'Bold changes': Pete Hegseth ousts more top Pentagon advisors amid 'wholesale' shake-up

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has dismissed members of several Pentagon advisory boards focused on defense policy and military technology, further shaking up the department during the former Fox News host’s time at the Pentagon, the Wall Street Journal reported.

In a memo outlining the removals from the Defense Policy Board, the Defense Science Board and other advisory panels, Hegseth said the Pentagon needs “fresh thinking to drive bold changes."

While it isn’t out of the ordinary for a new administration to overhaul the membership of advisory panels, “Hegseth is directing the wholesale dismissals of board members at several panels,” the Journal added.

“The panels are made up of former officials, industry executives, academics, scientists and engineers, and have long provided independent and bipartisan analysis and advice to the Defense Department,” according to the report.

The move was praised by Elon Musk, who wrote on X that “a reset was needed.” But it was still criticized by others.

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“We were thanked for our service,” Michael O’Hanlon, a Brookings Institution defense expert who served on the Defense Policy Board until Hegseth discharged him earlier this week, is quoted as saying. He dismissed the accusation that "we were somehow involved in gossip and leaking because we had no involvement with this administration as a board. We had zero interaction."

The board shakeup wasn’t an early sign that the defense secretary was scraping the boards altogether, according to a Pentagon spokesperson, who added that new members would eventually fill the departures.

“Hegseth has also replaced the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other senior officers and has ousted several top civilian aides,” the Journal reported Friday. “He did away with the Office of Net Assessment, an in-house think tank established during the Nixon administration.”

In his memo, Hegseth indicated that some dismissed advisory panel members could be reinstated following a case-by-case review, if deemed essential to the panels’ operation.