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The Senate confirmed former Army Lt. Col. Mark Esper as Secretary of Defense Tuesday, making him the first permanent Pentagon boss since James Mattis resigned last December. Esper, who served 10 years on active duty and 11 years in the National Guard and Army Reserve, was Acting Secretary before his nomination, and Patrick Shanahan had been Acting Secretary prior to that. The vote was not close, with the Senate confirming Esper by a vote of 90-8. The no votes included 2020 Democratic presidential candidates Cory Booker, Kirsten Gillibrand, Kamala Harris, Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren.

Trump to Nominate Mark Esper as SecDef, Ryan McCarthy as Army Secretary Military.com | By Hope Hodge Seck After allowing Patrick Shanahan to serve as acting defense secretary for 168 days without a nomination to the post, President Donald Trump is moving to nominate his replacement before he even arrives in the role. On Friday evening, Trump announced his intent to nominate Army Secretary Mark Esper for secretary of defense. Esper was set to step up as acting defense secretary Monday after Trump announced earlier this week that Shanahan would not continue to pursue nomination, following reports of an FBI...

Trump Withdraws Patrick Shanahan from Consideration for SECDEF Job By: Ben Werner June 18, 2019 1:23 PM • Updated: June 18, 2019 2:13 PM Acting U.S. Secretary of Defense Patrick M. Shanahan meets with Portuguese Minister of Defense João Titternigton Gomes Cravinho at the Pentagon, Washington, D.C. on June 14, 2019. DoD Photo This post has been updated with a statement from Patrick Shanahan said. Patrick Shanahan is stepping down as acting U.S. defense secretary and is no longer in contention to lead the Pentagon, according to a series of Tuesday tweets from President Trump. Instead, Secretary of the Army...

President Donald Trump plans to nominate acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan to formally take over the top spot at the Pentagon, the president's spokeswoman said Thursday. Shanahan, a former longtime executive at the aerospace giant Boeing, needs Senate confirmation for the post most recently held by James Mattis. "Acting Secretary Shanahan has proven over the last several months that he is beyond qualified to lead the Department of Defense, and he will continue to do an excellent job," White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders wrote on Twitter.

A close adviser to ex-Defense Secretary James Mattis has written a "sometimes shocking" book detailing the "complicated relationship" between Mattis and President Donald Trump, and describing how Mattis worked to block some of Trump's proposals, according to a press release obtained by NBC News ahead of the book's official distribution. Written by the secretary's former communications director, retired Navy Cmdr. Guy "Bus" Snodgrass, "Holding the Line: Inside the Pentagon With General Mattis" is scheduled for publication by Sentinel in October. The press release describes the book as "an insider's sometimes shocking account of how Defense Secretary James Mattis led the...

The Trump administration is considering Jim Webb, a former Democratic senator and Reagan-era secretary of the Navy, to be the next defense secretary, according to three officials, potentially bypassing more hawkish Republicans whose names have been floated to replace Jim Mattis. Mr. Webb, an outspoken opponent of the Iraq war, is being considered as President Trump seeks to carry out campaign promises to withdraw American troops from Syria and Afghanistan. Those two decisions prompted Mr. Mattis to resign late last month, putting the deputy defense secretary, Patrick M. Shanahan, a former Boeing executive, in the top role in an acting...

Defense Secretary James Mattis said U.S. forces are using "annihilation tactics" in their fight against the Islamic State. "We have already shifted from attrition tactics where we shove them from one position to another in Iraq and Syria to annihilation tactics where we surround them," Mattis said on CBS' ‘Face the Nation.' "Our intention is that the foreign fighters do not survive the fight to return home to north Africa, to Europe, to America, to Asia, to Africa, we are not going to allow them to do so. We are going to stop them there and take apart the caliphate."...

The Pentagon wants the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to repeal, modify or clarify nearly two dozen regulations that create extra layers of red tape and compliance for military operations. EPA has been accepting public comments since April on which regulations should be rescinded or modified. The Department of Defense was quick to submit a draft memo to EPA in April detailing 22 regulations they want to see repealed or change. In one instance, the Pentagon asked the EPA to modify a regulation on hazardous emissions from internal combustion engines. That rule requires military maintenance crews to change engine oil and...

Dear General Mattis, I know you’ve been busy sir. Across the globe, our enemies are stacking up against us. The Pentagon is the virtual three alarm fire brigade, attempting to put out every conflagration caused by the Obama administration’s disastrous national security policies. Eight years of worthless, feckless US leadership and budget cuts have severely weakened the US armed forces. While in our history, the US military has been gutted by Congress, then rebuilt, to fight another day, the military has never been a vast social experiment as it is now. This is something that apparently you have not focused...

