The Disappearing, Reappearing Defense Secretary

The Secretary of Defense occupies a critical role in the US military command structure.  He serves as an advisor to the President of the United States and the focal point from which orders from the Commander in Chief are promulgated throughout the military to the various services and combatant commands.  He is one of the few men whose daily whereabouts and status need to be known by the President and senior US military officers, lest a breakdown in the chain of command occur in a crisis.  Therefore when Sec. Lloyd Austin virtually vanishes for three days without informing the President or the majority of his subordinates, and by all accounts no one notices, some eyebrows tend to be raised.

The story begins in December of last year.  According to the Pentagon, Sec. Austin took leave and had an elective procedure performed on Dec. 22, 2023.  Whether the leave was taken explicitly to allow for the procedure, and what the procedure was – the “elective” description covers a wide range of operations ranging from cosmetic surgery to gallbladder removal, is unknown.  The Secretary was discharged and subsequently began experiencing some significant levels of pain.  He was taken to hospital by ambulance on January 1^st and admitted into the intensive care unit at Walter Reed Hospital.  Austin remained in the ICU for a period of four days and the details of his status, whether he lost consciousness, if he was under heavy sedation, etc. during that time have not been released.  The Pentagon broke the news late on Friday, January 5^th.  Secretary Austin is currently still in hospital and reportedly in good condition, though there is no word on when he might be discharged.

However, this is where what would otherwise be an unremarkable, if concerning, story of a 70 year old man having complications from surgery that required rehospitalization, takes a bizarre turn.  Virtually no one knew the Secretary was hospitalized for three days from January 1^st when he was admitted until January 4^th when the President and other officials were informed of his status.  Thus far it seems only General Brown, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was told fairly quickly on January 2^nd.  There is no indication (yet) that he informed anyone else of this fact.

It gets weirder.  Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks was vacationing in Puerto Rico during this period and although she began taking responsibility for some of Secretary Austin’s duties on January 2^nd, she was unaware that he was then in hospital.  She was informed of the issue on January 4^th, along with the President, National Security Advisor Sullivan, and the rest of the National Security Council.  Acting Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Alexandra Baker, number three in the Pentagon hierarchy, was apparently filling in for Sec. Austin during the week and completely unaware of his condition.  She was under the impression he was working from home.  The secretaries of the armed services and Congress were informed on January 5^th, along with the bulk of the Pentagon.  There has been no word on when the commanding officers of the combatant commands were informed, though it seems likely they were told on January 5^th.  The current excuse from the Pentagon is that notifications were delayed because the Secretary of Defense’s Chief of Staff Kelly Magsamen was ill and unable to make them.  Secretary Austin is taking full responsibility for the breakdown in communications.

Frankly this series of events, and the threadbare explanation for them, raise more questions than they answer.  The more obvious ones are serious enough.  Why (supposedly) was the Secretary of Defense’s Chief of Staff the only person in the entire Pentagon capable of sending out an alert on the status of the civilian head of the Department of Defense to the parties with a need to know?  How ill does one have to be to render them incapable of sending an email?  Was the elective medical operation pre-planned in advance and was that the reason Sec. Austin took leave to begin with?  If so, did no one call just to check in on him last week given his absence?  When was that leave supposed to expire?  If it was known he was going in for a medical procedure and he had not returned after the expiration of his leave, why was there not more concern expressed by the White House, the senior Pentagon staff, and the NSC as to his status?  Why did Gen. Brown, who had unique knowledge of the Secretary’s condition at an early stage, apparently decline to share that information with anyone else?  Was he ordered not to by Sec. Austin? 

These questions on the personal choices of the actors involved would be concerning enough, but this episode also raises some institutional questions that are even more troubling.  First, Sec. Austin is provided with a security detail drawn from Army CID’s Protective Services Battalion.  CID is a Direct Reporting Unit, which means that through its current director Gregory Ford, it reports directly to the Secretary of the Army or their direct staff.  Sec. Austin’s protection team almost certainly filed a report that their protectee had been rushed by ambulance to the ICU at Walter Reed.  Given the status of Sec. Austin, whose desk did that report ultimately land on?  According to what is currently being reported, CID did not forward that report to the Secretary of the Army Wormuth.  Why?

