Tuesday’s House Armed Services Committee hearing on the Fiscal Year 2023 Defense Budget Request produced some great theater as Florida Representative Matt Gaetz took on the shabby and incompetent record of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.

It all started innocently enough, though the contempt the two men had for one another was on display.

Gaetz: Secretary Austin, why should American taxpayers fund lectures at the National Defense University that promote socialism as a strategy to combat China?

Austin: The National Defense University is an academic institution and I don’t know of any such lecture…

Gaetz: That’s surprising because it was widely reported. The National Defense University had Thomas Piketty come and this was the title of his lecture “Responding to China: The Case for Global Justice and Democratic Socialism.” So, now that you know that they did this, would you agree that embracing socialism is not an effective strategy to combat China?

Austin: I certainly don’t agree with embracing socialism.

Gaetz: So that means…

Committee chairman white knighting for Austin: I’m sorry, we’re not going to do this. We’re not going to let the guy talk, say four words, and then cut him off. We’re not…

Gaetz: I control the time, Mr. Chairman.

White Knight: Yes, but you also have to be fair to the witness.

Gaetz: I got the answer I wanted. I have a follow-up. My follow up question is, if we don’t embrace it, then why did the National Defense University put out a statement, again this is funded by US taxpayers, saying, “In this talk, Mr. Piketty will argue that the right answer lies in ending Western arrogance and promoting a new emancipatory and egalitarian horizon on a global scale, a new form of democratic and participatory, ecological and postcolonial socialism.” Why would we invite people we don’t agree with to evangelize views and values that we don’t share at the National Defense University when we should be learning strategy about how to combat our enemies and make assessments that are accurate.

From there, Gaetz dragged Austin over the coals on various issues, such as the Defense Department predicting it would take months, if ever, for the Taliban to seize control in Afghanistan, predicting an easy Russian win in Ukraine. He hammered Austin over China and Russia, stealing a march on us in the fielding of hypersonic missiles. Incredibly, Austin accused Gaetz of being ashamed of America because he had the temerity to demand answers of this wide-ride when he was demanding 730 billion of our hard-earned dollars.

Gaetz: No, no, no, I’m embarrassed by your leadership. I’m not embarrassed for my country. I wish we were not losing to China. I wish we were not losing… You know what, that’s, that is so disgraceful that you’d here and conflate your failures with the failures of the uniformed service members. You guys said that Russia would overrun Ukraine in 36 days. You said the Taliban would be kept at bay for months. You totally blew those calls and maybe we’d be better at them if the National Defense University worked a little more on strategy and a little less on wokeism.

Austin: Has it occurred to you that Russia has not overrun Ukraine because what we’ve done and our allies have done?

Gaetz: But that was baked into your flawed assessment. I saw that the Obama administration tried to destroy our military by starving it of resources, it seems that the Biden administration is trying to destroy our military by force-feeding it wokeism.

Let’s face it.

Our military, at the senior ranks, is a barking shambles. It is increasingly partisan (this is not a new development). Even though the public thinks of general officers and admirals as raging fascists, they are largely fiscally and socially liberal Democrats; see Obama’s Generals. The coin of the realm is wokeism in all its permutations. The coda of “duty, honor, country,” if not dead, is on life support. Rember General Milley nearly in open mutiny against President Trump. The US Army Museum at Fort Belvoir, VA, has a display honoring the first lesbian general, Major General (ret.) Tammy Smith. What they don’t bother to tell you is that she lied about her sexual deviancy to maintain her career, most of which was spent in the era when homosexuality was, rightfully, considered incompatible with military service. They also gloss over the dozens of senior officers who knew that Smith was homosexual and elected to sponsor her for promotion (see The Official Outrage Over Tucker Carlson’s Critique of Joe Biden’s Military Shows Just How Lost Our Military Is). We had Navy admirals countermand direct orders given them by the President of the United States (see Trump Wins This One. Chief Eddie Gallagher Will Keep His Seal Trident but Mutineers Are Still at Large).

The Navy, which would be our bulwark in a war with China, more closely resembles a welfare program for defense contractors than a military service.

