At the beginning of the week, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth visited service members in the U.S. Southern Command area of responsibility and met with sailors aboard the USS Iwo Jima who are involved in defending the United States against the influence of criminal drug traffickers.
"The secretary spoke to service members about their contribution [to] protecting the homeland from narco-terrorists who poison the American people," said Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell during the War Department's Weekly Sitrep video.
Aboard the Iwo Jima, Hegseth told sailors how impressed he is with their work, and how important it is to keeping America safe.
"What you're doing right now, it's not training," Hegseth told the sailors. "This is a real-world exercise, on behalf of the vital national interests of the United States of America, to end the poisoning of the American people."
As part of the trip, Hegseth, along with Air Force Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, visited Air National Guardsmen at Muniz Air National Guard Base, just outside of San Juan, Puerto Rico.
"What you're doing here is critically important to American citizens, to American families [and] to communities that have been ravaged by violence ... ravaged by drugs and ravaged by violent gangs and criminality [due to] a porous Southwest border and drugs pouring into our country," Hegseth told the service members.
President Donald J. Trump signed an executive order Jan. 20 designating cartels and other organizations as foreign terrorist organizations, which authorizes the military to engage any perceived threats from such entities.
"Narco-terrorists will find no safe harbor in international waters or anywhere in our hemisphere," Parnell said. "If you traffic drugs toward our shores, the United States military will use every tool at our disposal to stop you cold."
Yesterday, the War Department commemorated the 24th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, which included an attack on the Pentagon.
"Secretary Hegseth hosted President Trump at an observance ceremony at the Pentagon in honor of every single person killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack on our nation," Parnell said. "We will never forget what happened that day."
During the ceremony, Hegseth recalled what happened at the three attack locations.
"Twenty-four years ago, Islamist terrorists massacred nearly 3,000 innocent American lives in New York City; Shanksville, Pennsylvania; and right here at the Pentagon," Hegseth said. "The building you see behind me — the War Department — was targeted in an act of savage evil. And today, on these hallowed grounds, we gather to honor those victims and heroes with the resolve to never forget."
Between then and now, the U.S. engaged in 20 years of war in both Afghanistan and Iraq, to root out the perpetrators of those attacks. Now that those conflicts are over, Hegseth said, America must ensure future generations know the cost of freedom and why they must be ready to pay for it.
"Our job now is to ensure that future generations inherit a strong and vigilant America," Hegseth said. "We must teach our children that the price of freedom, [which] we love, is eternal vigilance. [We must] instill in them the importance of upholding America's Constitution, holding tight to our freedom and our faith, and relentlessly pursuing our enemies. [We must] prepare them to defend this nation by the ballot, the wallet and when necessary, the cloth of our country."
Finally, this week, Charlie Kirk, recently appointed by Trump to serve on the U.S. Air Force Academy Board of Visitors, was killed in Utah.
"I would ... like to take this moment to honor the great Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated on [Sept. 10] while engaging in the free exchange of ideas on a college campus in Utah," Parnell said. "His work to revive patriotism among young people set off a movement that has secured him a place as a legend in American history."