The President's Daily Brief
March 21st, 2025: Pentagon Mulls Controversial Global Shakeup Of Military Command & Turkey In Turmoil Over Arrest Of Key Erdogan Rival
21 Mar 2025
In this episode of The President's Daily Brief: First up, the Pentagon is considering a major shake-up in U.S. military command, prompting the Republican chairmen of the Senate and House Armed Services committees to issue a rare joint statement warning the Trump administration the move risks undermining American deterrence around the globe. Later in the show, amid talks of a partial ceasefire between Moscow and Kyiv, Ukraine launched a major strike against a critical Russian strategic bomber airfield, dealing a blow to the Kremlin's aerial capabilities. Plus, protests erupt in Turkey after authorities arrested the top political rival of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a move the opposition condemned as an undemocratic "coup attempt." In our 'Back of the Brief' segment, the U.S. State Department has issued a $15 million bounty for a Chinese national and three accomplices accused of smuggling sensitive military technology to Iran for nearly 20 years. To listen to the show ad-free, become a premium member of The President’s Daily Brief by visiting PDBPremium.com. Please remember to subscribe if you enjoyed this episode of The President's Daily Brief. YouTube: youtube.com/@presidentsdailybrief Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Full Episode
It's Friday, the 21st of March. Welcome to the President's Daily Brief. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. All right, let's get briefed. First up, the Pentagon is considering a major shakeup in U.S.
military command structure, prompting the Republican chairman of the Senate and House Armed Services Committees to issue a rare joint statement warning the Trump administration that the move risks undermining American deterrence around the globe.
Later in the show, amid talks of a partial ceasefire between Moscow and Kyiv, Ukraine launched a major strike against a critical Russian strategic bomber, Airfield, dealing a significant blow to the Kremlin's aerial capabilities. This, of course, followed Russian attacks on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure the previous evening.
Plus, massive protests erupt in Turkey after authorities arrested the top political rival of President Erdogan, a move the opposition condemned as an undemocratic coup attempt. Well, to be fair, Erdogan is an undemocratic strongman, so at least he's being consistent. And in today's back of the brief, the U.S.
State Department has issued a $15 million bounty for a Chinese national and three accomplices accused of smuggling drone weapons and other sensitive military technology to Iran for nearly 20 years. Yeah, that's nearly 20 years. But first, today's PDB Spotlight.
The Trump administration is facing some rare blowback from congressional Republicans as they mull plans for a shakeup of Pentagon operations that critics say risk undermining American deterrence around the globe. According to two defense officials and a Pentagon briefing document that was first obtained by NBC News, The White House is considering a massive restructuring of the U.S.
military's combatant commands and headquarters. The proposals are wide ranging, calling for potentially merging five of the military commands to streamline operations and reduce costs, and perhaps even relinquishing the U.S. role as NATO's supreme allied commander in Europe. That's according to a report from CNN.
For some background, the Defense Department maintains 11 combatant commands, which are comprised of units from two or more service branches, focusing on providing command and control of military forces in either a specific geographic region, such as Indo-Pacific Command, or for a specific function, such as US Cyber Command.
While the White House has not confirmed the plans, insiders say the administration is considering consolidating several of the commands in order to shrink the size of the U.S. military.
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