Pete Hegseth, the United States Secretary of Defense, spent his Monday night body-shaming what he believed to be Canadian soldiers. They were teenagers at a summer camp. The post is still up.
What He Actually Did
On Monday night, Hegseth posted a photograph on X of two people in Canadian military uniforms, captioning it 'this is real' — a dig at Canada's armed forces in the middle of the Trump administration's ongoing trade war with its northern neighbor. The implication was clear: look at these people, look at how pathetic they are, look at Canada.
The problem, as The Guardian reports, is that the photograph came from an Instagram post by the Vernon Cadet Training Centre in British Columbia. It was from a summer camp held in July for teenagers learning life skills on a military base. The person whose body Hegseth decided to mock is likely a volunteer instructor. The girl receiving the medal in the photo is no older than eighteen years old.
So to recap the situation: the civilian head of the most powerful military apparatus in human history opened his phone and decided to punch down at a kid in a cadet uniform. That's where we are. That's Tuesday now.
Canada, Understandably, Was Not Thrilled
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney called the post 'beneath the office' of the Secretary of Defense. That is a very diplomatic way of saying what most people were thinking. Carney, responding to a full week of provocations from Washington that included Donald Trump attempting to rename Lake Ontario by executive order, told reporters it was time for the US to 'start being serious.'
'When the Americans stop doing memes, stop throwing shade, stop trying to be tough and start being serious about having those discussions, we can have those discussions,' Carney said. British Columbia Premier David Eby was less measured, calling it 'amateur-hour, distracted, bizarre leadership.'
The civilian Army Cadet League of Canada released a formal statement accusing Hegseth of online harassment. 'Directing derogatory commentary toward youth who are actively working to better themselves and serve their communities is unacceptable,' the group said. That sentence should not have needed to be written. And yet.
Even Republicans Think This Is Embarrassing
Former Republican congressman and military veteran Adam Kinzinger posted on X with the kind of energy that comes from someone who has genuinely had enough. 'Literally they're kids. This is a cadet program and our ass hat of a Secdef is making fun of children,' he wrote. 'MAGA males are betas who have to punch down to feel big.'
Democratic Senator Ruben Gallego, a former Marine, called the post 'stupid' and 'disrespectful.' Canadian veteran Danny O'Regan wrote on X: 'Don't be a Pete.' That phrase deserves to enter the language permanently.
The Pentagon's response to all of this, delivered by deputy press secretary Jacob Bliss on Tuesday, was: 'The X post speaks for itself.' Which is one of those sentences that is technically true in a way the speaker did not intend.
The Man Who Calls His Own Troops Fat
It is worth spending a moment with the specific grotesquerie of Pete Hegseth being the person doing this. As The Guardian notes, Hegseth told senior commanders in Virginia last year that 'fat troops are tiring to look at.' He stood in front of military leadership and said, out loud, 'It's tiring to look out at combat formations, or really any formation, and see fat troops.'
So the man who runs the US military on a philosophy of body-shaming his own soldiers decided to extend that philosophy internationally to Canadian teenagers at a summer program. The ideology is at least consistent. The judgment is catastrophic.
This is also the same week that US Army Chief Dan Driscoll resigned after reported months of clashes with Hegseth, Democrats have accused him of having 'hollowed out' the military's senior ranks, and the Associated Press reported a 'beyond critical' shortage of missile interceptors amid the ongoing Iran conflict. But sure. The cadet post was how he chose to spend his time.
The Broader Context Is Actually Worse
Hegseth's post did not happen in a vacuum. It was part of what multiple officials and commentators have described to The Guardian as a Trump administration 'bullying campaign' against Canada amid the trade war. Trump renaming Lake Ontario. Hegseth mocking cadets. The pressure campaign against a democratic ally and neighbor that shares the longest undefended border on earth.
Iran, meanwhile, accused the US of a 'war crime' after five people were killed, including a four-year-old child, in a reported missile strike on a wedding. The Pentagon is stretched dangerously thin on interceptor munitions. NATO allies are reportedly anxious about their vulnerability to Russian military action. These are the actual problems sitting on Pete Hegseth's desk.
He posted a photo of a teenager at summer camp and called it 'this is real.' The post is still up.
The Dingo Take
You are supposed to believe this man is a serious steward of American military power. Pete Hegseth, who cannot get through a confirmation hearing without scandal, who has reportedly driven out his own Army chief, who is presiding over a missile shortage that has NATO losing sleep, spent his Monday night scrolling Canadian Instagram accounts looking for something to mock. He found a cadet program. He posted it. He called it 'this is real.' The Pentagon said the post 'speaks for itself.' They are correct, though not in the way they meant.
The cruelty here is not incidental. It is the point. The entire posture of this administration toward Canada, an ally, a neighbor, a country that has fought beside American soldiers in every major conflict of the last century, is contempt dressed up as strength. It is not strength. Kinzinger had the right word for it: beta. The guy who actually can't bench press the weight of his own responsibilities needs to make a teenager feel small to feel big.
Hegseth built his entire public persona on the idea that the American military had gone soft, that it needed to get back to toughness, that warriors had been replaced by bureaucrats. And then he logged on and body-shamed a kid at summer camp while his department ran out of missiles. The post speaks for itself. Everything about this administration speaks for itself. Nobody's listening.
Comments