Gen. Christopher Mahoney, assistant commandant of the Marine Corps, attends a meeting at Joint Base Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on April 24, 2025. (Juaquin Greaves/U.S. Marine Corps)
WASHINGTON — Service officials on Tuesday said it was too soon to tell how they will be impacted by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s order to pare down the military’s senior ranks, but the Marine Corps will likely be affected the most.
“Our ratio of Marines to general officers is the highest in the [Defense Department],” said Gen. Christopher Mahoney, the service’s assistant commandant. “So any cut we’re going to have to look very, very closely at.”
Hegseth on Monday ordered a minimum 20% cut to the number of four-star generals and admirals on active duty, as well as a corresponding 20% reduction of four-star positions in the National Guard and a 10% reduction of general and flag officers across the military.
“We’re going to shift resources from bloated headquarters elements to our warfighters,” Hegseth said.
There are about 800 general-level officers in the military, with 44 at a four-star rank.
The Marine Corps has 2,700 Marines for every general officer, Mahoney said Tuesday in his testimony to a House Armed Services Committee subpanel examining readiness. The service has 64 general officers, including two four-star officers, he said.
The number of active-duty general or flag officers is set by Congress. The cap is 219 for the Army, 171 for the Air Force, 150 for the Navy, 64 for the Marine Corps and 21 for the Space Force.
Gen. James Mingus, vice chief of staff of the Army, said the Army was aware of the Pentagon’s review of general officers before Monday’s announcement and had begun restructuring months earlier to better streamline leadership.
“We knew we were over-structured,” he said. “We had too much, too many headquarters.”
Still, he said it was “probably a little too early to tell in terms of what the overall impacts” of Hegseth’s order are going to be.
Lt. Gen. Adrian Spain, the Air Force deputy chief of staff for operations, and Adm. James Kilby, vice chief of naval operations, said they also could not yet predict the potential consequences of the reduction plan.
“We look forward to seeing the exact language following the announcement,” Spain said. “I have every confidence that we’ll be able to work with the department to minimize any particular mission or readiness impacts of the decisions.”
The reaction from lawmakers on Capitol Hill has been mixed.
Republican Mike Rogers of Alabama, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said the military was “top-heavy” and Hegseth was right to review the issue.
“I look forward to working with him on this effort to maximize strategic readiness and operational effectiveness,” he said in a post on X on Monday.
But Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he was skeptical of Hegseth’s motive after he already fired a raft of military leaders in recent months.
Among those let go were the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force Gen. Charles “CQ” Brown; the Navy’s top officer, Adm. Lisa Franchetti; and Air Force Gen. Timothy Haugh, who oversaw U.S. Cyber Command and the National Security Agency.
“We need efficiency at the Department of Defense,” Reed wrote on X on Tuesday. “But personnel decisions should be based on facts & analysis, not arbitrary percentages. Eliminating the positions of many of our most experienced officers without justification could cripple the military.”
In a video announcing the changes, Hegseth said the reduction plan will be done “carefully, but it’s going to be done expeditiously.”