Once again, this Administration has chosen the divest-to-invest strategy as if whatever future conflict will not occur for at least two decades. Admirals Davidson and Aquilino disagree. 2/7

— Rep. Elaine Luria (@RepElaineLuria) March 29, 2022

They propose decommissioning 24 ships; 11 of which are less than 10 years old. 1 has been in service less than 2 years and 2 are currently in modernization. 4/7

— Rep. Elaine Luria (@RepElaineLuria) March 29, 2022

China is not a “pacing challenge” when they will soon have double the size of our Navy. We are losing 1000+ VLS cells, with NO PLAN to replace them. Instead, we are investing in the next “Gucci” missile and technology that will not be mature for 20+ years. 6/7

— Rep. Elaine Luria (@RepElaineLuria) March 29, 2022

Lastly, the Navy has no strategy. Stop saying you do, because if you did you would be able to explain how this Fleet size will allow us to defend Taiwan. 7/7

— Rep. Elaine Luria (@RepElaineLuria) March 29, 2022

When combat readiness gets so bad that a liberal Democrat notices, you have problems.

What’s worse than @POTUS's budget only proposing to build 9 Navy warships (while retiring 24)? One of these new ships double-counts a ship previously authorized by Congress (and doing so is a violation of law).

— Sen. Jim Inhofe (@JimInhofe) March 28, 2022

The commander of the Pacific Fleet is saying that his fleet is under maximum stress. As my long-time acquaintance “cdrsalamander” points out, we are at peace. What happens if shooting starts.

…and there you go.

"Our force is operating at the top of the stress curve."

That is an indictment, not a bragging point.

If our Navy – presently at peace – is operating at "the top of the stress curve" then we are doing it wrong.

Stewardship of sea power is a marathon. https://t.co/G1xmuBwuhM

— cdrsalamander (@cdrsalamander) April 5, 2022

The service has created a Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity office in the Pentagon to make sure the correct gender and melanin levels are available in the right places. Women are being pushed into the combat arms in the Army and Marines. They were put there not because of manpower (yes, I said it) shortages but because some hyper woke general officers decided they didn’t care about combat effectiveness or young men and women needlessly dying as much as they cared about being woke. The lie we were forced to parrot was that women would meet the same physical standard for a position as the men. It isn’t true. It was never true.

One of Gaetz’s most powerful statements was in his closing, “You totally blew those calls [about Afghanistan and Ukraine],” he said, “and maybe we’d be better at them if the National Defense University worked a little more on strategy and a little less on wokeism.

Indeed.

There is no evidence that our senior military colleges produce graduates more capable of guiding national military strategy than the graduates of your typical undergraduate gender studies program, mainly because the focus has become the same in both places. Did anyone ever hear a strategy articulated for accomplishing the mission in Afghanistan? I’ll take it a step further, was there ever a mission for Afghanistan that could produce anything recognizable as a win.

While the US military entered into the last half of the 20th century with an unbroken string of wins, the last 70 years have been unkind. Where we have been most successful are in the wars that your typical Infantry major could plan (Panama, Grenada). Conflicts requiring an overarching strategy have been dismal failures. That is because we have raised a generation of general officers, including field commanders, who don’t see strategic acumen or tactical proficiency as part of their job description. Instead, they are resource managers and self-seeking careerists.

And yet, the Secretary of Defense comes before Congress asking for more money than the GDP of Poland to defend this nation, and he can’t explain why a French socialist is giving a lecture at the National Defense University on how to use a “new emancipatory and egalitarian horizon on a global scale, a new form of democratic and participatory, ecological and postcolonial socialism,” to defeat Communist China. He definitely can’t explain what the military services are doing to train the warriors of all ranks who will have to do the job.

Transcript

Gaetz: Secretary Austin, why should American taxpayers fund lectures at the National Defense University that promote socialism as a strategy to combat China?

Austin: The National Defense University is an academic institution and I don’t know of any such lecture…

Gaetz: That’s surprising because it was widely reported. The National Defense University had Thomas Piketty come and this was the title of his lecture “Responding to China: The Cae for Global Justice and Democratic Socialism. So, now that you know that they did this, would you agree that embracing socialism is not an effective strategy to combat China?

