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WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is launching an office of religious affairs, the latest of his faith-related reforms at the Pentagon.

He announced in a speech Wednesday that the office will help offer “first-class religious support” and will report directly to him.

“Our department is, you might say, putting on the full armor of God, because while we wage physical war, we all know the real battle is spiritual,” he said.

Hegseth has infused his evangelical Christianity into his leadership of the Pentagon, hosting Christian worship services for employees and often speaking of the United States as a Christian nation.

The Office of Religious Affairs, or ORA, will advocate for military chaplains and religious support “at the highest level of the Department,” according to a Pentagon statement. It will not “compel religious participation, favor one faith, or diminish the rights of personnel of any faith or lack thereof.”

Some criticism of the initiative surfaced quickly.

The Pentagon “owes it to the nation’s service members to defend religious freedom,” said Rachel Laser, head of Americans United for Separation of Church, which has sued the Pentagon over its worship services. “Hegseth’s latest announcement violates that promise by elevating Christianity to an even higher role in shaping U.S. military policy.”

Other federal agencies have had religious or faith-based offices, which were established under President George W. Bush and were continued in different forms under the Obama and Biden administrations. President Donald Trump established a White House Faith Office and had a similar effort during his first term.

Shaun Casey, a religion scholar, led the State Department’s Office of Religion and Global Affairs during the Obama administration. The office did not promote religion or spiritual well-being, he said. “It was there to understand what were the political implications of lived religion in the various hot spots around the world.”

The leader of the new office has not been named. A Pentagon memo said the religious affairs director will coordinate spiritual resources, including “faith-based homeschool support for military families.” Hegseth has also pushed the military school system to introduce more coursework that draws from conservative and Christian influences.

The memo mentions “faith-based initiatives supporting Department-wide suicide reduction.” In recent years, the military has become increasingly dependent on chaplains to help address the growing numbers of troops in mental health distress. Hegseth has said he wants chaplains to focus more on God and less on therapeutic “self-help and self-care.”

The secretary has pushed other changes within the military’s chaplain corps, which provides spiritual care to troops. He ordered chaplains, who are commissioned officers, to no longer wear their rank on their uniform but instead be identified by religious insignia.

The Defense Department also slashed the number of religious affiliations it officially recognizes, down to 31 from more than 200 previously recognized traditions. The list no longer includes atheists, Unitarian Universalists, pagans and Wiccans.

Hegseth spoke directly to chaplains in his address Wednesday at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia. Using Christian-inflected language, he said: “Live your calling. Stand firm. Preach truth. Minister to the flock.”

He then quoted from the Bible: “The Lord is on my side; I will not fear. What can man do unto me?”

Stanley writes for the Associated Press.

Oct. 1, 2026 1:36 PM PT

WASHINGTON — The U.S. military is dispatching roughly 9,000 troops aboard a group of ships to the Middle East, a U.S. official said Thursday. The bolstering of the American military presence comes as President Trump warned anew that new strikes against Iran could be on the horizon.

He also said early indications suggest that Iran is linked to the co-pilot who stabbed his captain and tried to crash an Israel-bound flight on Wednesday.

In an exchange with reporters at the White House, Trump raised the connection when asked by a reporter if there were any links between the pilot behind the attack and Tehran.

“I would say the answer, based on what I’m hearing, is ‘yes,’ but we’re working on it right now,” Trump said, without offering details.

Trump also warned that if the link is established to Iran, the United States would retaliate.

“Oh they’ll be hit, very hard, don’t worry,” Trump said. “You just ask them. They know what happened. They’ll be hit very hard.”

Meanwhile, the group of ships now en route to the Middle East together carry over 7,000 sailors and 2,000 Marines.

It includes the USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group, which recently deployed with the cruiser USS Chosin, and the USS Makin Island amphibious readiness group, which includes the USS John P. Murtha and USS Anchorage amphibious landing ships.

It could mean that three carriers are in the region as early as the end of October, according to the U.S. official who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military operations.

Given the personnel already in place in the Middle East, the move would bring the U.S. naval presence to an unusually high number of more than 20,000 sailors and Marines and hundreds of aircraft. The Navy previously had three carrier strike groups in the Middle East in April for the first time since 2003.

The carriers USS George H.W. Bush and the USS George Washington are in the region now, along with the USS Boxer amphibious readiness group. The Washington is typically deployed to Pacific Ocean but it was moved to the Middle East to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln, whose arduous deployment resulted in the crew being at sea for more than 260 days straight.

