Retired Army Gen. Mark Milley defended women serving in military combat roles on Wednesday as he seemingly slammed comments by former Fox News host Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s pick to run the Department of Defense.
“Don’t lecture me about women in combat. Women have been in combat and it doesn’t matter if that 7.62 hits you in the chest, no one gives a shit if it’s a woman or guy who pulled that trigger, you’re still dead,” said Milley, a former chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the president-elect’s first term.
Milley, who has notably described Trump as “a total fascist” and the “most dangerous person ever,” made the not-so-subtle jab at Hegseth over remarks he made just days before the president-elect announced him as his defense secretary pick.
“I’m straight-up just saying we should not have women in combat roles. It hasn’t made us more effective, it hasn’t made us more lethal, it has made fighting more complicated,” said Hegseth in an appearance on the “Shawn Ryan Show.”
Hegseth later clarified that he was referring to women in “physical, labor-intensive” roles in the military.
“I’m talking about stuff that would need strength as a differentiator. Pilots? Give me a female pilot all day long, I got no issues with that,” said Hegseth, a controversial choice for the DOD post who has faced a sea of questionsover a 2017 sexual assault allegation.
Hegseth’s remarks would later get pushback from Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), an Army National Guard veteran who lost both her legs when her Black Hawk helicopter was attacked during the Iraq War in 2004.
“I would ask him, you know, ‘Where do you think I lost my legs? In a bar fight?’ I’m pretty sure I was in combat when that happened,” Duckworth said in an interview with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins last week.
Milley, who addressed the National Security Innovation Forum on Wednesday, emphasized that someone’s “readiness standards” are what matters in the military.
Democracy In The Balance
Already contributed? Log in to hide these messages.
“If you meet the standards, our military must be and always should be a standard-based, merit-based military. Period, full stop. It doesn’t matter if you’re white, if you’re black, if you’re a man, if you’re a woman, if you’re a Catholic, if you’re a Protestant,” Milley said.
He later continued, “Do you meet the standard or not? If yes, pass go, collect 200, join the infantry.”