The US’s sharpening ideological polarization is affecting a wider and much more junior cross-section of the country’s armed forces and challenging the military’s ability to remain above the political fray, a former chairman of the joint chiefs of staff has said.
Retired Adm Mike Mullen, who was the US’s top military commander under presidents George W Bush and Barack Obama, called the political environment facing currently serving officers “challenging” and “the most dangerous time” in his memory.
Speaking at a security forum organized by the Aspen Institute thinktank on Wednesday, he warned that it had become much harder to maintain the armed forces’ traditional apolitical stance than when he served as joint chiefs chair between 2007 and 2011.
“I didn’t really understand how hard [the civilian-military relationship] was until I was in the middle of it,” he said. “I talked about the military being apolitical a lot in those four year and it’s only gotten harder. We have gotten so much more divided.”
Mullen’s comments follow accusations that the Trump administration has consciously sought to politicize the military by purging senior commanders and by deploying national guard units on unaccustomed law and order missions in American cities, including Washington DC, to counteract supposed “crime waves”.
New documents show the crew on board the United States' newest aircraft carrier are growing increasingly...
Democratic US senator Mark Kelly filed a lawsuit on Monday seeking to nullify the “chilling” attempt...
North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) aircraft will soon be in Greenland for “long-planned” activities, even...
