This week, I watched with disbelief as the Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth convened every U.S. general and admiral, along with their senior staffs, at Quantico, Virginia. These are matters fit for lower-level commanders, not the most senior officers in the armed forces. Watching Hegseth and, later, the president, demand fealty from officers with decades more experience than either of them was pathetic and, frankly, frightening. The generals and admirals in that hall held to the tradition of an apolitical military, as their silence attested. Too many have been silent, content to let the president and his secretary of defense warp the military for their own ends.