Would be … monumentally stupid

Naïveté, stupidity, arrogance … or bullsh*t. Your point on officer corps political illiteracy is right on, but this sounds to me like service-standard cya. Self-interested dishonesty is contagious - especially when modeled from above

No, much worse in fact. Particularly perhaps when one considers the specific base/units/leaders involved & potential role those formations might play in a domestic employment scenario. Elements of 82nd were once staged outside DC for Lafayette Square

To your credit you’ve been warning about this for a long time. Recall a War on the Rocks podcast panel ~6 yrs ago where you were the only guest who seemed appropriately alarmed at the direction we were already traveling…

Similar thought - did a double take when I saw the grenade launcher

Yeah, this is a particularly bad - and I suspect premature - take from the Economist. Ignores actions already taken & those yet to come. None of the past proposals involved setting a blatant predicate for broad political purge. And Tillerson’s “reforms” were universally understood to be disastrous

Agree. People comforted by idea soldiers may disobey an unlawful order assume illegality is somehow self-evident - all the ink spilt on this subject suggests otherwise. SCOTUS deference & stretched war powers have only exacerbated the problem. Force vs (insert country) sounds like POTUS prerogative

There’s an obvious reason to pluck someone obscure & under-qualified from retirement - to ignore that context seems unwise. The dilemma is 1) Trump demands personal loyalty over patriotic duty, and 2) anyone with sound judgement & personal integrity would recognize this fact & decline the job

Re: fewer civilian faculty - so astoundingly stupid & self-defeating. We don’t know each other but very sorry for your situation, Brad. Best of luck with the dissertation & defense

Yup

- > due to administrative deference, executive privilege, separation of powers, etc. court declines to test or further interrogate fabricated motive

- or -

- > subject action is reversed briefly until admin minimally adjusts executive direction to fit the false predicate

-> govt fabricates post-facto a superficially legitimate rationale that (often barely) meets legal threshold and/or invokes (often implausible) national security justification

Agreed. Not sensing much real appetite for a showdown. Expect repeat of tired pattern established early in Trump 1.0:

-> administration loudly telegraphs true motive in social media & public comms

-> suit is brought vs actions that are plainly illegal

What remains or is reinstated by court order can be strangled again in a variety of legal-ish ways over the course of the next 4 yrs. As for re-hiring, put yourself in these people’s position - would you go back to work for an organization under this new leadership? If so, how would your behave?

Suspect they are betting (correctly in my judgement) that court reversals, even if upheld on appeal, will be largely ineffective. Even were the admin to be compelled to reopen USAID, USIP, etc. those agencies will be de facto destroyed

Ditto. I actually think being an Americanist puts one at a disadvantage in recognizing what’s going on here - there’s a conditioned tendency to view events thru the lens of normal politics. Comparative political scientists are better prepared. Saw something similar with civ-mil scholars circa 2019.