The plan calls for a 20 percent cut of four-star generals and admirals.

Pete Hegseth stands out the Department of Defense building.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth awaits the arrival of Peru Foreign Affairs Minister Elmer Schialer and Peru Minister of Defense Walter Astudillo at the Pentagon on May 5. | Mark Schiefelbein/AP

By Paul McLeary

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered a major restructuring Monday of the way the military is led, including a plan that could cut a significant number of the military’s highest-ranking officers.

Hegseth, in a memo and video laying out his moves, said the reductions will entail a 20 percent cut to the ranks of four-star generals and admirals and 10 percent of the military’s more than 800 generals and admirals. The plan also calls for a 20 percent reduction of generals in the National Guard.

“This is not a slash and burn exercise,” he said in the video. “More generals and admirals does not lead to more success.”

Hegseth has long voiced disdain for high-ranking officers, and swiftly fired Joint Chiefs Chair C.Q. Brown and the Navy’s top admiral once taking office.

The Pentagon has yet to detail specific cuts, but proposals inside the building include consolidating the European and Africa commands — both run by four-star generals — and combining the Northern and Southern commands.

Hegseth called it the “most comprehensive review” since a bill in 1986 known as the Goldwater Nichols Defense Reorganization Act, which gave more power to U.S. commanders across the globe to plan and execute military missions.

There is no timeline for when the changes might take place, but Hegseth said that they will come in two phases.

The first will look at the current force and reduce the number of active-duty four-star general officers and admirals by 20 percent. That phase could happen relatively quickly. The second phase will involve a deeper look at the Unified Command Plan, a classified document that guides the global distribution of U.S. forces, and which will cut the general officer and admiral ranks by another 10 percent.

The “strategic review” of the Unified Command Plan, as Hegseth referred to it, will lead to much deeper changes in global combatant commands.

The Army has also created plans to reduce commands and offices led by generals by 40 positions, a significant culling of the roughly 200 billets currently occupied by those officers, according to one person familiar with the plans.

“Through these measures, we will uphold our position as the most lethal fighting force in the world,” Hegseth said in the memo, “achieving peace through strength and ensuring greater efficiency, innovation, and preparedness for any challenge that lies ahead.”