Self-styled US ‘war secretary’ Pete Hegseth, a heavy drinker in his pre-White House days to the extent that in early 2023 he got through three gin and tonics at a weekday breakfast meeting, continues to claim that he has given up alcohol. So what could be a more sober decision than to announce a snuff film on live television?
Hegseth – still being tipped by some of the loopier MAGA crowd as a potential successor to Donald Trump – has announced that the December 3 execution of a former US Army major by firing squad will be live-streamed online. He declared (quite accurately, if you think about it) that his decision was a “no-brainer”.
The execution of Nidal Hasan, who shot dead 13 unarmed US soldiers at Fort Hood in 2009, would write Thirsty Pete’s name in a ghoulish version of the Guinness Book Of Records. If carried out, it would mark the first time the US military has broadcast an execution live on the internet, be the first US public execution in 90 years, the first US military execution since 1961, and the first death by military firing squad since WWII.
Hegseth told Real America’s Voice: “We’ll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it’s public. Because people need to understand that there’s [sic] serious consequences for these types of things.”
Coming in the wake of the botched execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee, who survived two injections of the drug pentobarbital, the announcement has been met with shock and revulsion. Democratic senator Chris Murphy called the idea “disgusting” and worthy of Islamic State. The decision to livestream an execution would be “unprecedented in the modern era” and “on uncertain legal terrain,” said John Mills, a lawyer who works with inmates sentenced to death, while the UN human rights office claimed it“would breach the absolute prohibition of torture”.
It is also unclear which streamer would be prepared to show somebody being killed live. Services such as YouTube have strict rules on violence, although Amazon Prime has previously streamed a car crash on behalf of the Trump administration (the hagiographical film Melania).
It’s only the latest in a string of increasingly unhinged public pronouncements by Hegseth, who last week gave a bizarre, ranting State of the Forces speech in which he promised to purge the US armed forces of “fatties, trannies and weirdos”.
Speaking to military staff, he said: “It’s worth saying again, so the fake news understands it. We are no longer the woke department or the weak department. Simple translation of that: no fatties, no trannies, no beardos, no weirdos, no wimps, no radicals. Just warriors.
“Our so-called ‘press’ makes Iranian state media look reasonable. Our media’s shameful lust for political retribution blinds them to the consequences of reckless, so-called ‘reporting.’ So-called ‘journalists’ juiced up on Trump Derangement Syndrome think they’re fighting against our president. But they’re really undermining you. Our warfighters.”
Nurse! The smelling salts!
And earlier this week, Hegseth appeared to claim the US had come to an agreement with Iran over the Strait of Hormuz in which the country had apparently been given “the bottom half”. He told troops: “To borrow a page from Admiral Ernest King in world war two, we’ve decided to share the ocean with Iran. We’ve given them the bottom half; we’ve damaged or sunk over 120 of their Navy ships with battle damage assessments pending for many more.”
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Hegseth is always keen to stress what a manly man he is, declaring that he wants to infuse the military with a “warrior ethos” and recently announcing mandatory testosterone screening for personnel over the age of 30.
Last year he used a speech to military leaders to insist all branches adhere to a rigid “male standard of high physical performance” for combat eligibility, he has actively banned long hair, beards and what he has characterised as “out-of-shape personnel” and had the Pengaon restrict press photographers from taking “unflattering” photographs during a war briefing.
So what happened when the 46-year-old former Fox and Friends Weekend host insisted on joining members of the military during a training exercise at the USS Abraham Lincoln this week? He huffed and puffed and was left in the dust!
Hegseth has been roundly mocked after footage showed him lagging well behind troops on a morning jog. At one point, after a round of pull-ups, troops are seen racing off to their next workout while a sweaty, breathless Hegseth is left hanging behind.
Criticism came even from former party colleagues, with Barbara Comstock, a former representative for Virginia, writing on X: “Who is working on protecting our troops and bring [sic] an end to the war? Get this loser @PeteHegseth a job at a MAGA gym.”
Hegseth had been present to receive the crew of the Abraham Lincoln after the aircraft carrier finally returned to the US following an extended deployment plagued with dwindling supplies, inadequate food, broken toilets and a lack of hygiene and maintenance. Still, at least they got to see their boss, the man who demands a “warrior ethos”, fail to carry out an elementary jog and a few pull-ups.
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