on Dec. 6, U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth took his shallow sloganeering to the Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, California, to extoll the supposed virtues of the Trump Administration’s 2025 National Security Strategy. Hegseth, reported the Pentagon summary, underscored numerous parallels that he believes exist between the military strategies and policies of Presidents Ronald Reagan and Donald J. Trump, while also emphasizing his view on the current President’s commitment to strengthening the U.S. military. Not said, is that one important difference between Reagan and Trump is that Reagan did not tear down the firewalls between the military and law enforcement in the way the current administration is doing now.
“Make no mistake about it: President Trump is hellbent on maintaining and accelerating the most powerful military the world has ever seen; the most powerful, the most lethal and American-made … the Arsenal of Freedom,” said Hegseth. Hegseth went on that the Trump administration and the War Department are committed to putting America first and avoiding getting into seemingly unending foreign entanglements, as well as prioritizing the nation’s security, freedom, and prosperity of its citizens. “We’re doing it in a way that leaves not only our nation better off, but the world. Out with utopian idealism, and in with hard-nosed realism,” he declared.