Austin: I certainly don’t agree with embracing socialism.

Gaetz: So that means…

Committee chairman white knighting for Austin: I’m sorry, we’re not going to do this. We’re not going to let the guy talk, say four words, and then cut him off. We’re not…

Gaetz: I control the time, Mr. Chairman.

White Knight: Yes, but you also have to be fair to the witness.

Gaetz: I got the answer I wanted. I have a follow-up. My follow up question is, if we don’t embrace it, then why did the National Defense University put out a statement, again, this is funded by US taxpayers, saying, “In this talk, Mr. Piketty will argue that the right answer lies in ending Western arrogance and promoting a new emancipatory and egalitarian horizon on a global scale, a new form of democratic and participatory, ecological and postcolonial socialism.” Why would we invite people we don’t agree with to evangelize views and values that we don’t share at the National Defense University when we should be learning strategy about how to combat our enemies and make assessments that are accurate.

Austin: And we do learn a lot about strategy and about the military and about joint force development. And so, that is our focus in these institutions. I don’t know what the context of this particular…or the content of this particular….

Gaetz: Mr. Secretary, I’ve shared with you the context. The context wasn’t let’s better understand socialism so we can defeat it. The context wasn’t learn about it, so we can offer countermeasures. The concept was that it’s time for socialism. And the reason I know that’s the context is because the lecture was pulled from a book written by Thomas Piketty entitled “Time for Socialism.” And I just can’t help but like notice that you guys have been…

Austin: And your point to me was whether…

Gaetz: I control the time.

Austin: Your question was [something] socialism…

Gaetz: You guys have been blowing a lot of calls lately…

Austin: …the answer is no…

Gaetz: …on matters of strategy, Mr. Secretary. You told us that Russia couldn’t lose. You told us that the Taliban couldn’t immediately win. So I guess I’m wondering what in the $773 billion you’re requesting today is going to help make assessments that are accurate in the face of so many blown calls?

Austin: You’ve seen what’s in the budget. You’ve seen how the budget matches strategy. And so I’ll let that speak for itself.

Gaetz: Well, I’ve also seen we’re behind, Mr. Secretary. We’re behind in hypersonic, we failed to deter Russia. Last year…

Austin: What do you mean we’re behind in hypersonic? How do you…

Gaetz: Okay? Who’s ahead in hypersonics?

Austin: How do you make that assessment?

Gaetz: I don’t know…I make that assessment because China is fielding hypersonic weapons, and we are still developing them. I make that assessment because Russia…

[cross talk]

Gaetz: By the way, your own people brief us that we are behind and China is winning. Are you aware of the briefings we get on hyprsonics?

Austin: I am certainly aware of briefings we provide to Congress.

Gaetz: It is not just the hypersonics; it is all over the world. It’s in Taiwan, where last year China flew more sorties than ever before. It’s North Korea on pace to shatter prior records for the number of missiles that they are testing. Everyone else in the world seem to be developing more capabilities and being more strategic; we’ve got time to embrace Critical Race Theory at West Point, to embrace socialism at the National Defense University, to do mandatory pronoun training. Do you assess…

Austin: Again, this is the most capable, the most combat credible force in the world. It has been, and it will be so going forward.

Gaetz: Not if we go down this path. Not if we embrace socialism.

Austin: The fact that you’re embarrassed by your country…

Gaetz: No, no, no, I’m embarrassed by your leadership. I’m not embarrassed for my country. I wish we were not losing to China. I wish we were not losing… You know what, that’s, that is so disgraceful that you’d here and conflate your failures with the failures of the uniformed service members. You guys said that Russia would overrun Ukraine in 36 days. You said the Taliban would be kept at bay for months. You totally blew those calls, and maybe we’d be better at them if the National Defense University worked a little more on strategy and a little less on wokeism.

Austin: Has it occurred to you that Russia has not overrun Ukraine because what we’ve done and our allies have done?

Gaetz: But that was baked into your flawed assessment. I saw that the Obama administration tried to destroy our military by starving it of resources; it seems that the Biden administration is trying to destroy our military by force-feeding it wokeism.