STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
In the middle of a war, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has removed the Army's top officer from his post. General Randy George was Army chief of staff. He's a veteran of multiple wars who rose to the top of his institution with a goal to make the Army more modern and more nimble in a time of changing technology. Now a U.S. official has confirmed to NPR that Hegseth asked George to retire. The official was speaking on condition of anonymity because they're not authorized to speak publicly. The Atlantic's Nancy Youssef is also covering this story, and she's on the line. Nancy, good morning.
NANCY YOUSSEF: Good morning.
INSKEEP: Household name in the Army. Maybe not known elsewhere. Who is Randy George?
YOUSSEF: So he was the head of the Army. He joined when he was 18 years old out of Iowa and eventually ended up going to West Point. He served in Iraq and Afghanistan. And up until yesterday, he was in charge of the largest service in the military - 400,050-plus personnel - and had rose through the ranks and had come to lead the Army. He'd also been an aide to former Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and was an advocate of really advancing technology. And his service, while the war in Iran was air- and sea-based, was the one that was leading the air defenses because those Patriots and THAAD systems that you hear about that shoot down the missiles and drones being fired by the Iranians are Army-operated. And so they had a key role in the U.S. fight against Iran.
INSKEEP: Oh, wow. So what kinds of conflicts was he having with Pete Hegseth?
YOUSSEF: Well, it's interesting. Hegseth has been involved in the Army from the time that he arrived at the department. You'll remember he was a major in the Army National Guard. He had very strong views on how the Army should be run and had been involved in things like personnel matters all the way down to the rank of colonel, going over promotion lists of who should and shouldn't be promoted, a decision generally left to the services.
INSKEEP: He was clipping people from those promotion lists, wasn't he?
YOUSSEF: That's right.
INSKEEP: Yeah.
YOUSSEF: That's right. And there was a pattern in which they were either female or minority. He had a particular tension with the civilian in charge of the Army, Dan Driscoll, who is a close associate of JD Vance's and, at times, was a favored person in the administration in that he had been sent to Ukraine to help negotiations there. And so we had seen this tension and, in some ways, had anticipated that General George would not get to serve his full expected four-year term. But I think the timing of it was quite surprising, given that we're in the middle of a very intense battle right now - the most costly and consequential military campaign of either of Trump's two terms.
INSKEEP: OK. So we don't know the official reason for the dismissal. We do know there was this ongoing conflict over personnel and who Hegseth wanted to promote or not. There was also something about Kid Rock. What is that?
YOUSSEF: Yes. And just to give you a sense of how much the secretary was involved in the army, a couple of days ago, Kid Rock, who is a big Trump supporter, posted a video of an Army helicopter sort of hovering over his house and sort of - almost sort of saluting him as - by air. And that goes against Army regulations, apparently. At least, that was being investigated after the video came out. And then a day later, the secretary of defense, via social media, said there would be no investigation. Carry on patriots, is how he described it. And the reason this is important is not just the effect on the service, but this is generally not the job of a secretary of defense. His job is to set policy and tone.
INSKEEP: OK. Nancy Youssef of The Atlantic on the dismissal of General Randy George from the Army. Nancy, pleasure talking with you. Thanks.
YOUSSEF: Great to be with you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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