News outlets ran a spate of articles and columns in recent days reflecting a level of anxiety over President-elect Trump choosing a number of retired generals for top positions in his White House.
But in January 2009, President Obama appointed the same number of retired high-ranking officers to posts that Trump has so far.
Trump has reportedly named retired Marine Gen. John Kelly as his secretary of homeland security, which brings the number of retired generals to three. Kelly would join retired Army Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn as national security adviser and retired Marine Gen. James Mattis as secretary of defense.
After the Kelly news, the Washington Post ran a story Wednesday headlined, “Trump hires a third general, raising concerns about heavy military influence.”
The story said Trump’s pick had “intensified worries among some members of Congress and national security experts that the new administration’s policies may be shaped disproportionately by military commanders.”
The Wall Street Journal similarly said Trump’s “Choice of Generals for Top Posts Raises Concerns.”
A column at the Post said there are “concerns” over Trump’s selections, “mostly … about the larger question of drawing so much from the military.”
The left-leaning Slate website asked, “Does Trump Want to Put Generals in Charge of Everything?”
As far back as Nov. 30, the New York Times said that Trump’s “Focus on Generals for Top Jobs Stirs Worries Over Military’s Sway.”
The worry, as the Journal’s news article put it, is that putting retired generals in top posts serves as a “threat to civilian oversight of government.”
Concerns came up on Capitol Hill as well. House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said he worried about the message that Trump’s choice of three generals sends to the rest of the world.
“I am concerned that so many of the President-Elect’s nominees thus far come from the ranks of recently retired military officers,” Hoyer said in a statement Wednesday evening. “I worry about the signal this sends to emerging democracies that may have a history of greater confidence in their militaries than in the fledgling democratic civilian institutions whose development we, as the world’s leading democracy, have worked so hard to encourage.”
Trump is said to be considering other retired high-ranking officers for other top posts, including retired Army Gen. David Petraeus for secretary of state and retired Adm. James Stavridis, who was spotted in Trump Tower Thursday morning. He’s even reportedly considering Adm. Michael Rogers for director of national intelligence, who’s still on active duty.
But as things stand, Trump has appointed the same number that Obama did.
Obama’s initial team included, as pointed out by the Washington Examiner’s Jamie McIntyre on Wednesday: retired Marine Gen. Jim Jones as national security adviser; retired Army Gen. Eric Shinseki as veterans affairs secretary; and retired Navy Adm. Dennis Blair as director of national intelligence.
The jobs they filled were indeed different than the ones Trump’s generals will fill. Much of the controversy over Trump’s selections comes from nominating a retired general, only three years out of uniform, to be defense secretary, which is not the same as a retired general running the VA. Yet others focus squarely on the number of retired officers tapped so far, and the possibility that Trump will choose more.
The Journal said Trump’s selections may symbolize “Mr. Trump’s reaction to the Obama presidency. The Obama White House is widely seen as being leery of the Pentagon’s power and the agendas of its generals ever since the decision to ‘surge’ troops into Afghanistan in 2009.”
Press accounts of Obama’s selection of two generals and an admiral seven years ago, however, were framed not as a sign that people should be wary, but more as an olive branch to an institution that didn’t trust its new president.
“Military officials say that a big step in Mr. Obama’s campaign to build their trust was his retention not only of Mr. Bush’s defense secretary, Robert M. Gates, but also his appointment of three other military men to top positions,” the New York Times wrote Jan. 30, 2009 in an article headlined “After Campaign Push, Obama Cultivates Military.”
“He has in his Cabinet a soldier, sailor and Marine,” the Times quoted then-Gen. James Conway, the Marine Corps commandant. “I find that pretty encouraging.”
On March 25, 2009, ABC News referred to the lineup as “Obama’s dream team.”
And on April 21, 2009, Government Executive posted a story headlined “Obama wins respect from the military.”
“A crisp salute, a first lady’s campaign, a generous budget and some familiar appointments have allowed President Obama to take great strides toward reassuring the group that was perhaps the most wary of his election — the military,” the article read. “While past and present military leaders aren’t about to change their largely Republican leanings, they are willing to credit the president with some shrewd moves that allowed him to avoid the mistakes that made for such a hostile relationship between the military and the last non-veteran president — and Democrat — Bill Clinton.”