The White House is considering granting the Pentagon more authority to launch time-sensitive anti-terrorism operations, which would give Defense Secretary James Mattis a freer hand to authorize raids against the Islamic State. President Donald Trump has indicated he wants Mattis to have the ability to launch raids quickly without necessarily needing White House approval as part of the administration's effort to fight ISIS, the Daily Beast reported Wednesday, citing U.S. officials. This policy change would be a stark contrast to the approach of Trump's predecessor, former President Barack Obama, who insisted on reviewing each anti-terrorism raid regardless of its time...

Retired Marine Gen. James Mattis was approved on Wednesday by the Senate Committee on Armed Services to serve as secretary of defense in Donald Trump’s administration. Mattis sailed through the committee, which voted 26-1 for him to lead the Pentagon. Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.) was the only member of the Senate panel to vote against the retired four-star general, who enjoys bipartisan support to head the Defense Department under President-elect Trump. Gillibrand has previously said she would oppose confirming Mattis because he only retired from the Marine Corps in 2013, while federal law requires a seven-year break between military...

Groups that advocate for LGBT troops were said they were assuaged by retired Gen. James Mattis’ Thursday testimony suggesting he won’t roll back rules set by the Obama administration allowing such service members to serve openly. “We are heartened by Gen. Mattis’ stated commitment during his testimony not to reverse the profound progress we have made in ensuring LGBT service members and their families are able to serve our nation with pride,” American Military Partner Association President Ashley Broadway-Mack and OutServe-SLDN Executive Director Matt Thorn said in a joint statement. Defense Secretary Ash Carter lifted the ban on transgender troops...

Epic General James “Mad Dog” Mattis moment during Defense Secretary confirmation hearing: Senator Gillibrand: “Do you believe that allowing LGBT Americans to serve in the military or women in combat is undermining our lethality?” General Mattis: “Frankly, senator, I’ve never cared much about two consenting adults and who they go to bed with.”

The Senate Armed Services Committee passed the waiver on Thursday that will allow retired Gen. James Mattis to serve as defense secretary so soon after leaving the Marine Corps, sending it to the full Senate for approval. The vote was 24-3. Democratic Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand, Richard Blumenthal and Elizabeth Warren all voted against the waiver. The committee approved the exemption following a wide-ranging confirmation hearing where Mattis fielded questions about threats facing the country, acquisition programs and how his time in uniform will affect his role as the department's top civilian. The law requires an officer to be out of...

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/james-mattis-confirmation-hearing-for-defense-secretary-live-blog/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tojLETR_leM

There’s been a fair amount of Trump-supporter braggadocio regarding the President-elect’s nomination of Gen. James “Mad Dog” Mattis as the new Defense Secretary – an admirable choice, certainly. If Mad Dog can navigate the machinations of the Pentagon as well as he did the battlefield we’re in for a rejuvenation of America’s military that should be a major reversal of its downward fortunes over the past few decades. I hope that Mr. Trump fully appreciates the magnitude of the task he has set before Gen. Mattis. That task that has grown steadily in size and complexity since the end of...

Rep. Tammy Duckworth worries her congressional colleagues don’t fully appreciate the importance of a civilian-run military. As a combat-wounded Iraq War veteran and incoming Illinois senator, she finds that troubling. “I believe so strongly that the military is subservient to civilian leaders,” she said Wednesday. “I went to fight in a war I didn’t believe​ was one we should be engaged in, but the president and Congress believed it was the right thing to do. So I’m proud of that. I would go back. “Every part of my being as a former military officer says what (Congress is) doing now...

President-elect Donald Trump's transition team at the Pentagon is looking into loosening the rules of engagement for troops fighting overseas, according to a report. The Trump team has asked for a list of restrictions, limitations and other "rules of engagement" on U.S. troops operating overseas, according to an NPR report. That includes rules on how close U.S. special operators can get to the fight in Iraq and Syria and who they can target on the battlefield and how. Trump often blasted the rules of engagement during the campaign trail, arguing they were too favorable to the Islamic State in Iraq...

President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of defense called the 2003 invasion of Iraq a “mistake,” according to a recording obtained by The Intercept. “Ladies and gentlemen,” Mattis said, “we will probably look back on the invasion of Iraq as a mistake — as a strategic mistake.” Mattis was one of the Iraq campaign’s most important ground commanders. He led the 1st Marine Division during the invasion and later oversaw the bloody retaking of Fallujah from insurgents in 2004. As for the Pentagon’s view on the Iraq invasion at the time, Mattis said this: “I think people were pretty much...