Thousands of men died during the brutal Bataan Death March in the Philippines during World War II. Army Capt. Willibald Charles Bianchi was one of the soldiers who stood out as a leader and caretaker. He survived more than two years in captivity before
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Friday that "all options will be on the table" when asked by former colleagues on the "Fox & Friends" TV show whether the military is now permitted to strike within Mexico.
President Donald Trump designated cartels operating in Mexico as foreign terrorist organizations on Jan. 20 during a slew of executive orders he signed after his inauguration and amid a broader crackdown on immigration across the U.S. southern border. Last week, 1,600 active-duty troops were deployed to the border[1] after Trump declared a national emergency.
While Hegseth said that he didn't "want to get ahead of the president" and that it is ultimately Trump's decision, he reiterated some of the language in the executive order, adding that the military is "shifting toward an understanding of homeland defense on our sovereign territorial border."
"If we're dealing with what are designated to be foreign terrorist organizations who are specifically targeting Americans on our border," Hegseth said, going on to refer to the military's overall defense of the border and adding "that is something we will do and do robustly."
The idea of using the military to strike within Mexico has been floated by other Trump officials, such as "border czar" Tom Homan, who said in November that the president was "committed to calling [the cartels] terrorist organizations and using the full might of the United States special operations to take them out."
When asked whether he would send special operations[5] forces into Mexico against the cartels last week, Trump said it "could happen, stranger things have happened."
It is unclear what a military operation inside Mexico would look like, though designating cartels as foreign terrorist organizations also broadens the legal ramifications for individuals who materially support those groups, for example.
The executive order did not name any cartels specifically, but highlighted other "transnational organizations" -- or gangs -- such as Tren de Aragua and La Mara Salvatrucha, known as MS-13.
"If we could solve the problem of fentanyl with one splendidly [surgical] Israeli-style 1967 surprise attack on 20 drug labs in Mexico and elsewhere, with or without the permission of those governments, that would be an interesting idea," Michael O'Hanlon, the director of research in the Foreign Policy Program at the Brookings Institution, said when asked about potential military operations in Mexico during an episode of Military.com's Fire Watch podcast[6] earlier this month.
After Trump signed the executive order designating cartels as terrorist groups, Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum said that there needed to be close coordination between the country's two governments.
"We all want to fight the drug cartels," Sheinbaum said last week, according to The Associated Press. The U.S. "in their territory, us in our territory."
O'Hanlon also said that decision-makers should be cautious about seeing those moves as a "cakewalk," especially coming off of 20 years of war in the Middle East.
"Everything I know historically about trying to attack these kinds of targets with airpower or Special Forces[7] makes me wary that we can be successful," O'Hanlon said.
Last week, 1,600 active-duty service members from the Marine Corps[8] and Army[9] quickly mobilized to the border amid the broader Trump administration's efforts to crack down on immigration there.
The Pentagon scheduled a briefing for reporters with a senior military official and a senior Customs and Border Protection official on Friday, but canceled the event about 8 minutes after it was set to start by telling dozens of reporters that one of the experts slated to brief the press had to go to another meeting.
When asked for details and updates Friday afternoon, a spokesperson for Joint Task Force-North referred Military.com to U.S. Northern Command, which said that there had been no increase in the number of troops deployed to the border since last week.
The 82nd Airborne is the unit typically used to quickly respond to major military crises that threaten U.S. troops, citizens or allies abroad, while the 10th Mountain Division out of Fort Drum[11] in New York was being considered as a headquarters element for the overall response at the border.
A Marine Corps official said there was "no real change for the Marine Corps' portion" of the mission, adding that they were still doing barrier construction and repairs. Officials from the Army did not respond by deadline.
The troops deployed to the border are charged with repairing and emplacing barriers, as well as supporting "enhanced detection and monitoring efforts," a spokesperson for Northern Command said earlier this week.
They added that troops "do not engage in interdiction or law enforcement activities."
On Friday, Morales said that those enhanced detection and monitoring measures included using light rotary-wing assets such as UH-72 Lakota[12] helicopters for aerial reconnaissance and Customs and Border Protection-owned static and mobile surveillance cameras.
She referred Military.com to the Pentagon when asked whether Northern Command was preparing options for operations within Mexico.
Meanwhile, Navy[13] officials confirmed the service had begun to participate in the border mission Thursday when two different air wings, one out of Jacksonville, Florida, and the other out of Whidbey Island[14], Washington, contributed P-8 Poseidon[15] maritime patrol aircraft to help with intelligence and surveillance efforts.
Lt. Cmdr. Lauren Chatmas, a spokeswoman for the service, wouldn't say how long the Navy planned to have its planes supporting the mission, but she noted that they are not being transferred to the area.
"They're going to remain [operating] out of their home bases; they're not going to leave and be stationed down close to the border," she said.
The Pentagon quietly reversed a policy that provided reimbursement for service members who needed to travel far from where they are based in order to get reproductive health care, including abortions.
Without any public announcement, the Pentagon's travel regulations were updated this week to remove the language allowing service members to get travel and transportation allowances for travel related to reproductive health care.
The change was publicly revealed Thursday evening by advocacy groups and Democratic lawmakers, who highlighted that the updated policy was posted online[1]. A defense official confirmed Friday the travel regulations were updated earlier in the week, but provided no additional comment.
The travel reimbursement policy was put in place by the Biden administration in response to the 2022 Supreme Court ruling that allowed states to ban abortion.
Since service members are not able to choose where they are stationed and some of the biggest bases are in states that have banned or severely restricted abortion since the Supreme Court ruling, the Biden administration argued that making it easier for service members to travel for reproductive health care was imperative to ensuring women join and stay in the military.
