By @Cynical Publius, retired Army Colonel
An emerging issue amidst the Trump 47 administration is the wisdom of active duty military officers and enlisted stating their views on social media about political and military issues. Is this wise?
The answer is, I think: “IT DEPENDS.”
Personally, I would prefer a world where active duty military silently did their duty and followed the lawful orders of their chain of command in the same manner as if they had issued such orders themselves, without commentary.
That would be a perfect world. But the world is not perfect, and it never will be.
To understand this, let’s take a step back and examine the social media age since 2004 or so.
The idea of active duty military opining publicly on politics did not start with Trump 47. No, it’s been with us for years and years and years, it’s just that no one in the Democrat/Media Complex saw things as being “political” until Trump took office.
For years prior we were treated to active duty flag officers spouting wholly political slogans like “Diversity is Our Strength.” We had leaders across the ranks embracing highly politicized transgender ideologies. We politicized those high ranks so heavily that former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, GEN (Ret.) Mark Milley felt comfortable telling his counterparts in the Chinese Communist Party that he would alert them in advance of President Trump’s military decisions.
This of course did not end with high-ranking officers—almost every installation, almost every unit, almost every public affairs office, almost every leader was quite comfortable publicly embracing the wholly political dogmas of DEI, on social media, in the legacy media, and in their private conversations.
Politics were the norm in uniform, so long as those politics supported DEI and similarly “woke” concepts. (Did you ever stop to consider that every “month” our uniformed military was required to “celebrate” was just so much deconstructive, polarizing party propaganda pushed by zampolit officers and NCOs?)
This was never tagged as being “political” because it represented agreement with the policies of the then-President and his ruling party, and the Democrat/Media Complex saw nothing wrong with those in uniform supporting the propaganda concepts of the day, because the D/M Complex AGREED with those concepts.
Then the American people elected Donald Trump to transform the U.S. military back into a non-political, warfighting force committed to the Constitution and the American people first and foremost.
To accomplish this, Pete Hegseth and his team needed to unravel DECADES of politicization in the ranks. However, Hegseth and other high-ranking political appointees need the help of the rank and file to support these depoliticization efforts.
Enter soldiers like InfantryDort and Raise the Black, active duty officers who vocally support the transformational efforts of Hegseth’s team in restoring our military’s focus on warfighting.
I follow both accounts closely (and others), and all they ever do is voice approval of their chain of command’s efforts to depoliticize the ranks and instead focus on being the world’s most lethal and effective fighting force.
They also set the record straight with respect to media naysayers and MILBLOGDORKs who lie about what is transpiring (witness today’s article from The Atlantic alleging that judging troops based on their abilities is somehow discriminatory).
Men and women like Dort and Black are not dabbling in politics. Instead, they are simply supporting their commander’s intent in a way that fends off lies and propaganda, and keeps the military focused on its core mission of closing with and destroying our enemies.
To go back to the start of this short article, I wish this was not so. I wish we did not NEED active duty military to speak up apolitically for what is right and just. I wish. But the simple fact is that over the past twenty years the U.S. military has become so overtly political that it NEEDS a period of cleansing to restore it to its just, apolitical baseline.
Think of it like chemotherapy—sometimes you have to engage in things you would rather not engage in so the cancer can be cut out.
Defending your chain of command in its effort to depoliticize the ranks is not “politics”; instead, it’s a cleansing of politics from where it should not be.
(And BTW, an active duty military member publicly speaking out in FAVOR of his/her chain of command is NOT THE SAME THING as an active duty military member publicly RIDICULING his/her chain of command; I’m not sure why this is so hard to follow for some people.)
I hate politicization in the ranks. But vocally depoliticizing the ranks is a necessary antidote after years and years of deeply politicized leaders in uniform.
That antidote? It’s not just Hegseth. It’s the brave men and women in uniform who saw what evils politicization wreaked during the earlier years of their careers, and now they fulfill their Constitutional oaths (in a manner wholly consistent with existing military service social media policies BTW) by speaking out against politicization on social media.
Maybe at some point in the future we can restore balance in the ranks to where it once was—where you could go years and never know the politics of the guy or gal in the fighting position next to you. But we’re not there yet, so in the meantime the depoliticization effort must be vocal and strong, and we all owe a debt of gratitude to those in the ranks who stand in the fire of social media to defend what is right.
— Cynical Publius (@CynicalPublius) May 3, 2026
My article below stirred up a lot of angst amongst the usual suspects.
One of the craziest and most disingenuous arguments against what I wrote goes something like this:
“U.S. military officers are smart enough, open-minded enough and well educated enough to have a meaningful… https://t.co/IEMROTChXI
— Cynical Publius (@CynicalPublius) May 7, 2026
FULL TEXT:
My article below stirred up a lot of angst amongst the usual suspects.
One of the craziest and most disingenuous arguments against what I wrote goes something like this:
“U.S. military officers are smart enough, open-minded enough and well educated enough to have a meaningful debate on DEI and its applicability to the military, and it is pure, inappropriate politics to just say DEI is wrong and no longer acceptable.”
Bullcrap.
For two decades (at least) the U.S. military had been fed the lies of DEI and expected to accept them WITHOUT QUESTION OR HESITATION. Challenging DEI while wearing a uniform was a certain path to charges of “racism” and “bigotry” and a GUARANTEED path to “do not promote” on an efficiency report.
We were fed the lies of DEI the same way Soviet commissars fed the lies of Marxism to Red Army soldiers, and we were just supposed to take those lies good and hard, and never speak out.
That’s not “open-minded discussion.” That shoving evil political orthodoxies down our throats.
So to undo this, we don’t suddenly get to have “discussions” about the wisdom of DEI. Nope. Nope. Nope. We PURGE IT as the cancer it is, and we purge it in the exact same authoritative way it was shoved down our throats.
Once the hate, racism, sexism and unconstitutional quest for “equity” of DEI is purged from the military, only then can we restore an apolitical baseline where “open dialogue” among “mature professionals” is possible.
That’s the fact, Jack.
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