{"id":1551,"date":"2025-08-23T05:19:05","date_gmt":"2025-08-23T05:19:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/?p=1551"},"modified":"2025-08-23T05:19:05","modified_gmt":"2025-08-23T05:19:05","slug":"hegseth-fires-defense-intelligence-agency-head-navy-leaders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/?p=1551","title":{"rendered":"Hegseth fires Defense Intelligence Agency head, Navy leaders"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><i>Editor\u2019s note: This report has been updated with additional reporting by The Associated Press.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has fired a general whose agency\u2019s\u00a0initial intelligence assessment\u00a0of U.S. damage to Iranian nuclear sites angered\u00a0President Donald Trump, according to two people familiar with the decision and a White House official.<\/p>\n<p>Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Kruse will no longer serve as head of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, according to the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly.<\/p>\n<div class=\"twitter-tweet-wrapper\" data-embed-anchor=\"3b3081d1-e69a-5fab-b942-a17a7e2b2d4a\">\n<div class=\"twitter-tweet twitter-tweet-rendered caas-loaded\" data-caas-lazy-loading-init=\"1\"><iframe id=\"twitter-widget-1\" class=\"\" title=\"X Post\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/embed\/Tweet.html?dnt=true&amp;embedId=twitter-widget-1&amp;features=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%3D%3D&amp;frame=false&amp;hideCard=false&amp;hideThread=false&amp;id=1958982563252642290&amp;lang=en&amp;origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.yahoo.com%2Fnews%2Farticles%2Fhegseth-fires-head-defense-intelligence-201802601.html&amp;sessionId=d3742bae4a2237e72c6011a6263fa477516abcc8&amp;siteScreenName=YahooNews&amp;theme=light&amp;widgetsVersion=2615f7e52b7e0%3A1702314776716&amp;width=550px\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-tweet-id=\"1958982563252642290\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Hegseth also fired Vice Adm. Nancy Lacore, who is chief of the Navy Reserve, as well as Rear Adm. Milton Sands, a Navy SEAL officer who oversees Naval Special Warfare Command, another U.S. official said.<\/p>\n<p>The reasons for their firings, the latest in a series targeting military leaders, were not clear Friday.<\/p>\n<p>The Trump administration increasingly has moved against both the military leadership and the intelligence community. Some current and former national security officials saw their\u00a0security clearances revoked\u00a0this week in a tactic that the administration has used against perceived foes.<\/p>\n<p>Critics say the administration\u2019s actions could chill dissent and send a signal that the intelligence community should be careful in reaching conclusions at odds with Trump\u2019s interests.<\/p>\n<p>Kruse\u2019s firing comes a few months after details of a preliminary assessment of U.S. airstrikes against Iran leaked to the media. It found that Iran\u2019s nuclear program has been set back only a few months, contradicting assertions from Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.<\/p>\n<p>The Republican president, who had pronounced the Iranian program \u201ccompletely and fully obliterated,\u201d rejected the report. His oft-repeated criticism of the DIA analysis built on his long-running distrust of intelligence assessments, including one published in 2017 that said Russia interfered on his behalf in the 2016 election.<\/p>\n<p>The Office of the Director of National Intelligence \u2014 which is responsible for coordinating the work of 18 intelligence agencies, including the Defense Intelligence Agency \u2014 has been\u00a0declassifying years-old documents\u00a0meant to cast doubt on those previous findings.<\/p>\n<p>Following the June strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites,\u00a0Hegseth lambasted the press\u00a0for focusing on the preliminary assessment but did not offer any direct evidence of the destruction of Iranian nuclear production facilities.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou want to call it destroyed, you want to call it defeated, you want to call it obliterated \u2014 choose your word. This was a historically successful attack,\u201d Hegseth said then in a news conference.<\/p>\n<p>While the Pentagon has offered no details on the firings, Democrats in Congress have raised alarm over the precedent Kruse\u2019s ouster sets for the intelligence community.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe firing of yet another senior national security official underscores the Trump administration\u2019s dangerous habit of treating intelligence as a loyalty test rather than a safeguard for our country,\u201d said Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.<\/p>\n<p>Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, called on the administration to show why Kruse was fired or \u201cotherwise, we can only assume that this is another politically motivated decision intended to create an atmosphere of fear\u201d within the intelligence community.<\/p>\n<p>Trump has a history of removing government officials\u00a0whose data and analysis he disagrees with. Earlier this month, after a lousy jobs report, he fired the official in charge of the data. His administration also has stopped\u00a0posting reports on climate change,\u00a0canceled studies on vaccine access\u00a0and removed\u00a0data on gender identity\u00a0from government sites.<\/p>\n<p>The new firings culminate a week of broad Trump administration changes to the intelligence community and new shake-ups to military leadership.<\/p>\n<p>The Office of the Director of National Intelligence announced this week that it would\u00a0slash its staff and budget. The Pentagon also said the Air Force\u2019s top uniformed officer, Gen. David Allvin,\u00a0planned to retire\u00a0two years early.<\/p>\n<p>Hegseth and Trump have been aggressive in dismissing top military officials, often without formal explanation.<\/p>\n<p>The administration has\u00a0fired Air Force Gen. CQ Brown Jr.\u00a0as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as well as the Navy\u2019s top officer, the Air Force\u2019s second highest-ranking officer, and the top lawyers for three military service branches.<\/p>\n<p>In April, Hegseth\u00a0fired Gen. Tim Haugh\u00a0as head of the National Security Agency and Vice Adm.\u00a0Shoshana Chatfield, who was a senior official at NATO.<\/p>\n<p>No public explanations have been offered by the Pentagon for any of these firings, though some of the officers were believed by the administration to endorse diversity, equity and inclusion programs.<\/p>\n<p>The ouster of Kruse, Lacore and Sands was reported earlier by The Washington Post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Editor\u2019s note: This report has been updated with additional reporting by The Associated Press. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1552,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-us"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1551"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1551\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1553,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1551\/revisions\/1553"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1552"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}