It’s amateur hour for a defense secretary who is supposed to be improving on the feckless performance of Joe Biden’s foreign-policy team.

I’ve been cautiously optimistic about Pete Hegseth’s appointment as secretary of defense. It’s undoubtedly true that a culture of waste, inefficiency, and rot has built up in the Pentagon. In these parlous times, the U.S. military needs to have a laser focus on rebuilding its strength and streamlining itself as a war-winning organization. The growing threat from Communist China demands exactly such a focus.

Pete Hegseth’s rhetorical emphasis on de-wokifying the military, empowering the grunts, and creating a merit-based culture of excellence is, in my view, welcome. And to push this forward, his well-known communications skills, honed via years on TV, are undoubtedly an asset. See, as an example, his “town hall” with Pentagon staff after he took office and the PR savvy he deployed in tweeting out images of his early-morning PT session with U.S. special operators in Germany.

De-wokifing the military, however, is a necessary but insufficient job description for the U.S. secretary of defense.

Hegseth’s role is also to speak for the Trump administration and establish crystal-clear U.S. policy in the realm of military and security affairs.

That’s why Hegseth’s last 48 hours have been so surprising — and so disappointing.

Yesterday, in prepared remarks to a gathering of allied defense ministers at NATO headquarters, Hegseth announced that while the United States was committed to a “sovereign and prosperous Ukraine,” it was an “unrealistic objective” for the West to push for a return to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders. Indeed, that would be an “illusionary goal” that would only “prolong the war and cause more suffering.” Moreover, while a negotiated end to the war “must include robust security guarantees to Ukraine,” the Trump administration “does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement.”

Now, reasonable minds can disagree on those pronouncements. I happen to think they are outcomes that are perhaps more likely than not, but I don’t see why the U.S. should be unilaterally offering major concessions to Russia up front without getting anything substantial in return. The maneuver has more than a whiff of appeasement. But, again, I don’t think it’s crazy for an analyst of this war, and the international security landscape as a whole, to come to these conclusions. And it’s certainly within the purview of the duly elected president to set such a foreign policy.

You can watch the key part of Hegseth’s speech below.

But, amazingly, not 24 hours after Hegseth’s groundbreaking policy announcement, the secretary of defense walked back the key points of yesterday’s speech in a Q&A session at NATO HQ.

In response to the first questioner — a clear indication of a planned walk-back — Hegseth said, “Well, I would say — I want to be clear about something as it pertains to NATO membership not being a realistic outcome of negotiations.”

“That was something that was stated as part of my remarks here,” Hegseth continued with a sheepish grin, “as part of a coordination with how we’re executing these ongoing negotiations, which are led by President Trump.” He went on:

All of that said, these negotiations are led by President Trump — everything is on the table in his conversations with Vladimir Putin and Zelensky. What he decides to allow or not allow is at the purview of the leader of the free world, of President Trump. So I’m not going to stand at this podium and declare what President Trump will do or won’t do — what will be in or what will be out — what concessions will be made or what concessions are not made. . . .

It’s not my job as the secretary of defense to define the parameters of the president of the United States as he leads some of the most complex and consequential negotiations in the world.

You can watch the relevant part of today’s press conference below.

Look, the SecDef shouldn’t set overall policy; that’s the president’s job. No one’s arguing that point. I’m certainly not. And I don’t object to the injection of some hard-headed realpolitik into U.S. foreign policy under the new administration.

But that doesn’t excuse Hegseth and his staff for the amateur-hour bungling of yesterday’s speech and policy declaration. 

Who cleared Hegseth’s prepared speech? Did the White House — and then Trump changed his mind on the policy on Ukraine and NATO membership? Or did Hegseth and the DOD not ensure that their critical policy declaration was aligned with the president’s view? Who told Hegseth to walk back today what he said yesterday? Is the SecDef out of the loop?

Either way — it’s a very disappointing moment for a team that is supposed to be taking over from and improving on the feckless performance of Joe Biden’s foreign-policy team. Pete Hegseth is giving the impression that the secretary of defense doesn’t speak for the president, which is a dangerous place for us to be.