President-elect Donald Trump has made clear in his first few picks for Cabinet secretaries that his main selection criterion is blind loyalty—even more clearly than many had anticipated. Qualifications such as competence or experience do not matter.

One candidate, Pete Hegseth, a war veteran and Fox News host, is so unqualified — a caricature of MAGA loyalty — that some insiders say even the Senate, which swore in 53 Republicans this January, might vote not to confirm him. As leader of the Department of Defense.

The same may be true of Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s pick for director of national intelligence, far-right Democrat turned MAGA Republican (one can always hope). Explains a wide range of international developments.

Less shocking is Trump’s choice of former Texas Representative John Ratcliffe as CIA director. A slightly more unbalanced Senate would likely reject Ratcliffe out of fear he would politicize intelligence; just as Trump did at the end of his first term, when he was director of national intelligence, the office that oversees intelligence and intelligence. It coordinates 18 US intelligence agencies. But they’ll probably let Ratcliffe pass, especially if enough Republicans think they can’t stomach Hegseth or Gabbard in high office.

Other beneficiaries of political revenge include South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, who is slated to be secretary of homeland security, and New York Rep. Elise Stefanik, who is slated to be ambassador to the United Nations. Neither of them have any experience remotely related to the job they will be doing. But both were ardent supporters and defenders of Trump; Stefanik has the privilege of serving as chair of the House Republican Conference following the impeachment of Rep. Liz Cheney for criticizing Trump over the Jan. 6 riots.

Oddly enough, the candidate who appears out of nowhere is Hegseth, who is completely unknown to non-watchers. Fox and Friends WeekendWhich he has co-hosted for ten years. Trump, of course, is a regular viewer of this program, and to the surprise of his advisers, he chose Hegseth to head the Department of Defense, the nation’s largest bureaucracy with 2.8 million employees and this year’s $841 billion budget. He liked most of what the rugged-looking co-host said.

Hegseth fought in Afghanistan and Iraq, but his rank (major in the Army National Guard) wasn’t exactly a leadership position. He has written some books, especially bestsellers. War Against Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free. Here and in several Fox broadcasts, he decried the introduction of diversity requirements in the military, saying they had led to the rise of “woke generals” that had weakened the Army’s fighting spirit. He also said lowering admission requirements to allow women to join combat units had the same detrimental effect. (Many Army officers say critics like Hegseth overestimate the amount of time spent on diversity training, and that women serving in combat—in some cases in elite units like the Rangers and Green Berets—have to go through the same ordeals as men.)

The anti-woke stance may be what appeals most to Trump, who wants to fire generals who don’t show enough loyalty to him. Hegseth said he would no doubt appoint a board of like-minded retired officers to draw up a list of active officers who should be removed from duty.

On the Fox show, Hegseth also vehemently protested the prosecution of soldiers for war crimes; He even went so far as to persuade Trump to do so while he was president. forgive the two perpetrators Especially heinous murders against civilians.

But when it comes to the core duties of a defense secretary (setting a budget, evaluating weapons systems, managing inter-service competition, creating interagency policy, conducting diplomacy with foreign counterparts, etc.), Hegseth has no apparent qualifications.

Even some MAGA Republicans see the benefits of having someone with at least one expert. A little People with political acumen and organizational talent run an organization as large, complex and vital as the Department of Defense. It would take four Republican senators to reject his nomination. Some on Capitol Hill think four people could gather to vote their consciences. Otherwise, and if Hegseth is sworn in, others doubt he will last more than six months in the job. The Pentagon bureaucracy has a deep-rooted structure; He can wear out players much more agile than Hegseth.

Before Trump launches a political campaign against military officials, he may also want to review the biography of his own first-business lawyer and mentor, Roy Cohn, who began his career as an advisor to Senator Joseph McCarthy. Cohn, who died in 1986, could have told Trump that McCarthy, who rose to prominence by rooting out and prosecuting suspected communists in the government, made a big mistake by going after army officers. It was during a program broadcast on national television. Army-McCarthy hearings In 1954, Joseph Welch, a lawyer for an accused officer, retorted at the senator: “Have you no sense of decency, sir?” And that was the end not only of McCarthy’s witch hunt, but also of his career and, three years later, his binge drinking.

Hegseth probably studied some history as an undergraduate at Princeton and a graduate student at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, so he might want to ponder the takeaways from this story: Is anti-wokeism the new anti-communism? Will Hegseth be its Cohn or its McCarthy?

As for Gabbard, who was chosen to oversee and coordinate 18 US intelligence agencies, not much else needs to be said beyond that:Damn!If confirmed, she would replace Avril Haines, who was deputy CIA director and deputy national security adviser before President Joe Biden nominated her for the post, despite Gabbard’s weak resume. Haines also has degrees in law and theoretical physics.

If the Senate does not consider Gabbard’s nomination an affront to the enterprise of intelligence gathering and analysis, we are in serious trouble as a nation. At the very least, hundreds of intelligence experts can be expected to resign; This may be Trump’s intention. He wants to destroy the “administrative state,” as former strategist Steve Bannon once said. Putting Gabbard in charge of the intelligence apparatus is one way to do this.

Ratcliffe’s nomination to be CIA director is only slightly less dire. In many ways, his and Gabbard’s choices are even more appalling than Hegseth’s. Although defense secretaries are expected to carry out the president’s policies, the chief of the main intelligence agency needs to be fully independent, and Ratcliffe is anything but that.

He first came to Trump’s attention as a congressman. spoke in the harshest way against officials investigating various alleged improprieties by the then-president, most notably the Mueller commission investigating stories of Trump collusion with Russia. Trump wanted to appoint Ratcliffe as director of national intelligence until even Republican senators warned him that the Texas congressman was too partisan and inexperienced for the job. Trump nominated Dan Coats, a more moderate congressman who has provided numerous honest reports that contradict Trump’s talk about Iran, North Korea and Russia. In his final year as president, Trump fired Coats and nominated Ratcliffe; but this time he stood behind his defender. As the 2020 elections approached, Republicans who followed Trump softened. Ratcliffe was confirmed by a narrow margin of 49-44.

During his 18 months on the job, Ratcliffe used his office to confirm every fear about him. various conspiracy theoriesMany of them involve Trump’s political rivals. These included claims that Russians supported Hillary Clinton more than Trump in the 2016 elections, and that Iranians supported Trump more than Trump in the 2020 elections. servers were hacked He is a member of the pro-Trump Proud Boys militia group and sent emails to voters in three battleground states, warning them: “You will vote for Trump on Election Day or we will come after you.” In fact, other intelligence agencies concluded in 2016 that the Russians were supporting Trump, not Clinton. Even Ratcliffe was forced to admit in his report on battlefield government emails that the evidence of Iranian involvement was insufficient.

With just over a week until Trump takes over the White House, the once and future president is making good on his most chilling threats. Those who theatrically dismiss his agenda, tell us not to worry, that he didn’t mean it, or that institutional guardrails will prevent it from happening — well, we’ll see. It falls to four out of 53 senators to play the hero, and as Liz Cheney found out, playing the hero by challenging Donald Trump can end your career. Be very nervous.