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AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org,The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González, as we continue to look at TuesdayS unprecedented gathering of 800 U.S. generals and admirals who were flown into the United States from around the world and gathered at Marine Corps Base quantico, Virginia. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called the meeting and ordered generals and admirals to gather together for what many have likened to a MAGA campaign rally. President Trump addressed the generals for over 70 minutes, but Hegseth spoke first.

WAR SECRETARY PETE HEGSETH: We are preparing every day. We have to be prepared for war, not for defense. We’re training warriors, not defenders. We fight wars to win, not to defend.Defense is something you do all the time. It’s inherently reactionary and can led to overuse, overreach and mission creep.War is something you do sparingly, on our own terms and with clear aims. We fight to win. … Well, today is another Liberation Day, the liberation of America’s warriors, in name, in deed and in authorities. You kill people and break things for a living. You are not politically correct and don’t necessarily belong always in polite society.

AMY GOODMAN: President Trump claimed the United States is facing an “invasion from within.”

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Only in recent decades did politicians somehow come to believe that our job is to police the far reaches of Kenya and Somalia,while America is under invasion from within. We’re under invasion from within, no diffrent than a foreign enemy, but more challenging in many ways as they don’t wear uniforms. At least when they’re wearing a uniform, you can take them out. These people don’t have uniforms. But we are under invasion from within, and we’re stopping it very quickly. After spending trillions of dollars defending the borders of foreign countries, with your help, we’re defending the borders of our country from now on.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re joined now by Eugene Fidell, senior research scholar at Yale Law School, where he teaches military justice.He co-wrote a piece for The Hill headlined “Trump and hegseth want to turn the military into a tool of personal loyalty.” He’s an expert on military law, served as a judge advocate in the U.S. Coast guard.

Eugene Fidell, thanks for joining us. Explain what you mean,as people describe this unprecedented gathering,where it is many of these generals and admirals were asking why they had to be flown in. This was live-streamed. What was the point of this?

EUGENE FIDELL: Good morning.

Well, the first thing is, I think you omitted what the generals and admirals actually said. There was probably an expletive that was inserted in their comments.

But I think, really, the reason for this unusual event at Quantico, unusual and costly event at Quantico, is probably

Should Military Officers Seek Civilian Lawyers Amidst Domestic Deployment Concerns?

AMY GOODMAN: So, what do you see as the likelihood, following from that, that the officer class would refuse to deploy troops against U.S.citizens, Eugene fidell?

EUGENE FIDELL: Well, I feel like the people who’ll be getting these orders – I’m talking about senior officers – they should be talking to their lawyers, and not just their staff judge advocate, their uniformed lawyers assigned to advise them. They might need more independent and confidential advice about what to do. Remember, the staff judge advocate doesn’t work for the commander; they work for the government. Those conversations might not be confidential. these senior officers really need good,private legal advice to help them figure out which orders are lawful and which aren’t.

of course, lawful orders must be followed. But some of these issues, like this talk of an “internal war” or using Chicago as a training mission, raise questions about whether they’re actually legal – under the Posse Comitatus Act, for example. That’s a 19th-century law that’s kept the military out of regular law enforcement… until now.

These are going to be tricky legal issues. Lawyers are going to have to study up and be ready to give advice. Maybe senior officers can get that advice within the service, but if I were a general or an admiral right now, I’d call my lawyer – someone who really knows the field.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I wanted to ask you, as well – the U.S. military, probably more than any other institution in American society, has made huge strides, especially during the volunteer army period, in terms of racial and ethnic diversity. Thirty-five to forty percent of the U.S. mili