By Gareth Vipers

The Senate confirmed Lt. Gen. Dan Caine as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff following President Trump's surprise shake-up at the Pentagon.

Retired Air Force fighter pilot Caine replaces Gen. CQ Brown Jr., who Trump ousted in February alongside other senior military leaders.

The 60-25 Senate vote came in the early hours of Friday after Democrats had expressed concerns about the dramatic firing of a raft of Pentagon officials that also included Adm. Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead the Navy and to be on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen. James Slife, the vice chief of staff for the Air Force.

The firings were an unprecedented move to replace top uniformed officers across several branches of the armed services as the administration accused the Pentagon of failing to focus on its core war-fighting mission.

Brown was the military's highest-ranking Black officer and Franchetti a top female commander. Trump appointees have said diversity policies by the Biden administration had resulted in promoting unqualified officers.

"General Caine is an accomplished pilot, national security expert, successful entrepreneur, and a 'warfighter' with significant interagency and special operations experience," Trump said in a Truth Social post announcing his nomination in February.

Caine brings a deep military experience to the role of chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the country's highest-ranking military officer and foremost military adviser to the president, the secretary of defense and the National Security Council.

Having graduated from the Virginia Military Institute in 1990, Caine later flew F-16 jet fighters and has served in Kuwait and Iraq.

He worked as a counterterrorism specialist for the White House's Homeland Security Council under President George W. Bush.

Democrats earlier this year balked at what many saw as Trump's attempts to politicize the military, seeking to gain de facto control over the Department of Defense by installing sympathetic allies to top positions.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has previously blasted what he describes as a "woke" military and had repeatedly called for Brown's dismissal. "The military cannot be organized like a Harvard faculty lounge, catering to ever more obscure constituencies," Hegseth said in an appearance on Fox Nation last year.

Write to Gareth Vipers at gareth.vipers@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 11, 2025 04:53 ET (08:53 GMT)

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