The second institutional question concerns the role of the Secretary of Defense in the current national security landscape.  For at least three days, Sec. Austin went unmissed.  Amidst two ongoing land wars, one in Europe and one in the Middle East – both of which we are supplying with munitions among other things, a major recently announced multilateral effort to protect shipping in the Red Sea, North Korea shelling targets on the sovereign territory of South Korea – a major US ally, and likely a hundred other concerns that are not public, no one needed to get the Secretary of Defense in a room.  Hicks, Austin’s chief deputy, was on vacation and Baker, who has only been confirmed as Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Policy by the Senate, is only acting in her current role after the departure of Colin Kahl from the position in July of 2023.  Yet no one needed Sec. Austin for anything.  Not the President, not NSA Sullivan, not the National Security Council.  Without knowledge of Sec. Austin’s condition it is impossible to say if he was taking work calls during his ICU stay, but it seems unlikely given the totality of events. 

Which brings me to the question: what role does the Secretary of Defense occupy under the Biden Administration?  One would think he would be a major player in all the issues I listed above and then some.  He would be instrumental in decision-making, coordination, issuing orders, and advising the President.  His return after several weeks of leave should have come with a horde of things waiting for him to address and a busy schedule designed to bring him fully up to speed on anything he might have missed during his time away.  Yet his absence in a time of, if not quite crisis then global upheaval, seems to have gone unremarked by the US national security establishment.  This is genuinely incredible.

Third, what was the status of the chain of command?  The US military is currently under attack on a weekly basis in the Middle East, with 69 casualties reported thus far.  American naval ships, along with civilian vessels, have been fired on in international waters repeatedly by Iranian proxies in Yemen.  CENTCOM, which exercises authority over many of the units under attack, as a unified combatant command should be reporting to the Secretary of Defense directly.  Was Dep.Sec.Def. Hicks filling that role while he was on leave?  Was she officially designated as Sec. Austin’s stand-in while he was away?  If she was, why was she allowed to be in Puerto Rico on vacation while her superior, Austin, was already on leave and out of the office?  If she wasn’t, then the chain of command was effectively broken for several days if Sec. Austin was unable to exercise his authority while in the ICU.

While that may seem like a trivial and bureaucratic concern it’s deadly serious.  Lawful orders must emanate from legitimate authority to be considered valid and legal.  Within the uniformed services things are simpler, when a superior is unavailable for any reason there is a clear chain of command from which authority flows based on rank and position.  Yet even within the military, the absence of key personnel can create issues.  On the civilian side, things get even worse.  Secretary Austin doesn’t have a designated executive officer to whom his authority automatically devolves if he is incapacitated.  Kathleen Hicks may be his Deputy, but on her own, she has no command authority.  Under 10 USC 132, Part B:

In other words, the Secretary of Defense must delegate his authority to his Deputy, or he must be officially incapacitated in order for Dep.Sec.Def. Hicks to legally assume his authority.  This requires the chain of command to be informed of that delegation or incapacitation to ensure any orders issued by Dep.Sec.Def. Hicks would be lawful.  As far as is currently known, neither event occurred.  In a crisis, this type of oversight can cause serious command confusion while the question of lawful authority Is determined. 

This entire episode was an easily avoidable, self-inflicted wound for the Pentagon and the administration.  Whatever Sec. Austin’s reasons for failing to adequately inform superiors of his status and delegate to his subordinates, he blundered badly.  We’re fortunate that very little real harm was done.  These events have also opened major questions about the inner workings of the Biden Administration on military matters, and the Pentagon’s ability to communicate internally.  Ironically the Press and Congress, two groups with no critical need to know but who possess robust oversight roles, will likely be leading the charge to look into this.