic behaviour that drives out those who hold to their principles, soldiers like this are the result of Hegseth’s cultification.

Nobody should be surprised.

Hegseth thinks loyalists + AI as brains can replace decades of actual real-world experience and keeping the highest ethics and morality standards with a bunch of AI-driven baboons with stars on their shoulders.

Paul Krugman wrote a good piece about exactly this. https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/cultifying-the-us-militar...

Everyone can already feel the ripples of what he is doing. There is an exodus in excellence in the upper echelons of the us military never seen before.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/apr/22/navy-secreta...

The US is getting less safe by the day. You can also see it on tourism data and forecasts. A lot of people don’t feel safe to travel to the US any longer.

Soccer World Cup in the US and 250th anniversary of the USA would have caused a tourism boom with past administrations. But people rather go to China instead.

https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/tourist...