President Donald Trump on Tuesday proposed using American cities as training grounds for the armed forces and spoke of needing U.S. military might to combat what he called the “invasion from within.”
Addressing an audience of military brass abruptly summoned to Virginia, Trump outlined a muscular and at times norm-shattering view of the military’s role in domestic affairs. He was joined by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who declared an end to “woke” culture and announced new directives for troops that include “gender-neutral” or “male-level” standards for physical fitness.
The dual messages underscored the Trump administration’s efforts not only to reshape contemporary Pentagon culture but to enlist military resources for the president’s priorities and decidedly domestic purposes, including quelling unrest and violent crime.
“We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military,” Trump said. He noted at another point: “We’re under invasion from within. No different than a foreign enemy but more difficult in many ways because they don’t wear uniforms.”
Hegseth called hundreds of military leaders and their top advisers from around the world to the Marine Corps base in Quantico without publicly revealing the reason. His address largely focused on long-used talking points that painted a picture of a military that has been hamstrung by “woke” policies, and he said military leaders should “do the honorable thing and resign” if they don’t like his new approach.
