Trump Removes Defense Secretary And Installs Loyalists Atop The Pentagon During Transition He Refuses To Acknowledge, Resolving Long-Standing Concern That The Outgoing President Still Did Not Fully Control The Armed Forces

WASHINGTON. Acting decisively to address a problem that existed only in his own refusal to concede, President Trump on Monday removed Defense Secretary Mark Esper and began installing loyal appointees throughout the upper ranks of the Pentagon, finally resolving the long-standing concern that an outgoing president might still lack total control over the armed forces during the seventy-three days he had left in office.

The President announced the firing the way he announced most things, by posting it. "Mark Esper has been terminated," Mr. Trump wrote, thanking the secretary for his service in the same breath that he ended it. Officials clarified that the dismissal was effective immediately and that the Senate-confirmed Cabinet member would be replaced by Christopher C. Miller, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, who would now run the largest fighting force in human history on an acting basis and without the customary inconvenience of a confirmation hearing.

Within days, the housecleaning extended downward. The acting under secretary for policy, the under secretary for intelligence, and the secretary's chief of staff departed in quick succession, their offices reassigned to a slate of figures known principally for their personal loyalty to the President rather than for any record of running things. Among the new arrivals were officials who had previously distinguished themselves by promoting the President's preferred narratives, a qualification that observers noted had not historically been listed in the position requirements. The reorganization was completed during the precise window in which Mr. Trump was insisting, without evidence, that he had won an election he had lost.

The deposed secretary had committed the offense, months earlier, of saying out loud that he did not support invoking the Insurrection Act to deploy active-duty troops against Americans protesting in the nation's streets. Defense officials had spent the summer quietly assuring the public that the military would not be used as a domestic instrument of the President's will, a reassurance the President now appeared determined to render obsolete by personnel decision. A source within the administration described the new leadership team as "very loyal, the most loyal," and said the President wanted people at the Pentagon "who understand what he wants."

What the President wanted remained a subject of considerable nervous speculation across two political parties, several allied capitals, and the building itself, where career officers reportedly began conducting their work under the assumption that any order, however unusual, might now arrive with no one above them positioned to question it. The arrangement placed the chain of command, during a contested transition, in the hands of men selected for their willingness to agree.

At press time, the President had successfully ensured that for the remaining weeks of his term the United States military would answer to a leadership corps chosen for loyalty over experience, an outcome the nation would spend the following January devoutly hoping it did not have occasion to regret.