--- title: Retired Military Officials Pan Donald Trump Military Parade description: Donald Trump's idea to hold a military parade was critiqued by former top generals. canonical: https://time.com/5137317/donald-trump-military-parade-officers/ author: Alana Abramson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-02-07T18:11:11.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T19:11:09.306Z article:section: Politics og:title: Former Military Officials Harshly Criticized President Trump's Idea for a Parade og:description: "It's not who we are as a military" og:url: https://time.com/5137317/donald-trump-military-parade-officers/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt88e163269653c8a9/6988faf3db298748db25eacb/gulf-war-victory-parade-washington.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3284 og:image:height: 1847 og:image:alt: U.S. GULF WAR VICTORY PARADE, WASHINGTON, USA og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Former Military Officials Harshly Criticized President Trump's Idea for a Parade twitter:description: "It's not who we are as a military" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt88e163269653c8a9/6988faf3db298748db25eacb/gulf-war-victory-parade-washington.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # 'Put Me Down as a No.' These Retired Generals Are Not Happy About President Trump's Military Parade > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters.  by [Alana Abramson](https://time.com/author/alana-abramson/)  ## Alana Abramson Feb 7, 2018 6:11 PM UTC  Mandatory Credit: Photo by DOUG MILLS/AP/REX/Shutterstock (6580154a) Troops march over the Memorial Bridge in Washington, D.C., as they head towards the Pentagon during the National Victory Day Parade on . The celebration to honor Gulf War troops drew an estimated 800,000 spectators. The Lincoln Memorial is visible in background U.S. GULF WAR VICTORY PARADE, WASHINGTON, USA Mandatory Credit: Photo by DOUG MILLS/AP/REX/Shutterstock (6580154a) Troops march over the Memorial Bridge in Washington, D.C., as they head towards the Pentagon during the National Victory Day Parade on . The celebration to honor Gulf War troops drew an estimated 800,000 spectators. The Lincoln Memorial is visible in background U.S. GULF WAR VICTORY PARADE, WASHINGTON, USADOUG MILLS/AP/REX/Shutterstock—DOUG MILLS/AP/REX/Shutterstock  by [Alana Abramson](https://time.com/author/alana-abramson/)  ## Alana Abramson Feb 7, 2018 6:11 PM UTC President Donald Trump’s reported proposal for a [military parade](http://time.com/5136871/donald-trump-military-parade-logistics/) replete with tanks and marching soldiers is facing withering criticism from an unexpected quarter: retired generals. A number of retired high-ranking military officials have spoken out about Trump’s orders for the Pentagon to begin planning a big parade, likely in Washington, D.C., since it was [reported Tuesday evening](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trumps-marching-orders-to-the-pentagon-plan-a-grand-military-parade/2018/02/06/9e19ca88-0b55-11e8-8b0d-891602206fb7%5Fstory.html?hpid=hp%5Fhp-top-table-main%5Fno-name%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm%5Fterm=.0334ed4c1c6c) by the Washington _Post_. Among their objections: Military parades have traditionally been the hallmarks of totalitarian regimes, appearing in the parade would be an unwelcome distraction for rank-and-file servicemembers and it would make it seem like the military is promoting the president and not serving the Constitution. **Read More:** [_President Trump’s Military Parade Is Likely to be a Logistical Nightmare_](http://time.com/5136871/donald-trump-military-parade-logistics/) Retired Army Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling told TIME that a military parade goes against U.S. democratic traditions. “A lot of countries have histories of longtime military conquest and the power and strength of the military supporting the government, but since our inception that has not been who we are,” he said. “We’re the only nation in the world that defends a piece of paper. An ideology. And to say we’re going to strut our stuff with tanks and rocket launchers and things like that, is just not a good representation of what the military does in a democratic nation.” > [](https://twitter.com/MarkHertling/status/961080419755143168) Other military officials found troubling Trump’s desire for a parade, reportedly sparked after viewing a Bastille Day celebration in France, especially since it came just days after he declared — jokingly, his advisers argued — that Democratic lawmakers who did not clap for him at the State of the Union were [“treasonous.”](http://time.com/5134150/donald-trump-state-union-democrats-treasonous/) **Read More:** [_Admiral Stavridis: Our Troops Deserve Better Than Trump’s Big Parade_](http://time.com/5137489/donald-trump-big-parade/?xid=homepage) “Donald Trump has continually shown himself to have authoritarian tendencies and this is just another worrisome example,” [said Retired Major General Paul Eaton,](https://twitter.com/votevets/status/961034722775203840) a Senior Adviser VoteVets, a progressive political organization devoted to electing veterans to office. “For someone who just declared that it was ‘treasonous’ to not applaud him, and for someone who has, in the past, admired the tactics of everyone from Saddam Hussein to Vladimir Putin, it is clear that a military parade isn’t about saluting the military — it is about making a display of the military saluting him.” “I used to watch them in Bulgaria,” retired Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, former director of the CIA and National Security Agency,[ said on Twitter](https://twitter.com/GenMhayden/status/961193449188929536) of these type of parades, another reference to the association of these events with totalitarian regimes. “Put me down as a no,” he [added](https://twitter.com/GenMhayden/status/961266211379187713). > [](https://twitter.com/GenMhayden/status/961193449188929536) Other former military officials were concerned that the parade would be antithetical to the military’s principles. “I’ll let military friends speak for themselves, hoping they don’t just salute Trump, but when I served in the U.S. Army, the LAST thing we wanted to do was parade,” tweeted John McLaughlin, who served in the CIA under the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations. > [](https://twitter.com/jmclaughlinSAIS/status/961263929145069568) Hertling added that, in the end, the parade would not actually be for the troops. “I think having a parade in the middle of the nation’s capital is obviously not for the soldiers, it’s more for the people that watch,” Hertling continued. “And in this case it’s one particular person and that’s the President.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5137317/donald-trump-military-parade-officers/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5137317/donald-trump-military-parade-officers/"},"headline":"'Put Me Down as a No.' These Retired Generals Are Not Happy About President Trump's Military Parade","datePublished":"2018-02-07T18:11:11.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T19:11:09.306Z","description":"\"It's not who we are as a military\"","url":"https://time.com/5137317/donald-trump-military-parade-officers/","keywords":["White House","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt88e163269653c8a9/6988faf3db298748db25eacb/gulf-war-victory-parade-washington.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alana Abramson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/alana-abramson/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt88e163269653c8a9/6988faf3db298748db25eacb/gulf-war-victory-parade-washington.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"U.S. GULF WAR VICTORY PARADE, WASHINGTON, USA","caption":"U.S. GULF WAR VICTORY PARADE, WASHINGTON, USA","creditText":"DOUG MILLS/AP/REX/Shutterstock—DOUG MILLS/AP/REX/Shutterstock","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/white-house/","name":"White House"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5137317/donald-trump-military-parade-officers/","name":"'Put Me Down as a No.' These Retired Generals Are Not Happy About President Trump's Military Parade"}}]}] ```