On “Fat Generals,” Rank, and the Comfort of Performative Toughness

It’s becoming painfully obvious that a lot of people — including some I served with — don’t actually understand how the military and its rank structure are supposed to work. That probably shouldn’t surprise me as much as it does, but here we are.

I never expected to feel compelled to write about something this basic. And yet, after watching what amounted to little more than a televised gripe session dressed up as leadership — one that repeatedly invoked the “dignity” of the U.S. military while actively undermining it — I feel the need to get this down in writing.

For anyone who missed it, on September 30, 2025, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth convened a highly publicized, rare gathering of senior military leaders at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia. Hundreds of generals and admirals — many summoned at short notice from around the world — sat in silence as Hegseth delivered what appeared, at first glance, to be an address on readiness and culture. According to Reuters, the event was extraordinary both in scale and tone.

Some of what was said wasn’t inherently illegitimate. The military is a massive institution with real challenges in training, retention, acquisition, and strategic focus. Every era has its critiques.

But one theme took on a life of its own almost immediately: the fixation on what quickly became known as “fat generals.”

During the address, Hegseth explicitly criticized the appearance of senior officers, calling the presence of “fat generals and admirals” unacceptable and damaging to the image of the military — a line that dominated coverage and commentary afterward (Reuters).

Spend five minutes in any comment section after the broadcast and you’ll see how well that landed.

Across X, Threads, TikTok, and Facebook, reactions followed a familiar pattern:

“If junior troops have to meet standards, so should generals.”
“Finally someone holding the brass accountable.”
“No more chairborne Rangers.”

It’s an emotionally satisfying argument. It feels like accountability. And it taps into long-standing resentment toward senior leadership — resentment that is sometimes justified, sometimes misplaced, and often both.

The problem is that it fundamentally misunderstands what generals are for.

The military is not a flat organization. It is not designed for everyone to do the same work, meet the same physical demands, or contribute in the same way. That isn’t a flaw. It’s the entire reason rank exists.

A private’s job is execution: run, shoot, dig, carry, sweat, grind. They are the most basic human resource in any military operation, and physical standards make sense because their role demands physical output.

A general’s job is something else entirely.

A general is expected to make decisions that determine whether those privates live or die. They operate at the level of campaigns, theaters, logistics, alliances, budgets, and long-term strategic risk. They are planners and coordinators, not frontline combatants.

If a four-star is “out in the mud” for any reason other than morale optics or a photo opportunity, something has already gone catastrophically wrong.

By the time someone reaches flag rank, their value is no longer measured in pull-ups or two-mile run times. It’s measured in their ability to balance finite resources, coordinate across services and allied nations, manage political constraints, and make decisions whose consequences unfold over years instead of minutes.

Fitness matters. Discipline matters. Standards matter.

But treating a general’s physical appearance as a proxy for readiness is a category error — and a revealing one. It’s easy to photograph. Easy to argue about. Easy to turn into a sound bite.

Which is precisely why it plays so well on television.

And that brings us back to the spectacle itself.

This was not a closed-door meeting. It wasn’t a private corrective discussion inside the chain of command. It was staged, televised, and deliberately framed as a public reckoning. As The Washington Post noted, it carried a distinctly political tone, with grievances aired publicly and senior leaders placed on display (Washington Post).

A retired Army brigadier general interviewed by WBUR called the meeting “an insult” and questioned why senior leaders were pulled from critical duties for what amounted to a televised lecture (WBUR).

That critique matters, because the spectacle extended well beyond waistlines.

Hegseth also used the platform to condemn diversity initiatives and announce sweeping changes to discrimination complaint processes — framing them as sources of institutional decay (Reuters).

And notably, part of the address was delivered not by the Secretary of Defense, but by President Donald Trump himself, who floated the idea of U.S. cities as potential “training grounds” for the military — language that raised immediate alarm among civil–military scholars and commentators (PBS NewsHour).

Some outlets framed the event positively. Fox News, for example, described it as a “come-to-Jesus meeting” that resonated with parts of the rank and file while acknowledging its divisive reception (Fox News).

But what was conspicuously absent from the event were serious discussions about deterrence strategy, force posture in the Pacific, acquisition reform, or multi-domain operations — the hard, unglamorous issues that actually define readiness.

Instead, we got optics.

Publicly shaming senior leaders may look like strength, but it corrodes the very structure it claims to defend. The chain of command exists so authority flows cleanly and responsibility is clearly owned. Turning it into a stage for humiliation undermines both.

Threats — explicit or implied — that dissenting leaders should resign if they disagree aren’t leadership. They’re pressure tactics. They prioritize loyalty over judgment and compliance over competence.

And rhetoric about domestic troop deployments or using American cities as “training grounds” crosses lines that exist for very good reasons. Blurring those boundaries isn’t toughness. It’s recklessness.

None of this is to argue that the Pentagon shouldn’t change. Reform is necessary. Institutions this large always need it.

But reform conducted as spectacle isn’t reform. It’s erosion.

It replaces professionalism with optics. It trades seriousness for applause. It demands loyalty rather than judgment.

If the institution we trust to defend the nation becomes a prop in political theater, everyone loses.

And the people who lose first won’t be the ones behind podiums or cameras. They’ll be the ones still doing the work — sweating in the dirt, carrying weight they didn’t choose, and living with the consequences of decisions made far above them.

That isn’t strength.

It’s failure dressed up as toughness.