While the abortion aspect of the Pentagon policy garnered the most attention, the policy allowed for travel allowances for a range of reproductive health care that is not provided by the military, including fertility treatments.
The entire policy has now been repealed -- meaning both fertility treatment-related travel and abortion-related travel are no longer eligible for reimbursement.
"This decision strips away service members' ability to access the reproductive care they need, which is nothing short of abhorrent," 19 Senate Democrats, including every Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a joint statement Thursday night. "It runs contrary to a core goal of the Department of Defense -- to ensure the health and wellbeing of all our service members so that our force remains ready at all times to protect Americans and keep this nation safe."
The Pentagon's reversal comes after President Donald Trump signed an executive order last week titled "Enforcing the Hyde Amendment" that demanded agencies "end the forced use of federal taxpayer dollars to fund or promote elective abortion." The memo from the Defense Travel Management Office cites Trump's executive order as the reason the travel reimbursement policy was repealed.
The Hyde amendment is a rider in annual spending bills passed by Congress that prevents certain federal funds from being used for abortion, except in cases of rape, incest or where the mother's life is in danger from the pregnancy. The Biden administration maintained the Pentagon travel reimbursement policy did not violate the Hyde amendment since the funding wasn't being directly used for abortions.
The policy, which required service members to submit a doctor's note certifying the travel was for reproductive health care, was rarely used in its two years of existence.
As of March 2024, the first and last time the Pentagon provided data on the policy, it had been used 12 times[3] and cost the department $44,791. The Pentagon did not track how many service members used the policy or the type of health care they received -- meaning it is impossible to know whether, for example, a couple of service members used the policy several times for fertility treatments that require multiple doctor visits or a dozen service members used the policy one time each to get abortions.
Perhaps the biggest effect of the policy was that it spurred Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., to launch an 11-month blockade against senior military promotions that caused chaos[4] and vacancies up and down the chain of command.
Tuberville eventually relented on his blockade[5] without winning any concessions from the Biden administration after some Republican senators appeared ready to side with Democrats to circumvent Tuberville to approve the stalled military promotions.
On Friday, Tuberville took a victory lap.
"I took a lot of heat when I stood alone for nearly a year in holding senior Pentagon promotions over this -- but as of today, it was all worth it," he said in a statement. "Thank God common sense has been restored to our military under President Trump's leadership."
While the Pentagon has not offered detailed comments on the repeal of the policy, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth responded to Tuberville on social media, telling him, "Thank you for your leadership, Coach."
President Donald Trump's unconventional pick for Army[1] secretary, Dan Driscoll, appeared poised for a smooth confirmation after a Senate hearing Thursday with little Democrat pushback.
Driscoll's hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee stayed far away from culture war issues, including so-called "diversity, equity and inclusion" battles that have defined the early days of Trump's second term and roiled the Pentagon. The phrase "DEI" wasn't mentioned once.
Driscoll, a little-known financier and Iraq War veteran, faced only mild questioning from lawmakers, despite lacking traditional qualifications for the role. He arrived at the hearing as a political blank slate[2] -- an advantage that stood in sharp contrast to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, whose confirmation was marred by allegations of sexual assault, alcohol abuse and marital infidelity.
When asked about how the Army promotes individuals, a perfect tee up for Driscoll to delve into culture war issues, he instead took issue with what he described as the service's bias toward how long a service member has been in a role. Traditionally, promotions are heavily weighted around that time in a specific role, in lieu of their qualifications.
"It's often the best woman or man for the job," Driscoll said, comparing how the private sector promotes versus the Army. "Time in a specific role is less correlated with a promotion. I think the Army can take a similar view."
He added that he agrees the service has an overall merit-based system.
However, some Democrats focused on Driscoll’s seeming lack of knowledge of the Army.
"To be candid, you performed very poorly in your conversation with me," said Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., noting that Driscoll seemed not to know how large a division is or where the Army is operating in Africa when he met with lawmakers privately last week.
The mellow tone Driscoll had in his hearing and total absence of red meat for the Republican base signaled to some defense officials interviewed that he may be a cooler head than some other Trump appointees, while still lacking many of the basic qualifications for the role.
Additionally, during his unsuccessful 2020 bid for North Carolina's 11th Congressional District, the few media engagements Driscoll did and his ads steered clear of any overtly far-right rhetoric or culture issues. He lost that race to Madison Cawthorn, a firebrand whose single term was marred by scandal.
"He certainly isn't a culture warrior; this might be a breath of fresh air," one senior Pentagon official told Military.com on the condition of anonymity to avoid retaliation. "At the same time, he only appeared to have a very surface-level understanding of the Army."
Hegseth's key initiative has been going after diversity initiatives in the Pentagon, falsely saying during his confirmation hearing there are "quotas" to fill when it comes to promotions and positions. Gender and race are not metrics taken into consideration.
The Army, for example, makes it a point to obscure race for senior officer promotion boards. There are no policies, anywhere in the military, to fill units with specified volumes of troops from certain demographics.
Driscoll went into the hearing as an unknown figure in the Pentagon and having no background in national security. His resume includes just under four years of service as a cavalry officer with an Iraq deployment[4] with the 10th Mountain Division, leaving the service as a first lieutenant.
His position would have not exposed him to any high-level planning, and he would have never managed more than a few dozen soldiers at a time.
After his service, he went to Yale Law School, where he was classmates with Vice President J.D. Vance, whom he would later go on to advise.
Driscoll spent much of his professional career in venture capital and on the board of a medical staffing agency. His lack of experience in the military stands in stark contrast to most contemporary Army secretaries, who spent their careers in national security policy.
Thousands of men died during the brutal Bataan Death March in the Philippines during World War II. Army Capt. Willibald Charles Bianchi was one of the soldiers who stood out as a leader and caretaker. He survived more than two years in captivity before
