After a week of handwringing about the purpose of an unprecedented gathering of generals and admirals on Tuesday, the meeting in Quantico, Virginia, ended with standard fare from both President Donald Trump and his self-styled Secretary of War Pete Hegseth.

During the largest single gathering of top military brass in memory — and perhaps ever — Hegseth began with an unhinged address filled with confusing contradictions, wild-eyed cheerleading, and politically charged rhetoric.

Trump followed with a long, rambling address that only sporadically touched on military topics. At one point the president, who has used the troops to quell protests and occupy American cities, warned the assembled military leadership of “a war from within.”

Three different defense officials who spoke with The Intercept called Trump’s speech “embarrassing.” The same defense officials took Hegseth to task for gathering the military’s top commanders from around the world for a rant little different than his social media posts. One called Hegseth’s address “garbage,” using a term the war secretary used during his speech. Another said: “We are diminished as a nation by both Hegseth and Trump.”

“We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military.”

Trump used his address to take aim at cities he claimed “are run by the radical left Democrats,” including San Francisco, Chicago, New York and Los Angeles. “We’re going to straighten them out one by one. And this is going to be a major part for some of the people in this room,” he said. “That’s a war too. It’s a war from within.” He continued, “We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military.”

“We will be a fighting and winning machine,” Trump said during a stream-of-consciousness address that meandered from sleepy word salads to tirades about tariffs, President Barack Obama’s ability to quickly descend stairs, President Joe Biden and the autopen, the press, his own supposed prowess at ending wars, the odds he will win the Nobel Prize, and his hope that the U.S. will get back to building warships of a bygone era.

“I think we should maybe start thinking about battleships by the way,” he said. “I don’t think it’s old technology when you look at those guns. But it’s something we’re actually considering, the concept of battleship, nice six-inch side solid steel, not aluminum.” Trump then expressed his fandom of a television documentary from the 1950s: “I used to watch ‘Victory at Sea.’ I love ‘Victory at Sea.’”

“I call it the N-word. There are two N-words, and you can’t use either of them.”

Trump also repeatedly discussed nuclear weapons during the speech. “I rebuilt our nuclear,”........

© The Intercept