Trump, in a Time magazine interview published Thursday, also raised the prospects of new strikes, saying it is “possible” that he will ramp up bombing in Iran after the Nov. 3 elections in the United States.

When pressed, Trump said he could not go further in detailing his strategy.

“I can’t tell you that because look, you know, you’re asking, where are you going to bomb?” Trump said.

He said in the interview, conducted Monday, that he rejected the latest ceasefire proposal from Iran because “things that I wouldn’t have approved a year ago I wouldn’t have today.”

Trump cited as an example an offer from Iran to “open up” the Strait of Hormuz, the key energy shipping corridor, but said the overall proposal was “not good enough.”

Members of the military listen as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gives a State of the Force address at Marine Corps Base Quantico.

(Alex Wong / Getty Images)

Asked if the increasingly unpopular war would threaten Republican Party chances in November, Trump at first responded, “It’s possible.” But then he added, “It should help, because Iran will not have a nuclear weapon.”

The president said “100% of the people” oppose Iran having nuclear attack capabilities “including worldwide.”

“So, when you say it that way, It would help,” Trump added. “If you don’t say that, it could hurt.”

Toropin and Price write for the Associated Press. AP writers Seung Min Kim, Will Weissert and Aamer Madhani contributed to this report.

Sept. 30, 2026 1:27 PM PT

QUANTICO, Va. — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed Wednesday that the U.S. military will cut 20% of its generals and admirals as he delivered what he is calling his “State of the Force” address.

Hegseth was speaking to junior officers and enlisted leaders at the Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia, the second year in a row that he has given such an address. This time, the U.S. military is seven months into a war with Iran with no clear end in sight, has captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and killed more than 200 people in strikes on alleged drug trafficking boats in Latin America, among other actions worldwide.

The speech is not a usual fixture among Pentagon leaders. While Hegseth’s predecessors regularly addressed troops and top officers, they traditionally have done so in small or private settings.

The Pentagon chief, however, again focused on how he has drastically retooled the U.S. military by targeting what he calls “woke” culture — through a rollback of diversity programs, a review of ground combat units with female troops and a new screening program for “testosterone deficiency” among male personnel.

Pentagon officials had previewed that Hegseth would announce more cuts to the number of generals and admirals. He directed all military services to double the 10% reduction he ordered last spring for roughly 800 flag and general officer positions, making it a total 20% decrease to be completed by Jan. 1.

“I call it accountability and long overdue,” he said.

Several senators viewed Hegseth’s move as nothing short of a “purge” of the military’s top ranks that will take years to rebuild.

“He’s got some kind of like deep-seated grievance about leadership in the military,” said Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., the former Navy combat pilot and NASA astronaut, who has been critical of Hegseth. “He’s purging a generation of great leaders of the military, and it’s going to take a generation to recover from it.”

Republican Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he wanted to understand Hegseth’s reasoning behind the decision.

“If it’s simply a matter of eliminating a very heavy top, there may be some validity to it, but I want to see it first,” Rounds said.

Hegseth and President Trump already have fired or pushed to retire more than two dozen military leaders since taking office, including the Army’s top uniformed officer, Gen. Randy George, a move that angered both Republicans and Democrats in Congress. The purge also has included a number of senior officers who are women or people of color.

Previous leaders who were ousted include Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. CQ Brown; Chief of Naval Operations Lisa Franchetti; and Vice Adm. Shoshana Chatfield, the U.S. military representative to the NATO Military Committee.

Although Hegseth never gave specific reasons for those firings, most were tied to the belief that they endorsed or spoke openly in support of diversity, equity and inclusion programs, which have been targets of Hegseth and Trump.

As part of last year’s cuts, Hegseth also ordered the active duty military to shed 20% of its four-star general officers — the highest-level leaders — and the National Guard to shed 20% of its top positions, but it is unclear if all those cuts have been made. The new cuts could include any one-star general or above, or an officer of equivalent Navy rank.

When Hegseth first announced the effort to trim the highest levels of the military ranks, he argued it was intended to remove “redundant force structure to optimize and streamline leadership.” In a memo released in May 2025, he said the aim was to free the military from “unnecessary bureaucratic layers.”

The number of general officer positions in the military is set by law, but it is possible to let positions remain unfilled by not submitting replacements to Congress.

Hegseth’s efforts have extended well beyond personnel changes among the top ranks. He oversaw Trump’s ban on transgender troops while announcing new directives for “gender-neutral” or “male-level” standards for physical fitness.

Toropin and Finley write for the Associated Press. AP writers Lisa Mascaro and Meg Kinnard contributed to this report.