Veterans Group Leader: Hegseth Misses Military Reason For Diversity
Brian Lehrer: A Daily Politics Podcast
WNYC Studios
4.4 • 663 Ratings
🗓️ 11 November 2025
⏱️ 20 minutes
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| 0:00.0 | From WNYC Studios, I'm Brian Lehrer. |
| 0:08.1 | This is my daily politics podcast. |
| 0:10.7 | It's Tuesday, November 11th. |
| 0:15.1 | Today is Veterans Day. |
| 0:16.8 | Thank you for your service. |
| 0:18.2 | Any vets or active duty military personnel listening right now? |
| 0:21.9 | And we want to invite any veterans listening right now to say what you think of the changes |
| 0:26.9 | that President Trump and Secretary Pete Hegeseth are bringing to the United States military. |
| 0:32.7 | We'll talk to Paul Reikoff, head of the Independent Veterans of America, |
| 0:36.7 | and previously founder of the Iraq and Afghanistan |
| 0:39.8 | Veterans of America, Paul Reikov in just a minute. But here's a clip of Hexeth first for you veterans |
| 0:48.8 | or active duty service members to react to, if you would like. One of his changes, as you know, |
| 0:55.7 | is simply changing the name of the department from the Defense Department to the Department of War. So here is Hegseff, |
| 1:01.7 | now called the Secretary of War, on that name change, speaking to military leaders at Quantico, |
| 1:07.6 | Virginia in September. We have to be prepared for war, not for defense. |
| 1:12.6 | We're training warriors, not defenders. |
| 1:14.6 | We fight wars to win, not to defend. |
| 1:16.6 | Defense is something you do all the time. |
| 1:18.6 | It's inherently reactionary and can lead to overuse, overreach, and mission creep. |
| 1:24.6 | War is something you do sparingly, on our own own terms and with clear aims. We fight to win. |
| 1:32.7 | We unleash overwhelming and punishing violence on the enemy. So it's the Department of War. |
| 1:40.6 | Veterans, do you like this better than the Department of Defense? How much do you accept or |
... |
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