“Hegseth indicates some US troops could be redeployed from Europe to Western Hemisphere”, 3 October 2026 (Photo via The Hill — the original report)
As it ran on the front
You will want to know what to call the man who helps plan the next war and sells the machinery for it, and the papers have handed you a phrase: a conflict of interest. Put it down. A conflict wants two loyalties pulling opposite ways, and there are not two here. There is one interest, held in both hands.
Take the dates in order. September 3: Elon Musk's return boosts the GOP spending advantage for 2026. September 30: Hegseth appoints him to the US taskforce on the future of warfare. October 3: the founder of SpaceX, with billions of dollars in military contracts, joins several other defense industry executives on a Pentagon advisory board. Several. Not one grubby exception — several.…
…(cont) An emolument is the profit a man takes from the place he holds. Do note that the contracts came first and the place came after.
And the troops? Hegseth, on Saturday: "we're definitely expanding our presence and our footprint in Central and South America." Out of Europe, where the Pentagon claims no oil stake ... into the hemisphere where it has claimed thirty-five percent. On September 3, Middle East deployments were extended into 2027. Fifty thousand troops. Fifty thousand.
Tonight the fox counts the hens. The fox is not hungry yet.
“A guy sitting on billions in Pentagon contracts now sits on the board that decides what the Pentagon will need next, and nobody had to break a single rule to get him there — that's the part that should bother you. Same weekend, Hegseth says the footprint is expanding into Central and South America and troops come out of Europe to do it. The contracts go to the donor, the kids go south, and you get the bill for both.”
“It's an advisory board — advisory, he advises, that's not a contract, that's advice. Anyone with real expertise has clients; you want those people in the room, which is not the same as saying — did I say that? That doesn't sound like me. And the troop thing is cartels, it's drugs headed for your kids, so why is the question about a board seat?”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth indicated on Saturday that some U.S. service members could be redeployed from Europe to the Western Hemisphere as the Trump administration ramps up its deadly campaign against drug cartels in South America. “Well, we're definitely expanding our presence and our footprint in Central and South America with…
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This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.
