The Man Unfit to Command

Hegseth has tried to claim his only job is to be offensive, dismissing “defense” of America as someone else’s job. So be it. Let’s review what his loud rejections of duty have meant so far in terms of military preparedness and execution.

I. Pattern

June 14, 2015. Pete Hegseth throws a double-sided axe on live television.

Behind the target: Master Sergeant Jeff Prosperie, West Point Band, five children.

Hegseth wasn’t authorized to throw. He’d practiced once. He threw anyway.

The axe struck Prosperie’s elbow, cut his wrist. Prosperie’s statement:

Poor decision, obvious negligence, should not have happened, could have been avoided. When shooting or throwing, always know what is behind your target.

He sued. The incident is documented.

The military now appears to be preparing for his removal through coordinated disclosures like these.

The question is whether Trump tries to cut ties or double down on his team remaining unfit for duty.

II. Preparation

January–August 2025: Hegseth fires the Army and Air Force Judge Advocates General to remove prevention of war crimes.

Quantico, on video: “Maximum lethality, not tepid legality.”

March 2025: Hegseth shares classified Yemen strike details via Signal with his wife, brother, Fox News producer, and journalist Jeffrey Goldberg. IG report confirms Hegseth pushed classified information to insecure networks, endangering soldiers.

Before September 2: Hegseth approves written contingency protocols. If survivors take “hostile action,” Hegseth says kill them, where hostile action is defined as the wounded and defenseless asking for help.

This war crime has American precedent. At Fort Pillow in 1864, Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest’s forces murdered Black Union soldiers attempting to surrender. General Forrest wrote that the massacre was intentional:

It is hoped that these facts will demonstrate to the Northern people that the Negro soldier cannot cope with Southerners.

Three months later, forces under General Lee did the same at the Battle of the Crater, butchering Black soldiers who surrendered, then murdering prisoners of war afterward.

The Union’s response established that killing the defenseless is murder, not war.

Think about that precedent and what it means when someone attempts to reverse it. This American history matters, not least of all because “Make America Great Again” and America First are both racist platforms that reject defeat of the Confederacy.

General Grant stopped these butchers on the battle fields and again in the ballot boxes. And yet, here we are again.

Hegseth’s tattoos tell you the hateful traditions he follows, rejecting post-Civil War values and clear military doctrines. His overt Confederate loyalties (e.g. forcing enemy Confederate names onto U.S. military bases) and protocols—kill any survivors who cry for help—show you he means it.

III. Execution

September 2, 2025. First strike. Two survivors on burning wreckage. One radios for rescue.

Admiral Bradley, executing Hegseth’s pre-approved criteria, orders second strike.

Both killed.

IV. Legality

Joint Publication 3-0 defines hostile act: “an attack or other use of force.”

Pentagon Law of War Manual, Section 7.3: hostile acts are “acts of violence.”

A drowning man radioing for rescue is neither.

Major General Steven Lepper, 35 years as military lawyer, former Deputy JAG of the Air Force, on record:

Once we have rendered a vessel capable of survival only if it’s rescued, our obligation then shifts as well from attack to rescue. And so under those circumstances, even in the best light possible, I don’t think that anyone can say that this was a lawful order.

V. Documentation

The following exist:

• Strike Bridge logs: automatic record of all communications during the September 2 operation
• Hegseth’s execute order
• Pre-approved contingency protocols
• Unedited video of both strikes
• Hegseth’s public statements contradicting each other across five days
• Hegseth’s social media posts celebrating the kills

Congress has requested these documents.

VI. Allies’ Unfavorable Assessment

Britain suspended intelligence-sharing with the Pentagon. Canada distanced itself. Allied nations made complicity calculations.

VII. War Crime Precedents

General Anton Dostler transmitted Hitler’s order to execute captured commandos. His defense: he only passed along the order, didn’t originate it.

The tribunal’s ruling:

No soldier, and still less a Commanding General, can be heard to say that he considered the summary shooting of prisoners of war legitimate.

Dostler was shot by firing squad, December 1, 1945.

Hegseth didn’t transmit an order from above. He originated the criteria. He approved the protocols before the operation. Bradley executed what Hegseth authorized.

Firing squad is on the table.

18 U.S.C. § 2441, the War Crimes Act: grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions by U.S. nationals are federal crimes. If death results, the penalty includes death.

VIII. Documented

Hegseth threw an axe without authorization and hit a soldier. Documented.

Hegseth fired the lawyers who would have stopped him. Documented.

Hegseth approved kill criteria for survivors in advance. Documented.

Hegseth’s criteria were executed. Two men dead. Documented.

Hegseth celebrated on social media. Documented.

Hegseth contradicted himself on camera for five days. Documented.

The man who couldn’t be trusted with an axe now commands the American military. The file he’s building is his own prosecution.

The SS nameplate, the mocking memes, the “maximum lethality not tepid legality”—those aren’t bugs, they’re features for the white nationalists saying they own the White House. But constitutional loyalists appear to be gathering Hegseth’s prosecution file in real time, using Hegseth’s leaks as testimony.

Bottom line: This is far more than political theater because an actual safety mechanism inside the Pentagon is rolling out to stop war crimes. Hegseth is losing the information war every time he opens his mouth or brags about another anti-American tattoo.

The file he’s building isn’t a highlight reel. It’s an air-tight prosecution of himself as a war criminal, reminiscent of racist Confederate and Nazi leaders tried and convicted by America.